Advent 2C

December 6, 2009

The Ven. Richard I. Cluett

Charles Dickens began his book, The Tale of Two Cities, with these words:

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way – in short, the period was so far like the present period…

Don’t those words have a ring of familiarity? He must have been reading this morning’s, NY Times. It does sound like a time not too dissimilar from our own time, our now. The lesson from Baruch is addressed to a people who also were living in such a time.

He was writing to people whose parents and grandparents had returned from exile in Babylon. They had come home to build futures for themselves and their people ... to find jobs, to build homes, to build new lives, new farms, new villages, a new Temple, a New Jerusalem.

But it had all turned sour. Some said, “The prophecies of Isaiah had been lies.” They were continually at war. The land was not giving forth her increase. Life was full of pain, unmet expectations, unfulfilled dreams, and hopes not realized. Life was full, but not of the fulfillment they had dreamed, hoped, worked, and prayed for. People were just trying to "hang in, hang on."

They were leaving the Promised Land in droves for the promise of work and security elsewhere. The chosen people were continuing to be dispersed, but now of their own accord, by their own will. The faith, the culture, the people themselves were blending into foreign faiths, foreign cultures, and foreign peoples. All was not right with the world, and the Lord seemed far distant from his people.

Into this setting came the words of Baruch. “Take off the gar­ment of your sorrow and affliction, O Jerusalem ... look toward the east and see your children gathered from the west and east at the word of the Holy One, rejoicing that God has remembered them … For God will lead Israel with joy, in the light of his glory, with the mercy and righteousness that come from him.”

Baruch presented to the Israelites, at home and abroad, the reason for their distress, the source of their redemption, and the certainty of their salvation. The return from exile had been but a foreshadow of the kingdom to come, “although eye cannot see, nor ear hear…”

God remembers and gathers Israel. God's faithfulness guides their return. God's compassion and justice accompany the people into God’s future and their future.

A few hundred years later, people again lived in such a time. A foreign power ruled in their land through vassal kings, princes, and governors. The poor had never been poorer. It seemed as if people were waiting in line to separate the people from their possessions, their land, their security.

And Luke tells us that again God sent a messenger to his people. He came out of the desert, having lived through nights than which there are no colder...land more barren than any... no security other than God. Out of the desert came John, prophet of God, to claim the future for God ... to reclaim God’s people by repentance and forgiveness ... to proclaim that “all flesh shall see the salvation of God.”

Out of the desert experience, salvation will come. In the cold and dark of human experience, God will fashion a new humanity. Through the birth, life, death and resurrection of Jesus, what has been promised BECOMES. The kingdom is begun, a New Jerusalem is being built … and the promise is that all flesh will see it."

My experience tells me that it is in the "winter of our discontent" that our dissatisfaction with our lives opens us up to the possibility of new life. My experience tells me that it is in the "dark night of the soul" that the glimmer of faith within us is rediscovered. My experience tells me that it is when we have gone astray and are lost that we are willing to be found.

It is in Advent that we hear the Good News of the Light that is coming into the world, whom we are blessed, to know is Jesus.

As Advent points to the Good News, so we witness to this world that Jesus is Lord – of this life and the life to come, the future. It is he who restores all things, even the ones in the cold and dark of human experience. It is he who is that salvation of God proclaimed by John and pointed to by Baruch. It is he whom Advent announces, and announces not just to the covenant people, but announces to all people ... even to us ... once again.

Therefore we and all people who turn to God can live in hope and in expectation that the way through the hard things in life will be found, and that in the living and in the searching for that way, we are known, we are loved, we are empowered – and in time,

“All shall be well and all shall be well and all manner of thing shall be well” in the words of Dame Julian of Norwich.

Even in the hard times of life, “God’s glory will be revealed and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.”

And so we come back to the words of the Prophet Baruch,

Take off the garment of your sorrow and affliction, O Jerusalem…

For God has ordered that every high mountain and the everlasting hills be made low

And the valleys filled up, to make level ground,

so that Israel may walk safely in the glory of God…

For God will lead Israel with joy,

in the light of his glory,

with the mercy and righteousness that come from him.

We are the New Jerusalem, we are the new Israel, so listen to Baruch and to John and turn to our God in all seasons of your life, in “the best of times and the worst of times” and in all those everyday times in between, turn to God, made known to us in Jesus the Messiah, and live – live expectantly, live in hope, and receive the salvation and the mercy and the righteousness that come from God.

Christ the King Sunday

The Rev. Canon Mariclair Partee

Yes, that was the correct gospel reading for today! We have not pressed fast-forward and gone directly to Lent, we are instead taking a little bit of a tour of our liturgical seasons as we hear what is ordinarily a Lenten reading on this last Sunday of the season of Pentecost, the Feast of Christ the King, as preparation for Advent. Did you get all that? If you are visiting the Episcopal Church for the first time today, please, do not despair-we do not always speak in code!

Pentecost, longest season, today would have been the 30th Sunday in the season. Gail in the office, who posts my sermons to the blog, will be glad that it is the end of my very clever joke-46th Sunday in Pentecost, 73rd Sunday in Pentecost.

So we have finally come to the end of that longest of seasons, and here we are, the Sunday of Christ the King, the Sunday before Advent begins, with a bit of the Passion story-Jesus being interrogated by Pontius Pilate. What is going on?

I think that we are given this low-point, this very un-kingly moment in Jesus’ life for two reasons. One is to balance the description of kingship we get in the reading from Daniel:

That Prophet says:

As I watched,
thrones were set in place,
and an Ancient One took his throne,
his clothing was white as snow…
his throne was fiery flames,
and its wheels were burning fire.
A stream of fire issued
and flowed out from his presence.
A thousand thousands served him,
and ten thousand times ten thousand stood attending him.”

That is the sort of language we are used to in the describing of kings, that is the sort of majesty and opulence we associate with royalty. Royalty were considered God’s chosen rulers on earth, and so they were worthy of gold and silver and jewels and thousands upon thousands of servants. And so how much more stark is the contrast between this fantastical description and what we hear in the Gospel:

Jesus, God’s true son on Earth, handed over to a local governor and judged like a common criminal, interrogated about his kingship in this common context.

