Talking Across the Divide of Ideology and Identity Politics

From The Trinitarian (August 2013)

Talking Across the Divide of Ideology and Identity Politics
The Rev. Dr. Anthony Hutchinson

Over the last year, several parish members have expressed frustration to me about the bitter political divide we see in the country and even in our own Rogue Valley Community, where Left and Right seem not willing to talk with each other, but rather only talk at, demonize, and vilify.   In our effort to maintain peace with family members and friends who do not share our views, we often exclude “religion and politics” from conversation, even when these are things that matter deeply to us and rightly should be part of what we share with those we love.  How can we bridge the divide and communicate? 

Willingness to go beyond one’s comfort zone is key here, and careful, respectful attention.  It does not mean that we necessarily are going to convince anyone of our opinions, but it gives room for hope of finding common ground and correcting on both sides the obvious misunderstandings that result from only talking to those who agree with us: misstating the other side’s view, or somehow thinking that we are entitled to our own set of facts in addition to our own opinions.   

I wanted to share with you a letter I wrote in response to a query I received from a local community leader with family ties to Trinity, who asked that The Episcopal Church, Trinity Ashland, and I sever any ties we might have with the National Council of Churches to protest the NCC’s statement after the acquittal in Florida of George Zimmerman:

“Thank you for your recent email and concern for the ongoing faith and health of Trinity Church, in particular how it ‘will respond’ to NCC President Kathryn Lohre’s statement last week ... (http://www.ncccusa.org/news/130715zimmermanacquittal.html).

“I think I can sum up the position of the Episcopal Church, Trinity Ashland, and myself by citing the words of the Bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Central Florida, the Right Reverend Greg Brewer, given in a sermon since the Zimmerman verdict:  ‘I want to live in a world where George Zimmerman offered Trayvon Martin a ride home to get him out of the rain that night’ (http://www.cfdiocese.org/news/article/2013/07/17/justice-and-good-samaritan-bishop-greg-trayvon-martin).

“I hope that this is also your view.  It is, I believe, the position that our Lord calls us to, regardless of our politics, interest group or ethnicity. No matter what one’s views are on the specifics of the Zimmerman verdict, the laws of the State of Florida that lie behind it, or what one thinks actually occurred between Mr. Zimmerman and Mr. Martin, I should hope that no one would wish for what happened, a tragedy for Martin, Zimmerman, and their families. 

“I believe that the whole affair underscores the fact that our society is still troubled by race: the fears and judgments that drove both Zimmerman and Martin to do and react as they did, the overwhelming sense of violation experienced by those identifying with Martin after the events of that night and its legal aftermath, and the echoing sense of violation and threat experienced by those who, like yourself, identified with Zimmerman.   (By way of full disclosure, I must state that I am a member of the Episcopal Diocese of Oregon’s Commission to End Racism, and would not be so if I did not believe that race remains a problem in America.)

“I also believe that the case reflects the larger problem of gun violence in our society: Zimmerman used a gun to kill Martin, and his actions in part were based on laws immunizing such use when it is for self-defense.   I thus also support and agree with the Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church, the Most Reverend Katharine Jefferts Schori, who in February called for people of faith to work to reduce the scourge of gun violence (http://www.episcopalchurch.org/notice/presiding-bishop-katharine-jefferts-schori-gun-violence).

“I am a firm believer in the Rule of Law, an independent judiciary, and trial by a jury of one’s peers.  As President Obama said after the verdict, ‘We are a nation of laws, and a jury has spoken. … [W]e should ask ourselves if we’re doing all we can to widen the circle of compassion and understanding in our own communities. We should ask ourselves if we’re doing all we can to stem the tide of gun violence that claims too many lives across this country on a daily basis. We should ask ourselves, as individuals and as a society, how we can prevent future tragedies like this. As citizens, that’s a job for all of us.’

“With the NCC, I ‘join in prayer for the family and friends of Trayvon Martin, for George Zimmerman and his family and friends, for the members of the jury and their family and friends, and for all who have suffered and will continue to suffer as a result of this tragedy.’  I recognize that people of good will may differ on how best to reduce racial strife and gun violence in our nation.   I hope that regardless of perhaps differing views on policy, we all share in a vision of a common future not driven by fear or faction, and where we help rather than hurt one another.”

