Hands on the Plow (proper 8C)

 

Hands on the Plow 

Homily delivered Third Sunday After Pentecost (Proper 8; Year C RCL)
26 June 2022; 8:00 a.m. and 10:00 a.m. Said Mass

The Rev. Anthony Hutchinson, SCP, Ph.D.
St. Mark’s Episcopal Church, Medford, OR

1 Kings 19:15-16, 19-21; Psalm 16; Galatians 5:1, 13-25; Luke 9:51-62

homily begins at 18:50  

God, take away our hearts of stone

 and give us hearts of flesh. Amen. 

 

[[Since it’s on everyone’s minds because of the Supreme Court decision on Friday, it might be helpful to simply repeat here the official position of the Episcopal Church on the matter of termination of pregnancies.  Our position has been clear from the mid 1990s, when General Convention approved a resolution that, after a lengthy discussion of the sanctity of human life, the joy and blessing of children, and how serious a thing abortion is, says the decision to continue or end a pregnancy “must be a matter of personal conscience,” and concludes: 

“We believe that legislation concerning abortions will not address the root of the problem. We therefore express our deep conviction that any proposed legislation on the part of national or state governments regarding abortions must take special care to see that the individual conscience is respected, and that the responsibility of individuals to reach informed decisions in this matter is acknowledged and honored…  the Episcopal Church express[es] its unequivocal opposition to any legislative, executive or judicial action on the part of local, state or national governments that abridges the right of a woman to reach an informed decision about the termination of pregnancy or that would limit the access of a woman to safe means of acting on her decision.”]]

 

Jesus has hardened his face, set his jaw, and started on the final trip—the one to Jerusalem, where he knows he will probably die.  He goes the most direct route, through Samaria.   Local Samaritans, hearing that Jesus is headed for Jerusalem, the capital of their enemies, refuse to welcome him to stay overnight. “Why should we welcome one of our persecutors?  Why provide hospitality for this racist, this oppressor?”  The disciples get angry in their turn.  Jesus, after all, has been more welcoming and tolerant of the Samaritans than anyone else around. “Can we call down fire from heaven upon them?” they ask Jesus eagerly. 

 

The intersection of politics, ethnicity, and religion has always been a hot topic, fraught with deep emotion:  We hear expressions of such tribe-driven emotion almost daily, from all corners. In the words of Stephen Stills, “A thousand people in the street, Singing songs and they carrying signs, Mostly say’in, "Hooray for our side.” 

 

In our normal, messed up way of doing things and thinking, we deny our common humanity.  We focus on tribal, religious, ethnic, class, or political division. There are, to be sure, legitimate grievances and complaints between groups and people.  But what I am talking about here is our tendency to avoid honest, fair-minded addressing such hurt and pursue in its stead a default tribal loyalty where my group can do no harm, and their group can do no right. 

 

“Can we call down fire from heaven! Punish them!”    The disciples here want justice.  But they tar all Samaritans with the same brush, just as the villagers have tarred Jesus and his disciples as Jewish oppressors.

 

“Call down fire from heaven!”  They have in mind the prophet Elijah, the star of today’s Hebrew Scripture.   Elijah not only stopped the rain for three years to bring people back to God, he also called down fire from heaven on the soldiers of Ahaziah, King of—where else?—Samaria, when he turned Elijah away from Yahweh and sought Baal-zebub, the god of Ekron, instead (2 Kings 1).

 

Elijah overshadows much of Jesus’ life. When people in his hometown question his lack of local miracles, he says, “No prophet is honored in his home town… There were many widows in Israel then, but Elijah was sent only to the [foreigner] widow in Zarephath in Sidon.  There were many lepers in the time of Elisha, but none was cleansed except Naaman the Syrian” (Luke 4:24-27).   Luke introduces John the Baptist as a forerunner of Jesus by saying that “he will go before him in the spirit and power of Elijah” (Luke 1:17).   Herod reacts to stories about Jesus’ mighty acts by thinking Jesus is either John the Baptist or Elijah come back to life (Luke 9:7-8).  On the Mount of Transfiguration, it is Elijah, along with Moses, who appears and tells Jesus of his need to go Jerusalem to accomplish his “Exodus” from this world (Luke 9:31).  

