Sunday September 23, 2012

Proper 20 Sunday September 23, 2012

The Cathedral Church of the Nativity, Bethlehem Pennsylvania

The Very Rev. Anthony R. Pompa

Mark 9:30-37

 

I remember once being sent in my car to find something described to me over the phone. I remember being completely disoriented as I had no idea what it is exactly I was looking for. I called from the car and asked stupidly, Where am I?   It is frustrating and disorienting sometimes when you are looking for something that has been described but that you have never seen before.

“Look for the resurrection," says Jesus, as he walks with the disciples to Jerusalem. He Is teaching them about his death and resurrection, but they don’t understand. They are confused again, they don’t get it again, Who would really in that moment. Like a student in Algebra I who doesn’t get it, but in order to save face because they think everyone else gets it, they don’t bother to ask for clarification.  Or maybe they are just plain scared because Jesus one line portrait of their journey’s point is filled with description of suffering and death, and they are still filled with the excitement of examples of power and miracles witnessing healings, expulsions of demons, and first rate miracles.

These companions of Jesus instead find themselves on this walk engaged in a discussion about which of them is the greatest? The greatest what? Or what do we mean by the greatest?  Well, I think its just human nature here at play. It’s like students comparing scores after a test. Like anyone competing for the notice and commendation of their supervisor. Like gathering with clergy who ask, So what is your average Sunday attendance, Mine is (fill in the bland)  Well,  maybe we need be careful not to judge the disciples too harshly or unfairly; Perhaps  the conversation is driven by earnest and authentic desires to be faithful to this charismatic dream in a man they have yet to come to understand. Maybe they are trying to find a way to measure their commitment to the Rabbi? Maybe they are struggling with the big question Mark’s gospel would have us struggle with ……Who is this guy anyway, the first to figure it our perhaps, the top of the class, the greatest, Or perhaps they were even jockeying for position to be the first to storm the gates of Jerusalem with Jesus, not at all being able to “see” the cross in the imaging of following Jesus there to Jersusalem.

All of this it seems to me a worthy struggle for his disciples to “see things more clearly”. This following Jesus thing it seems just as confounding sometimes to us, particularly the part about following Jesus to the cross, about working through our own nature to work out way to proficiency, find the correct curriculum to bring us to competency, finding measurables to demonstrate our faithfulness. All of this perhaps sometimes impairing our vision to a life lived in the heart of God.

And so we go back into that house in Capernaum where the teacher Jesus  is about to take his disciples to school. Not interested in their discussion about who is the greatest, Jesus takes them to school again, by offering them a new way to “look at the conversation”. There he picks up a child and invites them to “see with their hearts”.  You need to know that in this culture to these adult males striving to produce the greatest outcome in the eyes of their great master; a child is the unlikeliest of props. A child is the last thing they would be “looking for” to “see” deeper into this experience of following Jesus. Children were of no significance until they were old enough to produce (work in male; babies in female). Children were invisible.

 Jesus wants to stop the moment, change the frame, catch the attention of these focused men. So, he again makes the invisible, visible.  "Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes not me, but the one who sent me (Mark 9:37). The disciples want to know who is the best at following Jesus, and Jesus says, "Do you see this child?’  In other words if you want to follow me into the mystery of the cross can you see the invisible? The unimportant, the vulnerable, the one yet to gain value unable to yet “produce”. The one not yet noticed. The one whose needs and wants you have not heard, you have not seen, you have been conditioned to be blind too?

Whats more Jesus it seems to be saying by inviting this child into their midst to change the frame of the picture, not only are you to see things you haven’t been looking for, but you are to welcome them into your very heart, existence, life! For when you do, you “see” me! And when you “see” me, you also “see” the one who him.

Another sign along the way might read “seeing is believing”, in this case “seeing is receiving into one’s very heart”.

Where is the invisible Jesus who will teach you the way of the cross?  In the grief of an awkward acquaintance whose behavior sometimes puts you on the defense, who is crying out for your compassion, an ear, and heart of consolation? In the sweet proclamation of  a small child who persists to be heard when you are “busy with other adult things”, offering you a simple grace if you will hear it, “you are beautiful”.  Or in the stories of a Sr. Citizen, whom you have never taken the time to really listen to, because life’s busyness has kept you from really “seeing” the amazing values that have driven a persons entire life.

Today we have a nice reminder to “Look for the invisible Jesus” as we take three young children into our midst and welcome them! We receive them not knowing at all what life will hold for them, trials, disappointment, triumphs and joys. But they remind us as we welcome them to look for Jesus, to point out those places and people that have become invisible to many and to greet them with warm and loving hearts. To allow these and all young persons to point to Jesus for us and join them in a journey into God’s very heart. Amen.