Grace and Peace, 

Fr. Tony+

Having and Being (Mid-week Message)

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Having and Being 

Fr. Tony’s Mid-week Message

July 31, 2013

²⁵ “I warn you, then: don’t worry about your livelihood, what you’ll eat or what you’ll drink, or about your body, what you’ll wear. Isn’t life more than food and the body more than clothes? ²⁶ Look at the birds in the sky. They don’t sow seed or harvest grain or gather crops into barns. Yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Aren’t you worth much more than they are? ²⁷ Who among you by worrying can add a single moment to your life? ²⁸ And why worry about clothes? Notice how the lilies in the field grow. They don’t wear themselves out with work, and they don’t spin cloth. ²⁹ But I say to you that even Solomon in all of his splendor wasn’t dressed like one of these. ³⁰ If God dresses grass in the field so beautifully, even though it’s alive today and tomorrow it’s thrown into the furnace, won’t God do much more for you, you people of weak faith? ³¹ Therefore, don’t worry and say, ‘What are we going to eat?’ or ‘What are we going to drink?’ or ‘What are we going to wear?’ ³²Unbelievers are always running after these things. Your heavenly Father knows that you need them. ³³ Instead, desire first and foremost God’s kingship over you and the justice this demands, and all these things will be given to you as well. ³⁴ Enough, then, of worrying about tomorrow.  Let tomorrow take care of itself. Today has troubles enough of its own. (Matthew 6:25-34) 

Psychologist Erich Fromm, in his later books To Have and to Be (1976) and the Art of Being, (1993) describes two basic modes of experiencing life:  “having” and “being.”   

“Having” is when we find our value and meaning in acquiring and keeping things outside of ourselves: money, wealth, prestige, beauty, honor, or what others call “success.   Ambition, aggressiveness, competitiveness, and constantly comparing ourselves with others, seeing how we are “measuring up” are all part of this mode of existence.   Craving for more and more is often part and parcel of the deal, and in the long run dissatisfaction with one’s life and a lack of psychological integration are almost always experienced.  

 “Being,” however, is a mode of living where we are not enslaved to a need to acquire, constantly craving more.  We simple are, and use our gifts fruitfully, being at one with the world.   

This coming Sunday’s scripture readings are mainly about what Fromm calls “having” as a way of life: Ecclesiastes 1-2 tell us about its total futility; the parable of the prematurely dead rich man (Luke 12:13-21), its foolishness.   A life of simply being with others, being dedicated to the Right and Just, and being who we truly are—cared for creatures of God, beloved children—is the life we are called to, a life of gratitude and trust.  It is the life that will give us joy. 

Grace and Peace,
Fr. Tony+  

God Already Knows (Proper 12C)

 

God Already Knows
Homily delivered the Tenth Sunday after Pentecost (Proper 12; Year C RCL)

The Rev. Dr. Anthony Hutchinson
28 July 2013; 8:00 a.m. Said and 10:00 a.m. Sung Mass
Parish Church of Trinity, Ashland (Oregon)
Readings: Genesis 18:20-32; Psalm 138; Colossians 2:6-15; Luke 10:25-37

God, take away our hearts of stone
 and give us hearts of flesh. Amen.

When I was ten years old, in fifth grade, I had my first male schoolteacher.   Mr. Franklin, an athletic and handsome 20-something, always wore a short-sleeved white dress shirt and skinny black tie to class.  Just out of teacher’s college, he had a sharp wit, demanded a lot of us.  He wore dark sunglasses when he stood as playground monitor.  My friend Jeff’s mom—in my small conservative town she was the rare Democrat—said that Mr. Franklin was part of the new direction of the whole country, with our young new president John Kennedy and his wife Jackie.  Mr. Franklin was what we were just then learning to call “cool.”

One day in November, the principal came into the classroom and asked to have a word with him outside.  He returned pale and visibly shaken and asked us to put our books away:  “I have just been told that the President has been shot in Texas.  The radio says they have taken him to a hospital, but not how badly injured he is.  I think it would be a good time to have a few minutes of silence for him, his family, and our country.”

The minutes that followed were surreal.  All of us students had known each other from kindergarten, but only as roles:  as class brains or dummies, teacher’s pets or problem kids, playground pals or rivals.  We who went to churches together knew each other in those same roles only in a different setting. 

 I had learned in Sunday School to pray free form—address God, say what you’re thankful for, and then say what you want God to do.   Remember to use “thee” and “thou” instead of “you” to show reverence.  Close “in the name of Jesus Christ” and say “amen.”  I silently asked God to keep John F. Kennedy alive and then give him full recovery.  I opened my eyes and looked around me at the strangely silent classroom.

Some looked bored and puzzled.  Some looked stunned.  But most were praying.  One girl fervently held her hands in a little church, looked up with wide eyes at the ceiling, and muttered something obviously memorized.  She crossed herself.    Mr. Franklin sat at the head of the class, with one hand covering his face, as if to force his eyes shut with fingers and block out the whole evil world.  His lips moved silently.  

After a while, he left the classroom and came back with word that the President was dead.  That evening, my father said that the shot had killed the President instantly. 