 

But Jesus departs from the example of Elijah.   He scolds the disciples for wanting to burn down the Samaritans.   His calling is to proclaim God’s liberation, not to punish those who reject him.   Earlier, sending his disciples out, he tells them to react to rejection by simply moving on: “dust off your shoes and be on your way” (Luke 9:5).  Then when a disciple wants Jesus to silence a healer who uses Jesus’ name in exorcisms but is not one of his followers, Jesus says simply, “Let him do as he wishes.  If he’s not against us, he’s with us” (Luke 9:50).   No fire from heaven for Jesus. 

 

 

For him on the way of the cross, the model prophet is not Elijah or even Moses.  It’s Jonah.  The Book of Jonah is read in its entirety in synagogue on the Day of Atonement, and was clearly important for Jesus.  Though the prophet at first runs away because he just can’t bear bringing repentance and salvation to people who hate him, and is brought to accept his call only by miraculously surviving being swallowed by a great fish, though even near the end of the story he whines about the burning sun, the dead gourd bush, and having to preach at great personal risk in the big city, Jonah ultimately finds compassion for its inhabitants and follows through.   He offers with boldness God’s grace to the people of Nineveh, and they turn to God.  When people ask Jesus for a sign, he says he can give no sign to them at all, other than the sign of Jonah.    Suffering in love even for those who despise him, Jonah brings them to God.  His is a sign of hope:  after three days in the belly of the Great Fish, he comes back to life. 

 

Jesus does not call down fire from heaven like Elijah.  He does not, like Elisha, send she-bears to kill rude teenagers mocking his bald pate (2 Kings 2:15, 23-4).   Like Jonah, he proclaims the gracious forgiveness and love of God, even if it means his death.  He proclaims it to those who reject him:  the sign of Jonah indeed.  

 

Jesus calls his followers to follow his way of self-sacrificing compassion, the ultimate escape from tribe and party.  Earlier in this same chapter of Luke, after Peter affirms his faith that Jesus is Messiah, Jesus tells him that being Messiah means suffering and dying.   And he says that all who follow him must also take up their own cross as well.  

 

That’s why in today’s reading, Jesus seems so harsh to the would-be follower who begs for a day or so to bury his father.  That’s why he won’t let another even say farewell to his loved ones.   Elijah gives Elisha time to say farewell and settle things.  But Jesus knows the way of suffering and compassion is so hard that you must set your face toward your goal, and not look back: “Let the dead bury their dead; keep your hand on the plow.” 

 

This is a sharp contrast from the scene last week, when Jesus tells the Gerasene demoniac whom he has healed “You’ve suffered enough.  Go back to your loved ones and family and share with them the grace God has shown you.”  Jesus has hardened his face.  He is on the way to Jerusalem.  And he expects us to be on the way with him. 

 

That’s why he says, “Keep your eyes forward, and your hand on the plow. No turning back and no regrets!”

 

Jesus is saying we must replace our particular loves and obligations to larger ones.  We must be willing to put aside tribe, family, nation, and all other special obligations to look for serving all, and welcoming all, especially those who hate us, those against whom we may have a grudge.

 

But we all inevitably run into compassion fatigue.  And it is here, I think, that all of us, at one time or another, loosen our grip on the plow and look back.   Jesus in Gethsemane certainly had second thoughts and doubts.  Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. did too. 

In the middle of the Montgomery Alabama bus boycott in early 1956, he lost hope.  The boycott was not working, and seemed to be falling apart.  Early in the evening, an anonymous caller had growled out, “If you aren’t out of this town in three days, we’re going to blow your brains out and blow up your house.”  King couldn’t sleep, and drank coffee most of the night.  This is what he later said happened:

“. . . I bowed down over that cup of coffee . . . I prayed a prayer and I prayed out loud that night. I said, ‘Lord, I’m down here trying to do what’s right. I think I’m right. I think the cause we represent is right. But Lord I must confess that I’m weak now. I’m faltering. I’m losing my courage. And I can’t let the people see me like this because if they see me weak and losing my courage, they will [too]’”  (Samuel Freeman, Upon This Rock, 143).    

The words of the African American spiritual, based on today’s gospel, came to him, “Keep your hand on the plow, hold on, hold on.”  And things turned around.