September 2, 2012 The Very Rev. Anthony R. Pompa

The Cathedral Church of the Nativity

Sunday September 2, 2012

The Very Rev. Anthony R. Pompa

James 1:17-27, Mark 7:1-8,14-15, 21-23

A wedding. A handshake. A kiss. A coronation. A parade. A dance. A meal. A graduation. A ritual is the ceremonial acting out of the profane in order to show forth its sacredness. A sacrament is the breaking through of the sacred into the profane.

A sacrament is God offering his holiness to us. A ritual is our raising up the holiness of our humanity to God.

I have oft used this quote from Fred Buechner at weddings or even funerals when I am aware the listeners gathered may be from different religious traditions or as may be the case moreso today, especially at weddings, when those in the assembly may have little experience with religious practices. I do so as an introduction to point to the importance of the rituals we take part in, the purpose of them,  the heart of them.

I do so, especially at weddings to remind all of us gathered that the point of the beauty of the rituals say of “dressing in beauty” or “processing to a public and visible place to consent to a joining” or  “repeating beautiful and profound words of promise to a new creation of marriage defined by covenant” or “joining hands bound symbolically by a stole, the yoke of Christ” or “by humbly kneeling before the altar to have this new creation blessed”  or triumphally, joyfully, and with dignity processing out of the Church and into the world” The point, the heart of the meaning of such ritual is to bring us into the full awareness that what we are about is “holiness”. It is not the pageantry of the symbolic acts that lead to a beautiful photo opportunity, or even the beauty of the words themselves, but what they point to and invoke in us.  Buchner so beautifully says it, to lift the holiness of our humanity to God and have it met by God’s holy offering for our lives!

The ritual pointing to the “mindfulness”  and “heartfulness” and “soulfulness” is what is at play in today’s Scriptures, especially in James and in the Gospel according to Mark.  

In the gospel reading today, Jesus again takes on the religious establishment. The engagement today is about ritual. In this interaction we are reminded of the ritual practices of the priestly establishment ironically enough concerned with a “holiness code”. The establishment are concerned it seems with Jesus’ disciples who are clearly not as concerned as they in keeping the purity rituals, in their minds, the rituals of holiness. Jesus seizes the moment as he often does to bring the audience into the “mindfulness of the heart of the matter.  On this occasion Jesus is asking the people to think of what holiness is discovered in the ritual? – Does the heart of their ritual reveal a holiness found in cleanliness or does their ritual of eating make them mindful that there are those who are hungry who need be fed?  Is compassion brought into mindfulness and action in this ritual?

Jesus reminds those who will listen that it is easy to lose sight of the heart of the matter and become lost from being in mindfulness of ritual for Godly things. It is the state of a holy heart that matters and what is borne from that holy hearts can be fruit of good works, as St. James would have it, or many opportunities for things that defile as Jesus would list them.

  It is not what goes into your body that will defile you or make you holy, and it is certainly not going to matter how meticulously you follow a ritual to “make these things clean” but rather what matters is an awareness of the heart of God that lifts our humanity to holiness and calls us out to live with integrity, compassion, dignity and with respect for all of God’s creation.

What matters to us? What begs us to raise our holiness to God in our rituals and seeks to be met by God’s holiness for us? What is the heart of the matter for us when it comes to bearing fruit reflective of our mindfulness, heartfulness, soulfulness of God’s promise for our lives?

For St. James, like Jesus’, it must go beyond just the ritualistic words of our faith, the words we say and receive is not the heart of the matter, but what is borne from our holiness matters, that is holy lives in activity of “holy living”, “holy acting”.  “Be doers of the word, not just receivers who deceive themselves”, James implores us.

Consider these holy words, taken from an old collection of prayers, produced in 1937 Forward Movement for personal devotion.  Pray this prayer mindful of St. James invitation to be doers of the Word, and Jesus call to the crowd to be mindful of what is in your heart.

Send us, O god, as thy messengers, to hearts without a home, to lives without love, to the crowds without a guide. Send us to the children whom none have blessed, to the famished whom none have visited, to the fallen whom none have lifted, to the bereaved whom none have comforted. Kindle thy flame on the altars of our hearts, that others may be warmed thereby; cause thy light to shine in our souls, that others may see the way; keep our sympathies and insight ready, our wills keen, our hands quick to help our neighbors in their need; for Christ’s sake. Amen.