I had always been taught that God heard and answered prayers.  Sunday School and home told me that if we just had enough faith when we asked for something in prayer, God would give it to us.  

But not only had God not given us what we had prayed for so fervently, all those prayers seemed kind of silly because the President was already dead at the time we offered them.  

That experience left me with a different, less confident, view of prayer.  It also gave me a very changed view of my classmates and my teacher.  In those few minutes I had glimpsed them as people, in all their rich complexity and depth, much more complicated than the various roles they each played.
 

Today’s first lesson Abraham prays that Sodom and Gomorrah be spared a horrible fate.  He is trying to save his nephew Lot and his family, who live there.  He bargains with God, shamelessly haggles over how few righteous would be a minimum threshold to spare the cities.   He flatters and cajoles with Asian honorifics ("now don't be angry with this, but ...," "don't think your humble servant here is being presumptuous to say...," etc.)    In the end, God warns Lot and his family to flee before the burning sulfur starts falling.  In the Book of Exodus, Moses likewise bargains with God to save the children of Israel from destruction (Exod. 32). 

In both stories, God might seem to be an angry, petulant, ego-maniac who needs to be argued with, to be reminded to do the right thing, be merciful and true to his promises.  But this is a misreading.   The authors and editors know very well that God is better than that.  These scenes are a bold way of showing who God actually is—in both, the prophet appeals to what he knows as God’s most basic character:  merciful, faithful, and just.  The stories are thus saying that God is not petty, vain, and selfish.    

The parable of a bothersome friend at the door at midnight who just won’t take no for an answer in today’s Gospel (Luke 11:5-8) provokes a similar misunderstanding.   You’ve missed the story’s point if you think that God is like the sleepy householder, who can’t be bothered.  The point of comparison is the chutzpah and persistence of the guy knocking on the door. “Go ahead—bother God and keep bothering him,” says Jesus, not because God is annoyed at our prayers, but because we need to persist in prayer.

Jesus here adds another parable as if to correct any misunderstanding we might have from that first one: “If any of you have a child who asks him for a fish, will you give him a snake?  Or if he asks for an egg, you give him a scorpion?  If you, who aren’t all that perfect, know how to give your children what they need, how much more will your Heavenly Father know how to treat you?” (Luke 11:11-13)  God is better, more loving, than a typical parent, not like a sleepy householder who can’t be bothered.

When prayer doesn’t seem to deliver what we think it’s supposed to, we get disillusioned and maybe stop praying, or only go through the motions of prayer out of a sense of duty, but without any hope or faith that it matters.   But Jesus says persist like that friend at midnight. 

Many scriptures that say that God will give us whatever we ask in faith.   But this is a metaphor, a way of saying that God is on our side and will give us what we need, not that we will always get what we want.    Jesus’ own prayer in Gethsemane, “Let this cup of suffering pass from me,” was not granted.  The point here is that is that we persist in prayer, regardless of how things “turn out.”   In the process we are changed and our will becomes closer to God’s.  We are able to say, with Jesus, “thy will, not mine, be done.”    Through prayer we gain acceptance of what we can’t change and strength for the truly intolerable. 

When Paul says “make your desires known to God,” he is consciously using an imperfect metaphor.  Paul understands perfectly well that God already knows whatever we might tell him in prayer.  When we pray, we aren’t “letting God know” anything that he doesn’t already know.  Changing God’s knowledge or will is not what prayer is about.  The point of prayer is not about having an effect on God by telling God something he doesn’t already know.

The point of prayer is that we are the ones doing it, that prayer has an effect on us.  Like lovers who undress and reveal themselves before the act of love, though the Beloved already knows what is under the clothes, in prayer we voluntarily disclose ourselves to God, reveal ourselves with intention, even though God already knows everything in our hearts. 

Our prayers are not about changing God.  They are about changing us.   After the death of his wife Joy Davidman, C.S. Lewis was asked whether it was worth it—had any of the prayers offered on her behalf during her cancer changed anything.  He replied, “They changed me.”   I knew as a boy that those prayers for John F. Kennedy that day were not silly, even though the way I understood prayer at the time made them look so.  I sensed, and still believe, that they were exactly what God wanted us to do. 

Our prayers are a way we establish intimacy with God, and let God establish intimacy with us.   We often find that if we are honest about telling God our desires, some can only be put before him as confessions of sin. 

Persistence in prayer is not just about asking. As we pray, we learn that we need not just prayers of petition, but also ones of thanksgiving, adoration, and intercession for others.  As we persist in prayer, we often find that these other forms of prayer begin to predominate.