 
Sisters and brothers, it is hard to be kingdom people.  It is hard to follow Jesus on the way of suffering compassion to Jerusalem. It is easy to regret what we have had to give up for Jesus. It is easy to let our fatigue distract us, and leave is whining under the gourd bush like Jonah.  It is easy to let the prospect of the cross cow us, force us into timidity.  But we must not lose hope.  We must soldier on, follow Jesus, and give to all the sign of Jonah—compassionate service despite it all. 
 
Keep your hands on the plow.  Hold on, Hold on.

 

In the name of God, Amen.  

 

Sweet Amid Bitter (midweek)

Sweet amid bitter

Fr. Tony’s Paw Prints Message

June 24, 20122

 

“The hour is coming, indeed it has come, when you will be scattered, each to your own home, and will leave me alone.  Yet I am not alone, for the Father is with me.  I have said this to you, that in me you may have peace.  In the world, you will have tribulation.  But be of good cheer: I have overcome the world.” 

(John 16:30-33)

 

The strange thing about this saying of Jesus in John’s Gospel is that Jesus is pictured saying it at the very moment when he knows he will be delivered over to the Romans for death.  “I have overcome the world,” right as it seems that the world has overcome him. 

 

This upside down, topsy-turvy take on the world and suffering is reflected in other sayings by Jesus:  “your pain will turn into joy” (John 16:20), “to gain life, you must first lose it (Luke 9:23), and “pick up your cross, and follow me” (Mark 8:34).

 

An old Zen story tells of a traveler who is surprised by a tiger.  He runs, the tiger pursuing.  Coming to a cliff, the man grabs a vine and swings down over the edge.  The tiger waits above, sniffing at the suspect vine.  The man looks down: there, far below, is another tiger looking up, waiting to eat him.   Then, to make things worse, two mice, one white and one black, start to gnaw away at the vine!  The man notices a small wild strawberry growing in the rock beside him.  With his one free hand, he reaches out to pluck and eat the berry.  How sweet it tasted!

 

Suffering is hard.  It takes patience when all our resources are used up.  It takes hope when no more hope is left.  Graceful suffering means not regretting what has been lost, instead focusing on what little we are able to do.  It means letting go of trying to control outcomes, and only thinking about what next step we must take. 

 

George MacDonald wrote, “The Son of God suffered unto death, not that man might not suffer, but that their suffering might be like his.”    Praying to a God who has suffered, and indeed, still suffers, helps us meet what we cannot avoid.   Knowing that Jesus is right there on the cross along with us helps us see with him the victory even when things seem darkest. 

 

Grace and Peace,

Fr. Tony+ 

 

 

 

An Army of Demons (Proper 7C)

 

“An Army of Demons”
Second Sunday after Pentecost (Proper 7C)
8 a.m. and 10:00 said Eucharist with hymns

19 June 2022
Homily
St. Mark’s Episcopal Church, Medford OR

The Rev. Dr. Anthony Hutchinson, homilist

Isaiah 65:1-9; Psalm 22:18-27; Galatians 3:23-29; Luke 8:26-39

Lord, you trouble our peace,

you step upon our guarded shore

and confront our chaos:

may we who are divided and colonized by the forces of death

learn from you to speak our own name and proclaim your works of life;

through Jesus Christ, Tamer of Legions.

 

Most healing stories in the gospels are pretty simple:  There’s an afflicted person, and Jesus fixes them.  Here, Jesus confronts what seems to be a primal force of nature, uncontrollable and uncontrolled. “For a long time [the afflicted man] had worn no clothes… Many times [the demon] had seized him; he was kept under guard and bound with chains and shackles, but he would break the bonds and be driven into the wilds.”  This guy has been through the wringer—multiple possessions, getting worse until he ends up raving, naked, and bleeding in a graveyard.  Here is something deeper and darker than normal illness, something intractable and overwhelming.

 

Jesus starts to cast the demon out; it argues with him, “Why am I any of your business?   Don’t hurt me!”   Jesus asks the demon its name, a prelude to exorcism in that day and age. It replies, “We are legion.”  Not very helpful: more a taunt than a name.  “Legion” was a 6,000 soldier-strong battalion in the Roman Army.   “My name?  I am so numerous as to be almost chaotic, as strong as the Roman imperium, and as violent as an army.  My name? Legion.”    