And that, I believe, is the second reason we are reading this particular passage from John today-because Jesus was in fact a king, and he came to turn the notion of kingship on its head. He was a king like no other-his kingdom was in heaven not in his earthly life, and so in this scene with Pilate we see Jesus redefine the very nature of kingship. This is very in line with his teachings during his life-the meek shall inherit the earth, the last shall be first-and the king must meet death to enter his kingdom.

I think that the wise people who designed our lectionary had all of that in mind when they set the readings for this day, and I think they also took this chance to inject a bit of drama into our Sunday. I say this because today is in fact the last day of Pentecost, which means that next Sunday is the first Sunday of Advent, which in another oddity of church time v. secular time is the beginning of our new year. Advent is the season of holy waiting, of prayer, study, fasting all in anticipation of the birth of our Savior at Christmas.

And so I think the readings today were chosen as a sort of bookend of the season to come-we see Jesus at the end of his earthly life as a bit of foreshadowing of what is to come in the life of this child we eagerly await.

In the last line of the Gospel passage Jesus says to Pilate:

"You say that I am a king. For this I was born, and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice."

If this Gospel was a movie we were watching in the theater, there would have been dramatic music-

And the camera would have cut away from the torch lit audience room in the imperial palace, and we suddenly would have found ourselves in dusk in Jerusalem, following a carpenter and his heavily pregnant wife as they walked from inn to inn in the dying light, seeking lodging, though none was to be found.

And our little film would end deep in the night, looking down on a manger as animals placidly chewed and a single lamp flickered, and the cry of a newborn King echoed in the night.
AMEN.

24th Sunday after Pentecost

Proper 28
The Ven Richard I. Cluett

Imagine that you are living in a time of great conflict. The powers of chaos seem to rule. The temporal powers of nations and armies are warring around you. Revolutionary bands are mounting armed resistance to gain power over their own lives and freedom for their people. Chaos reigns. You expect the worst. You expect the end of life as you have known it. You are searching everywhere and anywhere for some way through this time. Some reason to hope.

You find yourself huddled in a cave with others and someone reads to you the words from the Book of Daniel. “The Lord spoke to Daniel in a vision and said, ‘… Michael, the great prince, the protector of your people, shall arise. There shall be a time of anguish, such as has never occurred since nations first came into existence. But at that time your people shall be delivered, everyone who is found written in the book. Many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt. Those who are wise shall shine like the brightness of the sky, and those who lead many to righteousness, like the stars forever and ever.’”

There will come a time when wars and rumors of wars will cease. There will be a time when swords are turned into plowshares and spears into pruning hooks. There will come a time when Anguish will end.There will come a time when God will reign. And you live in hope, even in the worst of times.

A couple of centuries later, Jesus and his disciples stand in the courtyard of the magnificent Temple built by Solomon to the glory of God. But as we heard again last week it had become a place where the name of God was used to enrich a few at the expense of all others. Jesus had said, “They devour the houses of widows.”

And today he proclaims that the day will come when what had been perverted by greed will be laid waste, “Not one stone will be left here upon another, they will all be thrown down.” And that will be the beginning of the birth of the age in which truly God will reign.

And if you go to Jerusalem today and walk your way through the narrow streets of the Old City, you will eventually come to the site where the Temple stood. And you see that it has been thrown down, stone by stone, until all that is left is the wall of the foundation. Even if you have not seen it, you have heard of it. It is called The Wailing Wall.

As you stand looking down at it, you see devout people laying their pain, their worries and anxieties, laying their fears, placing the burdens of their hearts before God at the foot of the wall. Some literally placing them on little scraps of paper into the crevices between the remaining stones.

Leading up to that terrible time, in Mark’s Gospel we hear Jesus say that there will be many who would lead the people, including his disciples, astray. They would offer all kinds of false hopes. Perhaps claiming military engagement, or even promising eventual and complete victory. Some will try to speak with the voice of Jesus and get them to go “My way, this way, not that way. Go this way. Live according to my rules.”

And if you think this only happens in the rare cults we read about or see on television, I want to tell you that it has happened even in parishes and dioceses of the Episcopal Church in the late 20th and early 21st centuries in the Christian Era. For the past year my work has been care for those who have been so led astray, used, abused, and finally left behind.

It was not only in the time of Daniel, nor only in the time of Jess, or solely in the time of the evangelist Mark, or the author of the Letter to the Hebrews that these things occurred.

The issue was then in those dangerous times and is now, where and how do we hear the voice of Jesus? Whose voice do we listen to? Which call do we follow? How do we follow in his way? Where do we seek our salvation? Do we have any reason at all to hope?

Did you ever wonder why the Bible has all those stories, the kind that inspired the Left Behind Series? All the apocalyptic stories of the fall of the Temple and Armageddon? All the prophecies in both the Hebrew and Christian scriptures of doom and gloom?

This apocalyptic literature was written and has been preserved because they point to the worst circumstances of life. The authors weren’t prognosticating the future, no fortune telling, pointing to cataclysmic events that would be happening in the far and distant future. No reading of Tea leaves. They were reading the signs of their times. They were writing from the context of their lives. The stories were created out of their experience.

Have you known Anguish or Agony? Have you ever been truly afraid? Have you ever been terrorized by demons, or powers, or forces which you could not control? Have you ever been lost and not known which way to turn, or not known who, what or how to follow to get to safety? Have you suffered a great loss and been left feeling bereft, totally alone?

That’s what these stories are about. They are talking about the all too familiar perils and pitfalls of life, real life, all human life, our lives. Their subject is “When bad things happen to good people?”

They are a call, a reminder, a warning to stay close to the one who is the source of strength, the one whose way is true, the one with whose image we have been created, and redeemed and saved, and who is always present in every circumstance of life, and even we believe, present beyond this life, beyond the grave, the one in whom we can trust and in whom we will ultimately rest from all our labors, all our strivings, all our fears, all our wanderings, all our pain – and find perfect peace.