I was raised in a tradition that used almost exclusively free-form prayers, and looked down on set or written prayers.  I found that if I tried to persist in prayer over time, I ended up using repeated phrases of my own, and often not particularly well formed or uplifting.  In the long haul, I have found that I need both occasional free-form prayers from the heart, but also lots of repeated, written prayers handed down us from those who have gone before, the “Our Father” foremost among them.  The Psalter and the other poetic passages of the Bible we know as the Canticles form a major part of my prayer life, as does daily scripture reading.   When we promise in baptism to “continue in the Apostles’ faith and fellowship, in the breaking of the bread, and in the prayers,” this is what we are talking about. 

I try to recite the liturgy of Morning and Evening Prayer every day, and have found that this creates a rhythm in my life that helps me grow closer to God and better serve those around me.   It makes me part of a great dialogue of prayer of the Christian Church that has been going on more than 2,000 years.   But it takes time, at least 20 minutes in the morning and 10 in the evening.  In prayer, as in so many other human endeavors, you get what you put into it. 

I challenge all of us this week to pray daily, and to put some effort and thought into it.  If Daily Morning and Evening Prayer is too much, then start small—look at “Daily Devotions for Individuals and Families” on page 137 of the Prayer Book and start there.  Or if it works better for you, use any of the great devotional prayer books that exist, whether in the Celtic, Contemplative, Wisdom, or Interfaith traditions.  All of us can revitalize our prayer life in some way.  The important thing is to set the time aside, and go ahead and bother the God who is never bothered:  just like that annoying guy in the middle of the night bothered his friend.  Let us persist in prayer. 

In the name of God,  Amen.

Standing with Others (Mid-week Message)

 

Fr. Tony’s Mid-week Message

July 24, 2013

 

One of the priestly blessings I use most often at the end of Eucharist is adapted from the Church of England’s Common Worship and is a summary of 1 Thessalonians 5:13-22:

 

“Go forth into the world in peace.  Be of good courage.  Render to no one evil for evil.  Strengthen the weak. Visit the sick.  Stand with the downtrodden.  Honor every person.  Love and serve God, rejoicing in the power of the Holy Spirit.  And the blessing of God Almighty, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, be among with you and remain with you always.  Amen.”

 

One of our Deacons told me once that she had found the words “stand with the down trodden” particularly helpful, since she had a bad week where it was clear that through her efforts she could not really solve any of the problems for people she was working with, and that the best she could manage was to “stand with” them. 

 

Sara Miles, in a homily posted this week on The Episcopal Café, writes that the most important word in the Bible is not “God,” “Jesus,” or “Mercy,” but simply “with” (http://www.episcopalcafe.com/daily/mission/the_most_important_word_in_the.php). Relationship—being with someone, not simply doing things for them—is at the heart of our Christian faith and life.  She describes the Holy Trinity as a perichoreisis, a dance of the three persons with each other, the Incarnation as God made fully human and present with us, and Pentecost as the Holy Spirit sent to be with us in the Church.  Christian service is not simply doing things for others.  It is being with them, in relationship with them:

“Doing for, as mission groups and lovers and parents know, is super-tempting: it’s easier and often feels safer than being fully with. Let me act on your behalf, doing something for you as if my being were somehow separate from yours. Let me hand you a sandwich at a sanctified distance. Let me solve your homework problems without getting entangled in your other problems. Let me send you some flowers to apologize when I’ve been snappish, without having a real conversation. Being with is riskier. If I wait and listen and show you what I’m really like, my life becomes implicated in yours: we are no longer separate. And I might get changed by our relationship.”

May we learn to content ourselves to stand with others, simply be with them, fully present, and come to share gladly what our being with them leads us to share. 

Peace and Grace, 

Fr. Tony+

 

Neither Domestic, Nor Dragon-slayer (Proper 11C)

 

Neither Domestic nor Dragon-slayer
Homily delivered Ninth Sunday after Pentecost (Proper 11C)
21 July 2013; 8:00 a.m. Said and 10:00 a.m. Sung Eucharist
Parish Church of Trinity, Ashland (Oregon)
Readings: Genesis 18:1-10a; Psalm 15
Colossians 1:15-28; Luke 10:38-42

God, take away our hearts of stone
 and give us hearts of flesh. Amen.

I have a very vivid memory of what it was that first attracted me to the woman who was to become my wife.  We met in college taking a full-time survey of world literature class.  As you know, she is petite, attractive, very well spoken and well read, and has a great sense of humor.  We quickly became good friends.  I was really struck by how much joy she brought to her hard-working, quiet competence.  I heard her say in a class discussion that she really actually sympathized with Martha rather than Mary in today’s Gospel.  At that moment, my heart was hers, though it took me a while to realize it. 