 

These demons are violent and expect the same of Jesus.  They call him Son of God but think this just means someone more violent and powerful than they are: “Don’t torment us, or cast us into the pit!”  But instead, without using violence, he drives them out of the poor man.  He even gives them their wish, to go into a herd of swine.  But alas, the violence of the demons is just too overpowering: the pigs panic and run headlong into the sea, drowning.  This terrifies everyone there. They beg Jesus to leave, just as afraid of violence from him as the demons. 

 

This story is about healing a mental illness, since people then blamed demons for madness. But “demons” also had another meaning.  They often are the personification not just of personal interior conflicts, but also of the unseen movers behind the world we see, the drivers we cannot see or explain.  When Paul talks about “thrones, dominions, rulers, and powers” (Col. 1:16) in God’s creation, he is thinking of spiritual beings, whether angelic or demonic, at work in the world around us.    We identify these same forces more abstractly, and less personally. We call them institutions, cultures, governments, corporations, power structures, ideologies, and value systems.

 

That’s why the great social conscience theologian of our age, Walter Wink, entitled his books Naming…, Unmasking…, and, Engaging the Powers.   He saw with clear vision these dark forces in the world around us that fight against God’s good intention for creation: abundance, peace, and justice.

 

We have seen dark forces at work in our country these last few weeks: a gunman’s racist murder of 10 African-Americans who were grocery shopping in Buffalo New York on May 14, the murder of one and serious wounding of 5 Taiwanese-American Christians worshipping in a Santa Ana California Church on May 17 by someone with a grudge against Taiwan, the slaughter of 19 first graders and their teachers in Uvalde Texas on May 24 by someone who felt he had been ill used by the school, and just a couple of days ago, the killing of three people at a church potluck at St. Stephen’s Episcopal Church in Birmingham Alabama by gunman described by police as “an occasional attendee” of the Church.    

 

These incidents are just part of an almost unending stream of mass killings using fire arms, a bloody litany that has gone for years: enraged and unstable men—most of them young—using military weaponry to kill people targeted because of their race, their gender, their religion, their sexual orientation, or sexual identity.  Children are targeted because they are helpless, easy targets for murderous rage especially ones with a grudge against the children’s school or community.    

 

I will not demean this pulpit by making it a political platform, so I am not going to talk about specific reasons for this horror, or what effective steps we might take to end it.  But the Gospel requires us to name evil.  It may help us see things more clearly. 

 

Demons, primal and intractable as Legion, possess us as a people.  These demons are not named Azazel or Beelzebub.  We call them by abstract names, and Jesus has something to say to each:

Violence:  It seems that the violence that plagues us is uncontrollable, just like Legion.   We glorify violence in our arts, have movies that tell stories of the good guys blowing the bad guys away, use armed force as a major component of our foreign policy, proclaim it in our political memes, and think that capital punishment is the ultimate solution to horrible crime.  Guns are an important part of this culture of violence.  Richard Slotkin in Gunfighter Nation: The Myth of the Frontier in Twentieth Century America says that our culture embraces the idea that there is no problem so severe that it wouldn’t improve if we could just shoot someone.  Walter Wink called this the false “myth of redemptive violence.”   To this, Jesus says, “those who live by the sword will die by it,” and “if someone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him your left.”

 

Fear:  Closely tied to this fascination with violence, is fear.  Most people who buy guns and who argue for no restrictions on gun ownership appeal to “self-defense” as their motivation.  They buy guns and want others to buy guns because of fear.   Fear makes us hunger at a banquet, be stingy with abundance, and externalize all our problems.  To this, Jesus says, “be not afraid, I am with you.”  

 

Rejection of the Stranger: Blaming our problems on someone else, we scapegoat.  We make them bear the blame and take it outside the wall.  To this Jesus says, “welcome and care for the alien and foreigner, for you too were once aliens,” and “the only thing that will matter on the last day will be whether you cared for the most vulnerable and least able to care for themselves.” 