If you want to be reminded from time to time who that is, who has come in Jesus of Nazareth to announce and bring into being this new age, pull out your prayer book or your bible and slowly, quietly read Psalm 139 and receive the gift that is contained there for you. Listen.

I know you through and through - I know everything about you. The very hairs of your head I have numbered. Nothing in your life is unimportant to me, I have followed you through the years, and I have always loved you - even in your wanderings. I know every one of your problems. I know your need and your worries. And yes, I know all your sins. But I tell you again that I love you - not for what you have or haven't done - I love you for you. ~ With thanks to Mother Theresa.

There is a wonderful hymn that sings these truths:
Look around you, can you see?
Times are troubled, people grieve.
See the violence, feel the hardness,
all my people – weep with me.

Walk among them. I’ll go with you.
Reach out to them with my hands.
Suffer with me and together
we will serve them, help them stand.

Forgive us father; hear our prayer.
we would walk with you anywhere,
through your suffering – with forgiveness,
take your life into the world.

Kyrie eleison, Christe eleison, Kyrie eleison.
Lord have mercy, Christ have mercy, Lord have mercy.

The Good News in the Gospel of Jesus Christ is “God reigns – the Alpha and the Omega, which is and which was and which is to come, the Almighty." No matter what, God reigns.

All Saints' Day

The Very Rev. Anthony R. Pompa

I cannot help on days like this in our tradition, it is on All Saints Sunday, I cannot help but reflect on all of the Saints, the living and the dead. And, my reflection this week led me to remember and reflect upon those members of the Quilt Group here at the Cathedral, a ministry for many years shared by women of this church. Their quilt room was a sanctuary unto itself. Do not enter unless you bring with you the spirit and the gift and the talent and an occasional urge to smoke a cigarette. These were women some of you may remember, and if you’re newer to the Cathedral or visiting this day, these were women who were committed to being together each week for hours, sharing things in common, sharing this place in common, sharing their faith in God in common, sharing their lives in common, and sharing their passion for bringing together their abilities, their gifts, and their talents. Each year, indeed, they did bring together a beautiful patchwork of patterns that would be gifted to the Cathedral through the emergence of a beautiful quilt.

I remember early as a curate hoping and praying that some year one of those quilts would be for me. They were not.

I remember this group because one year, maybe because I was young and didn’t know any better or because God was bracing me, I agreed to drive them in the old church van to Lancaster to the quilt show. There, on that trip, I realized what it was all about. They loved each other, these women. They loved each other. They loved being together. They loved sharing their life stories together. They loved sharing their gifts and talents together. They just, plain and simply, loved each other. This, indeed, was a coming together of beautiful patterns. Beautiful patterns of their lives and their faith and the gifts that they had to offer one another.

This group, some are living now in the saints in heaven, and there are a few of you sitting out there, but on such days as All Saints, it is through relationships like this that we get a glimpse into what it is to be knit together as the Collect for this day speaks to us. That God has knit us together in one communion and fellowship in the mystical body of Christ. This tradition of ours claims that we are knit together, both the living and the dead. That pattern of lives lived in history by those who have been created and gifted and sent, and those who are now living created and gifted and sent are, indeed, woven together in a fabric that emerges in Christ as a beautiful pattern.

This is such unique theological and existential worldview and is a gift to you and me. But the saints of God, the living and the dead, are patched together in a relationship that is alive, that is intimate, and is dynamic. Fred Beuchner reminds us that the power of this patchwork comes in the belief that in that communion even that death has sure enough put an end to some in this patchwork that death, sure enough, has not ended the relationships that we share with them. He says or however else those who have loved and died may now have come to life since. It is beyond a doubt that they still live in us. Memory is more than a looking back to a time that is no longer. It is a looking out into another kind of time altogether, where everything that ever was continues not just to be, but to grow and change with the life that is in it still. The people we loved; the people who loved us, the people who, for good or ill, taught us things, dead and gone they may be. But as we come to understand them in new ways, it is as though they come to understand us, and through them, we come to understand ourselves in new ways, too.

On this All Saints’ Day, you may bring with you to this communion, that is to you and me with one another, you may bring with you those to whom you are connected and in relationship with, those who you love and those who love and love you, who indeed are living with the saints of God in heaven. And you may, indeed, I pray, come to understand that this is an intimate patchwork that makes you, you, and makes us a community of faith. It makes us who we are.

I confess to you that I love movies. You probably knew that. I also confess that I’m really trying hard to stay away from any baseball analogies today. But you may remember the two versions of The Night at the Museum movies. Anybody see any of those? Don’t be afraid. The two movies that live in me are The Night at the Museum 1 and 2 and also Where the Wild Things Are, but I haven’t seen the movie. I’m more about the book. I think you know The Night at the Museum is a story that takes place at the Natural History Museum in New York, and the second one takes place there and at the Smithsonian in Washington. This fictitious story is about the magic that happens in those places at night and of which the night watchman is privileged to partake when the doors are shut, the sun goes down, the people leave, and all of those people of history living in those places come to life. It’s fantastic! And the adventures they have as those people come to life and sort out their places and conditions continuously is a wonderful thing.

I confess when the doors are shut and the lights are out and I just need a place to be that I occasionally walk over into the sanctuary and sit in the dark. And I begin to imagine what it would be if we could have a Night at the Cathedral. Maybe we will. I imagine the memorials that are on these walls, or the stitch work that exists in the cushions or in the kneelers, or the fingerprints of DNA that have been left over the centuries on all of the wonderful things that we see and touch and experience here. I wonder if all of those who came through that door, and that door, and who were baptized in that font, might come to life. I literally imagine what it might be to experience a party, a communion with the Sayres and the Packers and the Butlers and the Jeters and the Lindermans and the Potters and the Whiteheads, and there are a few for whom I have some really interesting questions, but I’ll keep them out of this right now. All of those names, all of those people throughout the years who came to this place to meet Jesus, they came to this place to be knit together in a communion. How wonderful it would be, in fact, on All Saints’ Day – how wonderful it is.