Luke’s story about Mary and Martha touches raw nerves.  Few passages of the Gospels seem to draw so many complaints, almost all from women.  “Why is Jesus tolerating that lazy sister Mary?”  “Why does he come down so hard on Martha, the only responsible adult in the whole story?”

The early and medieval Church took the story to contrast the ministry of action and service, seen in Martha, with the ministry of contemplation and study, seen in Mary.  An early legend says that later in her life, Martha went to the south of France, where she confronted a dragon that had been ravaging the country.  Unlike St. George, the patron saint of soldiers and England, Martha does not slay the dragon with a sword.  She charms it with her hospitality and the word of God so that it can be chained and controlled.  That is why in medieval representations of St. Martha, she holds a cross and stands over a dragon. 
 

Modern sociological and feminist approaches to this story base their approach in the social customs behind the story.  Martha is fulfilling a very traditional role endorsed by the religion and culture of the time.  Mary, on the other hand, appears to abandon what was a woman’s work and role by opting for religious study and discussion, seen as the domain of men.  Martha honors her duty and behaves decently; Mary somewhat shamelessly crosses a gender barrier.    

Some commentators say that Jesus here endorses the sister engaged in inappropriate activity—the one crossing gender boundaries—and chastens the conventional sister who is behaving decently.  He thus favors liberation and rejects conventional roles.   Others are less sanguine:  they say Jesus, though indeed endorsing broader roles for women, values only the actions, roles, and perspectives that were traditionally seen as male and thus devalues traditional female ones.  He thus implicitly buys into the oppression of women and rejects autonomous womanhood. 

I beg to differ with this view.   

It is clear that in this story, Jesus legitimates a woman taking on the role of a man in the ordering of the early Christian community.  He does so, however, not because he thinks man’s roles and perspectives are better.  It is because, as seen in so many other passages of the Gospels, he believes that God’s kingdom is breaking into our lives, and as a result, there is no place for oppression, no place for bondage.  Roles based on boundaries are thus suspect.  Roles that oppress are part of the evil world the kingdom of God will replace. 

Again and again we see in the New Testament Jesus lives out what Saint Paul later puts into words and doctrine.  Here the theme in part seems to be, “There is no longer Jew or Gentile, neither free or slave, or male or female, for all are one in Christ Jesus (Gal. 3:28).  

But today’s story is not just about that.  It addresses the theological reason that these divisions don’t matter.  God didn't create us so that we could fill a role. God made us for love -- to be loved by God, to love God, and then to love one another and show this love in service. 

The contrast Luke sets up in this story between Martha and Mary is not about the roles each plays, but rather about how each reacts to them. 
 

Martha is the home-owner and mistress, with no apparent husband around.  (Her name in Aramaic, in fact, means mistress of the house, Mar’etha.)  So Mary is not the only woman stepping out of traditional roles. 

The contrast is also not between the active and the contemplative life.  Mary her sister sits at Jesus’ feet, totally lost in his words.  This is the language of discipleship.  This describes a focused student of the master’s words.  Buddhists would say that she is “in the moment,” or “fully present.” 

Martha, however, is “worried, distracted by her many tasks” in being hospitable to Jesus.  The point here is not her service, but rather the distraction it has caused her. 

Martha’s complaint is perfectly reasonable.  Mary as family also has an obligation of hospitality to Jesus.  If anything, Martha is a little too gentle.  She doesn’t confront her sister and say bluntly “Sis, hate to break in on this, but you are not carrying your weight here, so get with the program, and get to work.  Let’s talk with Jesus while we set the table.” Martha realizes that Mary is totally absorbed listening to Jesus. 

So she asks Jesus to intervene.  She is pretty confident that he is a fair-minded fellow who will remedy the situation with no hurt feelings or loss of face to anyone.
  
Jesus’ answer, while totally unexpected from Martha’s viewpoint, is similarly kind-hearted.  The double use of the name, “Martha, Martha,” is a clear sign of gentle chiding, not harsh criticism. 

“You are busy with many things,” he says.  He is sensitive to Martha’s plight—she has planned just too grand a dinner, in the great Middle Eastern tradition of mezze, and forgotten how complicated it was to do so many dishes. 

But then he surprises her.  “You only really need one thing.”  Jesus seems to be telling the hostess how to do her business.  “Stressed from trying to serve too many dishes?   Well then simplify and only serve me one.”   

“Simplicity.” You see, Jesus anticipated Martha Stewart by 2,000 years!

But that’s not the kind of simplification Jesus is really talking about, as becomes clear in his next phrase.  “Mary has chosen the best bit. I won’t take that away from her.”  It’s not the number of mezze dishes at issue here. 

The point is not that Martha chose the bad part, or even the less good part.  The point is that being lost in hearing God’s word is what we were made for, and what gives our service and love direction and meaning. 