 

Disgust:  Blaming our problems on other people might seem a bit too unfair. So we say “love the sinner hate the sin.”  We objectify evil and bad and identify it with anything with which we are unfamiliar or uncomfortable.  Disgust is the most common emotion we experience as we do this; we see the object of our disgust as impure, unclean, corrupt.  Disgust is an instinctual emotion that tries to keep us safe by keeping us from eating or touching poisonous or contaminated things.  But when it becomes part of a system of exclusion or oppression, it is a demon of great power.   Using any reason—different sex, language, cultural practices, sexual orientation, skin color or hair texture, being a vulnerable school child—any reason to take away in our minds the image of God in a human being and replace it with a cartoon caricature of evil is wickedness itself.  Homophobia is a sin.  Sexism is a sin.  Racism is a sin.  Anti-Semitism is a sin.  Xenophobia and nativist political ideology are a sin.  Hating people because they seem more privileged and loved than us—that’s a sin too. It’s that simple.   To this demon of disgust at the stranger, Jesus says, “Love each other.  Treat others as you would be treated.  Pray for your enemies and bless those who misuse you.” 

 

Rage and Hatred: whether the result of being bullied, excluded, or not getting the privilege we think we deserve, murderous rage is behind almost all of these horrors.  To this, Jesus says, “Each day, do not let the sun set on your anger. Forgive.” He does not ask us to be doormats, helpless and willing victims, but he insists that when we hold others accountable for their actions we do so peacefully, and never lose sight of their humanity.    

 

Power, Control, and Wealth:  The gun lobby draws its strength from the money of gun manufacturers and merchants and the greed of politicians eager to sell their souls for power.  To those in the thrall of these demons, Jesus says “You need to lose your life in order to save it,” “not as I will, but as you will,” and “You cannot serve both God and money.”  

 

Madness: the demon that afflicted that naked man in Gerasa, clearly afflicts some of these killers.  Jesus shows us the example: help them.  Care for them.  Even madness can be healed. 

 

“Righteous” Anger:  Some of the killers point to their scripture’s rage and desire to punish evil as a model for their monstrous actions.  Unhappily, the Scriptures of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam all contain a few passages that incite violence against the ungodly and the impure.   These do not represent the heart of God.  These same Scriptures also all dream of a world from which murderous violence has been finally exorcised.  The prophets sing of a world where swords have become farming tools and where natural enemies dwell in peace together. All major faiths teach that God’s most basic nature is steadfast loving kindness.

 

Some many demons!  One definition of insanity is always trying the same thing over and over again, and expecting different results.   In America, guns and our obsession with power, privilege, and wealth have possessed us, made us insane. 

 

Those songs of the prophets tell of a world no longer haunted by war, horror, or hunger.  This is what God wants for us.  

Legion, breaking all the chains and bonds, bursts forth to terrorize us. Legion brings us to the grave mourning again and again.  We wait in the graveyard, head bloodied and body aching, for deliverance.  We—gay, straight, trans, cis, whites, blacks, Latinos, Muslims, Christians, Jews, Indians, Americans long here and newly arrived—we wait and we hope. We, not them and us.  And we pray that those songs of freedom and peace open all our hearts so we work together to drive away the army of demons.   We must work to change things.  To do otherwise is to accept the fate of the Gadarene swine. 

 

Jesus in today’s story assures us one day we will sit together again, clothed and in our right minds.  

 

Amen.

Lover, Beloved, and Love Itself (Trinity Sunday)

 

Lover, Beloved, and Love Itself
Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity

Sunday after Pentecost, 12 June 2022 
Homily preached at 8:00 a.m. said, 10:00 a.m. sung Eucharist 
Parish Church of St. Mark, Medford Oregon

The Rev. Fr. Anthony Hutchinson, SCP, Ph.D., homilist

In the name of the Holy and Triune God:

Lover, Beloved, and Love Itself. Amen.

 

 

Today is Trinity Sunday, a celebration of that most theological of all doctrines.   For many of us here in “spiritual but not religious” Pacific Northwest, both those words—theology and doctrine—tend to be trigger words.  They have an intimidating, threatening ring to them.  For many of us, they are redolent of dry and dusty intellectualism that at best kills love and the spirit, and, at worst, hurls authoritarian anathemas, excommunicating and burning witches, scientists, and adherents of (gasp!) heresy.  That’s another trigger word:  even mentioning it summons images of Grand Inquisitors violently forcing confessions and renunciations out of people whose freedom of conscience and religion should have been respected.  