Not only do we remember in such a gathering as this, but we recognize that the relationships continue to inform and strengthen us. The pattern, the patchwork, continues to be made new. On this day, we will be delighted because there are more threads being woven into the patchwork as we once again go to that font, as have thousands literally. We celebrate a new beginning as we welcome the newly baptized, and as we insert them into the patchwork that is you and I. And now, Where the Wild Things Are...you see, I believe with all my heart, I believe that we are, indeed, knit together in a communion of saints, the living and the dead. On this day together we gather for that great banquet, and we gather together celebrating that which is the divine. That which is, ties us together and that is the craftsperson, the creator; the one who made us, who celebrates with us as we pour water. And, as we eat bread and wine and we share our faith and our lives, and I hear, as that story in Where the Wild Things Are, I hear the great call to our journey. Let the rumpus begin. Amen.

Pentecost 21

The Rev. Canon Mariclair Partee

I love a good story. Being an Episcopalian and a past English major, I really love a good story that involves God and history and drama and intrigue and pageantry and England.

So I was in luck a few weeks ago when this year’s Booker Prize winner was announced, and it was Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel. The Booker Prize is an annual prize for fiction awarded to a novel written by a citizen of the United Kingdom, or of a former colony, and has introduced me to a few of my favorite authors, including Salman Rushdie, A.S. Byatt, and Aravind Adiga. My copy of this year’s Booker arrived in its Amazon box about a week and a half ago. On Monday I finally let myself open it and I haven’t put it down since.

Wolf Hall is the story of Thomas Cromwell and traces the trajectory of his life from his origins as the son of an alcoholic blacksmith to a trusted confidante of Cardinal Wolsey, Roman Catholic prelate and Lord Chancellor of England during the reign of Henry VIII, and eventually to advisor to King Henry VIII himself when that king decides he would like to divorce his first wife, Katherine, and marry Lady Anne Boleyn, though the book ends shortly before that second marriage. Cromwell ultimately is one of the architects of what would become the Church of England, which would, of course, give rise to our Episcopal Church. So each night this week I have fallen asleep reading this book, with my head full of palace intrigue and papal edicts and rich descriptions of this time in our church’s history.

And all of that is why, around the middle of this week, I almost drove into a ditch when I heard on the radio that Pope Benedict had announced he would authorize a mechanism by which disaffected Episcopal clergy could “return to the Roman Catholic church”, maintaining their Anglican customs. Suddenly my night-time reading and my daily existence collided, and I had to remind myself that I was in fact living 500 years after medieval times. Because I am a modern priest, as soon as I got home I immediately set about emailing and reading blogs and updating facebook statuses, all to figure out what in the world was going on, why our church was suddenly enmeshed in a conversation that I thought had had its end in 1552.

Luckily, the gospel today has a good story in it, if you will allow me a little poetic license --

There was a man named Timaeus. He was a craftsman, he worked with his hands, and he lived in a small village near Jericho. His wife came to him one day and told him he would be a father, and Timaeus looked on with joy over the months as her belly grew, and finally, she gave birth to a son. In this son, named Bartimaeus, literally the son – bar, of Timaeus – Timaeus saw immortality for his family line, for his craft, and he was full of love for the Lord who had blessed him so. A few years went by, maybe ten, and Bartimaeus became his father’s apprentice in the workroom, began learning the skills that would allow him to support his own family one day. But then, one day, he felt weak. He took to his bed as a sickness swept through the village, and Timaeus sat at his son’s bedside for three days, praying as his son struggled against fever. Finally, on the morning of the third day, the fever broke and Timaeus rejoiced once again to the Lord for delivering his son through this peril. However, Bartimaeus’ mother noticed later that day that something wasn’t quite right, that the boy had survived his illness, but had not emerged unblemished. Bartimaeus was blind, and with his sight died the hopes of his father, his family. Bartimaeus continued to grow, no longer able to practice a craft, and eventually he wound up on the side of a road, sitting in the dirt of the gutter, able only to beg for his continued survival.

And this is where we find him, this day, sitting in the dusty roadside, calling out to travelers for a coin or two to spend on food. Someone calls to him, “Jesus, the healer of Nazareth is coming with his followers.” As he hears the group grow closer on the road, Bartimaeus calls out – “Son of David, have mercy on me!”

The disciples hear him and immediately hush him out of fear. Their master has been acting strangely lately. Three times he has foretold his own arrest in Jerusalem, has told of punishment, death, saying that he will rise again. The disciples do not understand what their teacher is saying. His stories often leave them confused and distressed, but they are on edge and on the look out for danger. They tell Bartimaeus to close his mouth, to leave them in peace. They know that the name he is using for Jesus – Son of God – is grounds for treason, as it implies that the messiah has come to earth, to free the Israelites from their Roman governors.

Bartimaeus ignores them, calls out again, “Son of David, have mercy on me!” And Jesus stops, there in the road, and he says to his disciples, “Call him here.” Bartimaeus leaps up from the ground and runs to Jesus’ side as Jesus asks, warily, wearily – “What do you want me to do for you?” Jesus has posed this same question to James and John, only to be disappointed when they ask for worldly power, for the seats at his right and left hand in glory, proving that despite all of his preparations, they still just don’t get it, what he has been set on this earth to do, what awaits him in the last days of his ministry.

Bartimaeus asks, “My teacher, let me see again.”

Bartimaeus asks only for his sight, to be put whole once more, so that he no longer be a beggar -- he doesn’t ask for riches or power or fame -- but only to be returned to sight so that he may better follow Jesus, his teacher, his Lord, the Son of God.

Jesus answers him not with “You are healed” or “I give you your sight,” but he says, “Go. Your faith has made you well.” And Bartimaeus’ sight is restored in that instant, and the newly sighted man, we are told, falls into step behind his teacher, his Messiah, and follows him to certain death in Jerusalem.

May we all have such faith in our Lord, in this new time of papal intrigue and talk of schism, that we might only ask to be made whole, so that we may better follow him.