Jesus knows that such moments of hearing God have come and will come for Martha.  But he is not going to break the moment of communion with God that Mary is experiencing for the sake of a few more dishes on the table, especially when they are for him to eat. 

Seen in this light, Martha’s complaint brings to mind two of Jesus’ parables.   In one, an older brother gets angry at the mercy shown by his father to a wayward younger brother and bitterly complains (Luke 15:12-38).  In another, a group of laborers who have worked a hard, long day almost riot when latecomers are paid the same wage (Matthew (20:1-16).  

The two parables make the point that we shouldn’t begrudge the grace given to others.  And so it is here.  Martha’s desire for simply fair division of labor has stepped onto holy ground.   Jesus won’t criticize her complaint, but he won’t grant her request, either, and ruin the moment for Mary. 

 

 There are many, many ways of begrudging the grace given to others.  We can belittle the grace, and say it isn’t God at work, despite the clear good we see before our eyes.  We can point out differences between it and how we received grace, as if to say that God can work with others only in the way he worked with us.  We can point out that the recipient is unworthy, as if grace were something that comes from deserving.  There are many, many ways of begrudging the grace given to others.  

This, I think is the greatest argument for marriage equality in our society.  Marriage is a good thing; commitment is a good thing; public honoring of such relationships is a good thing.  Why should  straight people begrudge this grace to those who  have loves that are different from theirs?

Martha and Mary also show up in the Gospel of John.  There too Martha is seen as a take-charge kind of woman who speaks her mind.  When Lazarus dies, Mary stays inside mourning quietly, while it is Martha who goes out to confront Jesus about his delay in coming, that in her mind caused her brother’s death.  “You can still do something,” she says.  Jesus replies Lazarus will come forth from the dead.  Martha replies, in effect, “Yeah, yeah, we’ll all be raised from the dead one day.  That’s not very satisfying right now, is it?”  It is at this moment that Jesus tells her, “I am the resurrection and the life,” and then proceeds to bring Lazarus back from the dead.  In that story of glorious mystery, Martha affirms her faith in Jesus, well before the miracle (John 11:17-44).
 
It is clear that Martha and Jesus had the kind of relationship where she felt she could tell him exactly what she was thinking and feeling, and not be afraid.  Jesus clearly felt the same way.  Oh that we could all have such a relationship with Jesus, and freely tell him what is really on our hearts and minds!

In closing, God did not create us for roles.  In creating Martha, God did not intend her to be a mere domestic, nor a dragon-slayer.  He intended a loved and a loving child, at peace with herself and others. It is clear from Luke’s portrayal that Martha loved Jesus, loved others, and served, and served, and served.   It is clear from that story in John that Martha herself at times had moments like the one of Mary that, because of distraction, she wanted Jesus to interrupt.  

Those moments, where we sit at Jesus’ feet, listen hard, and truly hear are rare enough that we need to treasure them, and value when they happen to others.  Let us not begrudge the grace that others experience, even when it seems unfair, or appears to put us at a disadvantage.   Grace is unwarranted, unbidden love.  And love, after all, is what ties all of us, and all things, together.

In the name of Christ, Amen. 

Falling Down (Mid-week Message)

 

Father Tony’s midweek message

July 17, 2013

Falling Down

 

Elena and I came back to Ashland from a short vacation at the Sisters Oregon Outdoor Quilt Show to the news that one of our dear parishioners had fallen, broken an arm, and was hospitalized.  News about people falling is all too frequent in a parish rich in elderly people, who may be experiencing balance and mobility issues.  Recovering from a fall is hard. Please review the following common-sense pointers for people who have fallen down: 

• Do not panic. Assess the situation and determine if you are hurt. Try gently to move your limbs to see whether there is any pain that may mean broken bones.
• Slide or crawl along the floor to the nearest couch or chair and try to get up.
• If you cannot get up, call for help.  Allow others to help you get up.
• If you are alone, use your cell phone or slowly crawl to a telephone and call 911, relatives, or friends who can help. 
• If you have a serious fall, go and see a physician.  If necessary, allow yourself to be taken to an emergency room.  Do not be ashamed at having fallen or minimize the medical issues that can cause or result from a fall. 

(Suggestions from http://www.ehow.com/how_2156969_recover-from-fall.html and http://orthoinfo.aaos.org/topic.cfm?topic=A00135, which also gives great suggestions on fall prevention.)

Let us pray:

 

Lord Jesus, as you carried your cross, you fell and were crushed by its weight three times, until finally it had to be carried by a stranger.  Protect us with your love, and shield us from falling down and hurting ourselves.  Keep us from falling from your grace as well, and help us be a shield and protection for others.  This we pray for your tender mercy’s sake, Amen.