Proper 21 -- Psalm 19:7-14

The Very Rev. Anthony R. Pompa

The Philosopher Nietzsche said, “You have your way. I have my way. As for the right way, the correct way, and the only way, it does not exist.”

In a previous life in my vocation, having left the Diocese of Bethlehem as a missionary to the Diocese of Virginia, serving on the Bishop’s staff there, I was the Bishop’s assistant for Congregational and Ministry Development. It was my job to assist congregations with the tools that they felt they needed to better their mission. Traveling around that diocese and particularly spending a great deal of time in smaller congregations, there was a consistent question. And, the question was – “Show us the way to do it. Show us the way to grow our church. Show us the way to balance our budget. Show us the way to do evangelism. Show us the way to have a dynamic Sunday school. Show us the way to do group ministry. Tell us how to do it. Reveal to us the way.”

I spent much of my time in conversations like that and, because I was fortunate to be in a diocese that had some resources, I was fortunate to gather experts in their fields from all around the church, bringing them into the diocese to do workshops. Some of those experts came touting the way. They had the way. Some of the more humble came sharing some things that they have experienced along the way. What I realized and came to know, and knew intuitively, of course, from the beginning is there isn’t one way. There isn’t one thing that might work in one place that will work in another place.

I found myself ending all of my conversations with those I was with inviting them into a “yes and” world. It’s a “yes and” world I would say. It’s not an “either or” world. In other words, there’s more than one right answer. There’s more than one possibility.

I’m about to venture into a world that I shouldn’t venture into. But, quantum physics has something to teach us a bit about the fundamental nature of the world. How it’s ordered. How it operates. I promise I’ll be here briefly, particularly to those of you who know anything about physics. I apologize. What my neophyte understanding of quantum physics teaches us about the fundamental nature of energy is that energy is small and discreet in its units and that the elementary particles of that energy behaves like particles and like waves.

Where’s Tom Stone when I need him? The movement of these particles in quantum theory is inherently random. That is to say that as energy moves about us and in us and about the world we know that it operates randomly, but in relationship with one another. We don’t always know nor can we predict how energy will move, but quantum theory does teach us that in the end, energy is in relationship. In other words, it’s a “yes and” world. Energy does behave this way and that way. How am I doing, Tom? Just shake your head, please. Thank you.

This, of course, is in dialogue with plutonium physics, which is a cause and effect physics. This is the cause of that. It’s a “yes and” world. Quantum physics teaches us, not an “either or” world. And here comes the big leap.

There is a theme in the scriptures today. And it seems like our primary player in both the Old Testament and the Gospel lesson today seem to be stuck in a world view that is “either or,” as opposed to “yes and.”

For Moses, he is surrounded by the disgruntled. He is surrounded by those who have followed a vision that he has proclaimed on behalf of the God who anointed and called him, that is that their lives should be lived free. Following that dream, they find themselves out in the wilderness, pangs of hunger coming upon them, and growing quite bored with the menu of the day...manna.

The “either or” of the world in which they seem to be stuck is either we stay here in the wilderness and eat this boring manna every day and have our stomachs cringing with hunger, or we return to slavery in Egypt where we at least tasted some meat and some sweet melon. There is a profound limitation with this worldview for those in the wilderness. They cannot and do not see the options. And, they cannot and do not see the limitless nature of the God who has called them to freedom.

Even Moses himself seems limited in his worldview, and I myself am horribly sympathetic to Moses in this particular passage. Moses himself, never sure really of his call, questioning his call all the way along, now finds himself in the wilderness surrounded by a bunch of complainers. Surely, God, this isn’t the way you planned it he says.

He is stuck in this moment in an “either or” worldview. Either God you have brought us out here and promised us something new or I can’t possibly stand one more day with this clamoring. His very own worldview seems limited and small. Even having experienced the broadness of God. Both Moses and his people seem to be stuck in that “either or” worldview and God, it seems, once again is called upon to offer the “yes and.” “Yes, people of Israel, I have liberated you and you will not die and you will grow into a new nation and you will live and once again you will taste meat and sweet melon.” And, by the way, look up at the stars and be reminded. “Moses,” he says, “yes, you will continue to lead.” And here’s the punch line Moses, “you cannot do that alone.” “And, there will be one, no two, no three, no four, no five, no seventy...seventy elders who will gather around you and will help you do that and, by the way, there’s these other two who will also anoint in order to aid you. “Yes, Moses and.”

Our good friends the disciples in today’s gospel also seem to be rooted strongly in that “either or” worldview. They come across a man who, believe it or not, is casting out demons, quickly recognizing that he is not a follower of Jesus; he’s not in their group. They quickly do what they think they should do and that is to stop him. No evil spirits cast out today...sorry, say the disciples.

It seems they cannot fathom that God’s kingdom might be spread outside of their domain. It seems that Jesus’ response to them reminds them of the yes and the and. Jesus reminds them that if one casts out in his name that he cannot continue his life without understanding that he is acting on behalf of the principals of the kingdom of God. And then, of course, Jesus goes on with all of that other stuff. You know, the pluck out your eye stuff, the cut off your hand stuff. You see here’s what I think about that. I think Jesus is hacked. I think he is hacked off. I think as is the theme in Mark’s gospel the disciples once again aren’t getting it. They stopped someone from doing a kingdom thing. And, therefore, they’re not getting it again. And Jesus reminds them though he grabs their attention and reminds them of the most prolific imagery he can find and reminds them that God’s a yes and the Kingdom of God is expansive and that the very last and very least they cannot be a stumbling block to that. Get out of the way when it’s important and part of the plan. And if that means plucking out your eye or cutting off your hand then do it. He doesn’t mean literally. There is it seems a yes and way to the Kingdom of God being spread. So the question for you today is the question I live with this week and that is...is it either or...or is it yes and? Is your rule to the way you approach life the way you see the challenges and opportunities of life one that is either or? Or yes and?

When we’re trapped in an either or worldview and I sometimes, indeed, am trapped in that either or worldview, we come to a place where we are closed off. We are incapable of being expansive and creative. We lack the perception to see the options that are around us. And we may even miss one more opportunity to grow. Now we know why we get there, you and me. We get there because we’re tired. We get there because as psychologists now call it the cumulative stress in our lives is high. Cumulative stress is now the psychology for burnout. We get to that place because we’re stressed. We get to that place because our relationships are taxed. If I have to find one more part of my heart that allows me to forgive my father one more time I’m just going to spit. If my father has to come to one more place in his life where he has to find one more part of his heart to forgive me in our relationship he’s just going to spit. That’s on the cumulatively stressed high part of that relationship. We know that we live in difficult financial times, and if we ourselves are not financially taxed, many who we love and know are. That, of course, puts us sometimes in places that we believe is either or. And, sometimes we’re in those places where we are not appropriately seeking the stimulation that we need...that stimulation in our mind and our body and our spirit. Perhaps we have forgotten what brings us joy in what we read. Or, depth to our experience in our work place by what we discover. Perhaps we’ve forgotten how important that mile walk we take every morning is. Or perhaps we’ve lost the way to the gym all together. And perhaps we’re taxed in our spiritual lives. Perhaps we’ve come to that place where we’ve forgotten how to pray. Or, where we’ve forgotten whom it is and where those places those touchstone places are in our lives that bring a step to our spirit. And, as in the disciples’ case sometimes we get there because of our arrogance or of our own control needs.

I invite you to consider the yes and worldview for you and I in our vocations. Can we lead and discover, and love and be compassionate? In our relationships, can we really live in a way that we give more of ourselves only to discover that and we will find more about ourselves?

In our finances, can we really spend less and give more? In our spiritual lives can we really let go and discover a safe place to be? We’ve been having Stewardship desserts. If you’ve not been able to get to the one you’ve been invited to or if you have no idea what I’m talking about call the office.

Recently, as recently as last night in our small group, having dessert and enjoying it, we talked about together the power of the yes. What it is just to say “yes”. Yes. Say “yes and” to the way we approach our every day work. Say “yes and” to the way we approach our relationships. Say “yes and” to the way we approach our spiritual lives. And say “yes and” to the way God may be working through us as individuals and as a community of faith. Amen.

Pentecost 16 - Proper 20

The Rev. Canon Mariclair Partee

This has been a hard week to be a Christian! Throughout our nation this week we have seen some startling behavior. A number of individuals that we hold up as icons, even role models in fields ranging from sports to entertainment to politics, have engaged in behavior we can only describe as rude, boorish, even angry outbursts and disgraceful, childish reactions, leading an associate from my old law firm to email me, asking if I was interested in starting a consulting business with her – we could market ourselves as behavioral consultants for celebrities and public figures, she said, with the motto, “We will teach you how not to show your behind in public.”

But this rash of bad behavior, crossing all lines – gender, race, creed, sportsmanship, professionalism – and the national reaction and discussion of the value of civility, have been yet another reminder to people of faith that we are truly pilgrims, singing the Lord’s song in a foreign land.

We have also seen behavior this week that was more brutish, more deeply troubling, though I’m not sure we have connected the two in our national debate – a young woman, brutally murdered, her body stuffed into a wall, with the only apparent explanation being anger boiling over into rage, unchecked emotion giving rise to unspeakable violence. Truly, we Christians are strangers in this land, where a fellow human being can be killed so thoughtlessly, and disposed of so easily, as if she were garbage to be tossed in a dumpster.

These have been sad days, disappointing days, but what we have seen, unfortunately, is nothing new in our history as humans. James describes it in the passage from the Epistle today: “Those conflicts and disputes among you, where do they come from? Do they not come from your cravings that are at war within you? You want something and do not have it; so you commit murder. And you covet something and cannot obtain it; so you engage in disputes and conflicts. You do not have, because you do not ask. You ask and do not receive, because you ask wrongly, in order to spend what you get on your pleasures.”

And what was the offered solution, in the time of James?

“Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you…[for] Who is wise and understanding among you? Show by your good life that your works are done with gentleness born of wisdom…
For where there is envy and selfish ambition, there will also be disorder and wickedness of every kind. But the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits, without a trace of partiality or hypocrisy.”

That’s the solution: Gentleness, born of wisdom.

James speaks of ambition, calling it wicked and evil. This isn’t a value that we hold today; ambition is something that is admired and praised, and rightly so. And ambition is not a bad thing, but ambition without regard to others is unspiritual, devilish, and ambition at all cost is truly evil.

In Judaism, there is a concept called, in Hebrew, tikkun olum, which roughly translates to “repairing the world through personal action.” Jews are taught to strive towards tikkun olum in every action, every interaction, so that in making every exchange with another person holy, the division between God and the world will be worn away.

Psychologists have a similar concept, and it is called Transformational Change. The theory is that all anger, all aggression, finds its genesis in fear. When we find ourselves in an interaction that makes us afraid – whether it is fear for our physical body, fear of loneliness, fear of not being as important as we’d like to be, fear of not getting the respect that we need – that fear quickly resolves itself in anger, and aggression, and we lash out at whatever, whomever, is making us afraid.

In Transformational Change, the idea is that when we find ourselves in a situation where we are feeling fear, we hold onto it, we sit with it and let it resonate in ourselves until we figure out what is causing it, and then we decide how to respond appropriately, and make the conscious choice not to simply project our fear into the world as anger.

And so, as we enter out from this place today, as Christian pilgrims into a chaotic and sometimes harsh world, may we all have the courage to be the change we wish to see, may we repair the world in all of our actions, and may we be guided by gentleness, born of wisdom, all to the glory of God.

AMEN.