 

Grace and Peace,   Fr. Tony+

 

 

Entrusted (Proper 9C)

Entrusted
Homily delivered Seventh Sunday of Pentecost (Proper 9; Year C RCL)
7 July 2013; 8:00 a.m. Said, 10:00 Sung Eucharist with Holy Baptism
Parish Church of Trinity Ashland, Oregon

Isaiah 66:10-14; Psalm 66:1-8; Galatians 6:(1-6), 7-16; Luke 10:1-11, 16-20

God, take away our hearts of stone
 and give us hearts of flesh. Amen.

Elena and I had the great pleasure of watching Ashland’s Fourth of July Parade on Thursday, seated with friends from the parish.  It was the first time for us.  I can tell you, we were impressed!  Ashland definitely puts on one of America’s best small town parades. 

The crowd laughed and clapped, and occasionally sang or danced along with the various groups and their messages—whether Latino pride, ban GMOs and disband Monsanto, support the troops, reduce fuel costs, end corporate legal personhood, GLBT pride, reduce use of fossil fuels, or simply love art and music. 

I was a bit puzzled when we saw those who had won the first prize for a “Religious Group”:  a small rag-tag group of pagans or atheists whose slogan, hastily scrawled on the banner they carried, was something like “NO RULES FROM ABOVE.”  “O.K.,” I thought to myself, “Maybe this is just  Ashlandia in all its glory.”  But the reason for the win became clear a few minutes later when the only competition in the category passed by.

A grim group of Evangelicals of some sort marched by with carefully lettered banners proclaiming “ANGRY JESUS IS COMING SOON.  BELIEVE AND REPENT, OR BURN IN HELL.”

The laughing and clapping crowd fell silent and watched sullenly as this group passed.  Someone nearby said, “Well isn’t THAT a great way to kill a buzz!”    But then the highland pipers marched past with their wail of joyful noise, and the crowd sprang back to life.

“What could they be thinking?” I thought.   “How do they think insulting everyone will attract anyone?”   No wonder the pagans won hands down!  

The fact is, the grim ones probably saw validation in the crowd’s rejection.  “True believers must be rejected, persecuted for their faith.”  It’s right there in today’s Gospel: “I send you out as lambs among wolves.  Those who reject you reject me, and come judgment day, it’ll be worse for them than for Sodom and Gomorrah!”   And so people who think this way tend to intentionally make others reject them and hate them, just as some sick people quote later verses here as they pick up rattlesnakes so God can prove he loves them.

But Jesus taught “You shall know a tree by its fruits.  A good tree cannot bring forth bitter fruits, and a bad tree sweet ones” (Matt. 7:17; Luke 6:43).   Jesus’ proclamation of God’s Reign was good news, not bad. 

Today’s Gospel tells the origins of Christian ministry.  Luke is the only Gospel that tells about Jesus calling and sending forth 70 apostles in addition to the Twelve.   Where the Twelve represent the recreation of Israel as a people with its ancient tribes; the Seventy stand for those in Israel who enjoy the spirit of communication with God.  Remember that when Moses received the Law, he was commanded to have “seventy of the elders of Israel” accompany him (Exodus 24:1-9; Numbers 11:16-30), where Moses says, “Oh that all the Lord’s people might be prophets!”   

John Dominic Crossan rightly observes that the stories of Jesus sending the twelve and the seventy represent a significant organizational strategy on the part of the historical Jesus.  A single decapitating sword-stroke by one of Herod’s henchmen had effectively ended John the Baptist’s movement.  By sending out many people with his good news all around, Jesus decentralized his movement.  The rulers would thus have a much harder time of killing it by simply killing its leader.   By the time Jesus was crucified, hundreds of such ministers were spread throughout Judea and Galilee.  When stories of his death and the events following finally reached them, their experience of Jesus, both before and after his death, led them to say, like the Seventy in today’s reading, “The blind see, the lame walk, the spirit is with us…  Christ is alive!”   

Despite almost continual efforts to impose order, hierarchy, and unity, from the beginning Christ’s followers have remained a diverse lot, driven by the investment that comes from having made the faith their own.  Fractious and tending to break into sects (usually along cultural or linguistic lines), different Christians have nevertheless seen themselves as the true expression of Christ’s teaching.  

We have tried to resist this centrifugal force, this tendency toward sectarianism, by grounding our faith in the scripture and writings of the apostolic age.  We found that such a canon—the Bible—is diverse and culturally and historically conditioned enough that it isn’t really sufficient to serve as a sole guide to the faith.  We tried to center our belief in the tradition of the bishops who succeeded the apostles in their oversight of the local churches, and to be universal in our faith.  But bishops disagreed with each other. 