Proverbs 22:1-2, 6-8, 22-23

Proper 18
The Very Rev. Anthony R. Pompa

The evolution of a national observance of Labor Day grew out of the labor movement in North America in the midst of the Industrial Revolution of the 1880’s and 1890’s. In the continued struggle for expanding industry in a difficult economy, the seeking of jobs and fair wages, and the hope of building a strong sustaining economy, came observances of both recognizing officially the goodness of labor, AND at the same time as unions were beginning to form, finding a just workplace for the common laborer in a time when management clearly had most of the power in such relationships. President Grover Cleveland’s administration took the lead in establishing a national observance of labor in the aftermath of the deaths of workers at the hands of police and federal marshals during the infamous Pullman strike in 1893. The workers of the Pullman Palace Company had experienced significant wage cuts in a difficult economy. In addition, many working for the company lived in company-owned housing. Despite wage cuts, there was no relief in rent for housing. The railroad union across the country joined in a strike, and management appealed to the federal government for intervention. Attorney General Richard Olney invoked an injunction to end the strike, citing that the strike was illegal, as the disruption in train service impeded fair trade and secondly, the strike interfered with the delivery of mail. The Sherman Anti-Trust Act created in 1890 was aimed at breaking up monopolies. In this case, it was being used to break up a strike. Workers, of course, rebelled, the government sent in agents, and there was violence and death.

President Wilson, in the aftermath of such difficulty, was intentional in striking a reconciliatory spirit and, working closely with congress, rushed legislation through marking a day of observance and thanksgiving for labor. Since that time in 1894, there has been a national observance of labor.

A history such as this calls us to reflect on our work, our individual place and understanding of who we are as we offer ourselves to the world through our work and, of course, the ever present, always important role of justice in all we do and all we are as individuals and as a society. Wisdom, it seems, would go a long way in the historical context of those struggling in difficult times to discover a common goal and place for labor and industry, particularly in the case of the Pullman strike and its aftermath that leads us to a national day of observance of labor. Common sense, it seems, may lead us to a place of understanding who we are in our labor and how we offer ourselves to the common good.

The Book of Proverbs perhaps offers us some good old-fashioned common sense as we reflect on who we are and how we are connected to the common good.

A good name is to be chosen rather than great riches,
and favor is better than silver or gold.
The rich and the poor have this in common:
the Lord is the maker of them all.
Whoever sows injustice will reap calamity,
and the rod of anger will fail.
Those who are generous are blessed,
for they share their bread with the poor.
Do not rob the poor because they are poor,
or crush the afflicted at the gate;
for the Lord pleads their cause
and despoils of life those who despoil them.

The Book of Proverbs is considered by scholars to be wisdom literature. This book is a compilation of “wisdom” collected from centuries of sayings and writings, and offered to Jews in post-exilic Jewish history. This literature consists of two characteristics. First, contemplative and speculative writings aimed at the revelation of God’s spirit for the goodness of living life. Second, short and even pithy sayings that emphasize a moral guide of life, often appealing to lessons of experience rather than revelation.

Our scripture today comes from sayings passed down through generations in the history of Israel. It belongs to the second description of wisdom literature. Today we read straight up common sense sayings designed to be a moral guide to those striving to live a faithful life for the good of themselves and for the common good.

First, to strive for a faithful life, strive not after gold and silver, but be more cognizant about who you are and who you will be remembered to be. Generations will remember you for who you were and what you gave to the common good, rather than by what you accumulated in life. Rooted in this teaching is the rather obvious statement, we are all created by God, rich and poor. Humanity links us together, making us accountable to one another. A common sense teaching, one even found in the earliest of foundational truths of our society, but clearly as history has taught us, it is a difficult one to live faithfully.

Second, live just lives. That is, be fair. Work for your share and be mindful not to take your share at the expense of others; simple, but difficult. Clearly it is not unique in the 21st century that fortunes are, at times, built on the backs of those less fortunate. This seems to be true in ancient times as well. It is also not unique to ancient times that linked humanity also had the capacity for great generosity to the poor and downtrodden, something I see also in many of you, and it gives me great hope.

Finally, all our proverbs for this day seem to remind us that we are always folks connected to the needs of others. Simple again, I say, in principle, but our greatest challenge to live in reality as well.

This Labor Day calls us to reflect upon who we are as a faithful people. It calls us to consider to what end our labors exist. It calls us to reflect upon the fair and industrious practices with ourselves and individuals, and the fair and industrious practices that exist or need to be established within our own society. Even as many in our society struggle with unemployment and finding re-employment, we take with us the wisdom of the scriptures that reminds us that we are defined by who we are and what we offer to the common good, not by our jobs themselves, but rather by the God who links us together by our humanity. Even as we observe again this national observance of labor, we reflect on our opportunity to live lives for the common good.

I leave you with this prayer from the Book of Common Prayer (BCP 261).

The Lord be with you:

Almighty God, you have so linked our lives one with another that all we do affects, for good or ill, all other lives: So guide us in the work we do, that we may do it not for self alone, but for the common good; and, as we seek a proper return for our own labor, make us mindful of the rightful aspirations of other workers, and arouse our concern for those who are out of work; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

Pentecost 13

The Rev. Canon Mariclair Partee

God loves us. Each and every one of us.

The readings today tell us this in a multitude of ways.

In James we are told that we are “a kind of first fruits of God’s creatures.”

“First fruits” was a term of art in ancient times – the first fruits were the finest, most perfect specimens of the harvest. The first born lambs, free of blemish, the first vegetables and fruits of the trees and vines, the first, most pure pressing of the olive oil – all of these were the first fruits that were presented at the temple as a sacrifice to God – the finest of creation for the creator of them all. And we people, says the author of James, are the first fruits, we are the most perfect of creation, presented back to God for his appreciation.

God created not only us in his image, but he created this world full of beautiful, wondrous things as our home, as our place to delight and be glad, and really, we shouldn’t need any more proof of God’s love for us than this world!

But, God also gave us free will and the ability to think for ourselves, and as soon as we were created, we started to out distance between ourselves and God, and in that space, evil grew.

We began to honor God with our lips, but not our hearts. We began to worship in vain, teaching human precepts as doctrine, and separate ourselves from God’s love through theft, murder, adultery, avarice, through wickedness, deceit, licentiousness, envy, and slander, through the folly of pride.