We sought a faith that we could all agree on.  That’s what the great early Councils of the Church were about.  A faith comprehensive both in time and space, throughout the eras and transcending localities—this is what the Greek word katholikos, means: according to the whole kat – holicos.  That’s why when we recite the Creed from these Councils to this day, we talk of believing one, holy, catholic, and apostolic Church. 

But we have been only partly successful in achieving truly comprehensive faith, that which was, according to St. Vincent of Lerins, commonly believed by the faithful of all times and all places.  So we use our reason to try to make it cohere.  Thus the tripod of our faith:  scripture, tradition, and reason informed by data and experience.  And still we tend toward sect.  

Given the schisms, divisions, and accusations of heresy that have always been a part of the big, baggy, and chaotic thing that historically is called Christianity, we might say that, Jesus in sending out missioners two by two into diverse settings, had anticipated a key idea of modern organizational behavior theory: lose control in order to gain influence.   He guaranteed the Church’s survival by entrusting it to believers, thus building into it the centrifugal force and ensuring its diversity. 

Jesus counsels those he sends to proclaim the Good News.  And we are all sent to proclaim the Good News.   Today we are celebrating the baptism of little Henry James Rutledge Tufts.  Jesus speaks to us in the baptismal covenant that we have all taken: be faithful to the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, in the breaking of the bread, and in the prayers; whenever you fall into sin repent and return to me; proclaim by word and example my Good News of God; seek and serve me in all persons; work for justice and peace and treat every person with dignity.

This is not a call to grimly use speech to beat up on other people like that sorry group in the parade.  St. Francis said that we should preach the Good News at all times and in all places, and only very occasionally, when it is really necessary, to open our mouths to do so.

Jesus’ counsel to those he sent is counsel to us, a guide to the spiritual life necessary to keep us faithful to him, despite our differences.

“Go two by two” that is, don’t trust your own individual belief and internal guidance, but always work and serve in larger community.  Use the self-correction that comes from being part of a larger team of believers.  Thomas Merton famously said that the most dangerous and spiritually deadly person is the mystic who lives in isolation, without the spiritual direction and guidance of another.  Since you are going into a dangerous world, lambs among wolves, Jesus implies, know you will be discouraged and lose faith at times, and need your comrades in faith to get you through the rough spots.  And then when they are in rough spots, it will your turn to get them through. We need each other.  That is why we baptize enfants—this calling in not a calling to individual monads, but to people in families, in communities.  “Go two by two.”    

“Carry no money bag, no sack, no sandals.  Stay with whoever will give you a place to stay, and together with them, eat and drink whatever they put in front of you.”   Serving Jesus and proclaiming joyful news is not about self-sufficiency and independence.  It is about interdependence, relying on each other.  So simplify your tastes and standards.  Don’t depart on this journey with everything prepared just so in extensive luggage, with your favorite foods and small comforts.  You may just have to eat non-gourmet, or non-vegan, or even barely edible, stuff if that is what those you serve have to offer.  This is about sharing and accepting things shared with you, not about meeting your standards or demands.  Simplicity is the mother of humility.  Humility is the mother of listening.  And listening is the mother of community.

We have medical needs, to be sure, but even here we must remember the spiritual principle of opening ourselves to dependence and being served. It may mean learning new ways of eating, drinking, communicating, and, yes, even worshiping, even when we are old.  I thank God that one of my mentors told me as I preparing for ordination that if at all possible, I had to simply love the people served, and with them their dogs and cats, no matter how allergic I was to them.  Love Jesus, love his people.  Love his people, love their dogs.  “Take no money bag or sack, and eat what they put in front of you.” 

“Don’t go from house to house, but stay where you are received.  Cure their illness, declare the joy of God’s reign there, and let your peace rest with them.”  Grow where you are planted. You are no longer a religious consumer, wandering from one potential friend in the faith to another.  You should no more pick and chose whom you will grace with relationship than you should pick and choose what is put on the plate before you.  “Stay where you are received.” 

This openness and vulnerability to community of the individual sent ones must also grow in their larger communities.  They must be open and willing to listen as well.

But even open-hearted sent ones might not be received with openness. Jesus here tells us here how to respond to rejection of us and the joyful news:  don’t dispute, curse, or worry.  Just move on quickly, and go to meet the others who surely will receive you with joy.  Go on your way and don’t look back. 

In all of these sayings, Jesus is calling us, too, to follow his example.  He wants us to lose control to gain influence.  In our labor in God’s harvest, we need to follow his guidance here.  Be open hearted, open minded, and open handed, willing to accept who and what God sends us.   And in that, he is calling us to the true unity of his followers and the true loving service of all his children. 

In the name of God,  Amen.