We began to set up barriers between ourselves and our fellows, arguing over who was closer to God, who was more beloved, while insuring in our very arguments and judgments that we were each, in fact, farther out of reach of God’s healing embrace, and eventually we mastered that state of evil, of pride, of folly that we were warned against when ignored the command to be “quick to listen, slow to speak, slow to anger…to rid ourselves of all sordidness and rank growth of wickedness, and instead to be doers of the word, not merely hearers who deceive themselves…”

And yet, while we still continue with our striving and our judging, our slander, our pride our evil – all the while, God watches over us, and God calls to us still, like a lover, “Arise, my love, my fair one, and come away; for now the winter is past, the rain is over and gone. The flowers appear on the earth; the time of singing has come…Arise, my love, my fair one, and come away.”

The11th Sunday after Pentecost

11th Sunday after Pentecost

August 16, 2009

The Ven. Richard I Cluett

Those of you who have been in church the last two Sundays will easily recognize today’s Gospel reading. It is almost exactly the same one from each of the past two Sundays. Each week expands it a little, but they all have to do with Jesus as the Bread of Life.

I haven’t been able to be here the last two Sundays, but I have read the sermons from the last two Sundays and both the dean and the canon have wonderfully unpacked this passage as they, to quote our dean, “Mixed, kneaded, shaped, baked, broken and shared…” the Bread of Life which is to be known and found in Jesus the Christ.

And we have it again today. I am wondering if you have had your fill of bread readings from the Gospel of John. You’d think the church would spread them out a bit over the year rather than have them Sunday after Sunday after Sunday, bread and more bread and more bread. We get it, right? Enough with the bread!

Well, gospel truth to tell, there may be a good reason why we have this passage three Sundays in a row. I want to see if we can find it. It’s probably important.

There is an old proverb about preaching a sermon that is learned on day one in seminary. It goes like this: “Tell them what you are going to tell them. Tell them. Then tell them what you told them.” The point being, it takes a lot to get through the busyness that occupies the human attention and mind before you can get to the human heart.

Reflect for a minute on all the things that occupied your mind, heart, and attention as you came through the doors of the cathedral this morning. If you are like me it is a cacophony of competing wants, needs, demands, priorities, voices, details of life. And that’s not just this morning. That’s life, as Frank Sinatra would sing. That’s how most of us go through life. That’s how most of us live life.

There is so much that calls us, grabs at us, yells at us demanding our attention… So much, that it is possible to lose one’s sense of self, to lose one’s orientation, to get lost in all of it.

Robert Kysar suggests that what Jesus was getting at, and the reason why we have this passage – again, is that Jesus is saying that we need literally to take Jesus into ourselves, to make him part of our essence, part of our very being, to have him at the very core of our lives, the center point from which all our life flows.

Back in the 1950’s there was a TV quiz show with Groucho Marx. It was called “You Bet Your Life”. Contestants were asked questions such as, “Who’s buried in Grant’s Tomb?” The point of the show was to have fun. It never approached a serious question about betting one’s life.

But the Gospel of Jesus Christ does. “On what do you bet your life?”

In my work around the church, I often start with asking questions that help me and those I am working with get in touch with those principles upon which they base their communal life. We call them Core Values. Core Values aren’t chosen, they aren’t decided upon intellectually, they just are. And they are non-negotiable. They are what define us. They guide everything else. All else flows from them – concerns, priorities, plans, strategies, tactics, and actions. And when a plan does not work out, we still know who we are at our very core. Everything comes from that center.

Let’s look at the scripture from 1Kings. Solomon has just ascended to the throne of his father David, that beloved king of Israel. It is a succession marked by court intrigue and competition between rival factions.

After all the intrigue and struggle, now Solomon is king, and he goes to Gibeon to offer sacrifices to the Lord. The Lord appears to him in a dream there and says, "Ask what I should give you." It is a remarkable offer for this young king; "Ask what you will," says God. One can imagine what he might request: long life, riches, power, and victory in battle.

Solomon asks for none of that. Instead, he praises God for God's faithfulness to his father David, and he describes his own situation. He is a young man. He has to govern a very numerous people; and not just any people, but a nation of God's own choosing.

He has a lot on his plate, his mind and his heart. He has bet his life on the Lord. And everything else flows from that. Therefore, he asks of God a "listening heart" or in our translation this morning, an “understanding mind" in order to judge God's people, and "to discern between good and evil."

A listening heart, an understanding mind, the ability to discern what is right and good — qualities essential to good governance, qualities we should pray to find in all our leaders. Actually these are qualities we would hope and pray for our children and ourselves – qualities that would give them – and us – a way to walk through this life with purpose, with integrity, with confidence and security that we are on the right path.

The bread that is being offered by Jesus Christ these weeks is himself. He offers to be so intimately part of who we are, that we can bet our life on him – at the very center of our life, at the very core of our being, the guiding light that shines on our path in good season and bad. The center from which all else flows… plans, strategies, tactics, actions, responses to all those voices that call us, those seductive songs that would lead us in their way, rather than ours.

The Poet Mary Oliver has a poem, “The Journey”, that speaks of these things.

One day you finally knew

What you had to do, and began,

Though the voices around you

Kept shouting

Their bad advice—

Though the whole house

Began to tremble

And you felt the old tug

At your ankles.

“Mend my life!”

each voice cried.

But you didn’t stop.

You knew what you had to do,

Though the wind pried

With its stiff fingers

At the very foundations,

Though their melancholy

Was terrible.

It was already late

Enough, and a wild night,

And the road full of fallen

Branches and stones.

But little by little,

As you left their voices behind,

The stars began to burn

Through the sheets of clouds,

And there was a new voice

Which you slowly

recognized as your own,

that kept you company

as you strode deeper and deeper into the world,

determined to do

the only thing you could do—

determined to save

the only life that you could save.

The Bread of Life Jesus offers is himself and it is life giving indeed. It can give us, not just life, but our life – our life to live with purpose, with integrity, with security, and with confidence that we are on the right path, today and forever.