 

It seems to us, especially here in the West of the United States, where "none of the above" is the largest religious grouping, that freedom of religion and freedom of belief implies that all religious opinions are equally valid, and have an equal shot of arriving at Truth.  Here in the woo-woo State of Jefferson, however, where Iawasca Vine Spirit Quests and magic mushrooms and peyote buttons, or just plain Everclear grain alcohol are used by some instead of Communion wafers and wine, and have won Supreme Court protection as expressions of religious freedom, our general inclination to think that any religion or none at all is good is shown to be problematic.  Not all faith is created equal, though we must act as if this is so if we are to live in a society free of inquisitors and theocrats.  Quirky, irrational, and downright crack-pot ideas and practice, though you are entitled under our constitution to practice them, simply cannot be on par with more mature and nuanced faith.  For those of us who flinch to hear this, just think of bad religion from the other direction: fundamentalism, racism, homophobia and patriarchy tarted up in religious robes, now demanding under the banner of “religious freedom” special protections to enforce their kind of religion on others. 

 

The great English social and literary critic and Christian apologist, Gilbert Keith Chesterton 100 years ago defended the idea of orthodoxy versus heresy, fully aware of the disrepute the idea had fallen into in a pluralistic society.  For Chesterton, orthodoxy was truth, well-balanced, fully rounded, growing irresistibly from the ground of comprehensive reason and faith, and always leaning toward greater, broader truth.  Heresy, however, was in a sense truth gone mad.  One part of the truth was seized upon in a monomania and focused on to the exclusion of all other truth.   For him, heresy was to be rejected not because it was too broad and open, but rather, because it was too narrow and restricted in its view. 

 

“But how can dusty doctrine compare with the reality of experience?” C.S. Lewis in Mere Christianity mentions a friend who says he prefers the spirituality of going out and experiencing the beauty of God’s creation, to the unreality of the dry and deadly musings of theologians any day.  Lewis writes:

 

“[One who] look[s] at the Atlantic from the beach, and then goes and looks at a map of the Atlantic, … will be turning [in some way] from something real to something less real… The map is admittedly only colored paper, but there are two things you have to remember about it. In the first place, it is based upon what … thousands of people have found out by sailing the real Atlantic. In that way it has behind it masses of experience just as real as the one you could have from the beach; only, while yours would be a single glimpse, the map fits all those different experiences together. In the second place, if you want to go anywhere, the map is absolutely necessary. As long as you are content with walks on the beach your own glimpses are far more fun than looking at a map” (p. 154).

 

Trinity Sunday is a celebration of a doctrine developed in the fourth Century by the Cappadocian Fathers.  Rooted in Biblical ideas and phrases, it is found nowhere as such in the Bible.  But that doesn’t make it any less true or crucial. 

 

Liberation theologian Leonardo Boff summarizes the Holy Trinity this way: 

 

“We believe that God is communion rather than solitude.  Believing in the Trinity means that at the root of everything that exists and subsists there is movement; there is an eternal process of life, of outward movement, of love.  Believing in the Trinity means that truth is on the side of communion rather than exclusion; consensus translates truth better than imposition; the participation of many is better than the dictate of a single one” (Leonardo Boff, Holy Trinity, Perfect Community).    

 

Here is the core of the doctrine of the Holy Trinity, as well as the core of our community life.    Community, consensus, free give and take and mutual service—this is what makes us who we are.

 

The heart of Christianity is not in theology or doctrine.  It is in the experience of the living God in our lives and our loving service to and compassion with others.  “The first commandment is love God.  The second is on par with this: love your neighbor.”   This is the life-giving heart of the Church.  The early Church leaders got into the business of theologizing and defining orthodox doctrine only when they realized that some ways of thinking about God and ourselves were not life-giving.

 

How you think impacts on how you experience life and the world.  How you believe colors how you live.  If you believe that God is a hate-filled, violent, and bloodthirsty deity, you probably will emulate some of these traits.   If you believe that God is a complete mystery, unrevealed and unrevealing, that kind of takes away any ability for God to actually touch you or change your life.   If you believe you are at heart a depraved wretch, you may from time to time actually act like one.

 

 “Heresy” in Greek simply means a choice, or alternative.  The Church over the centuries has identified many such “choices” as something to be avoided.  A history of these controversies make a very sorry story, one where Christians have not been their best at following Jesus.  But the Church first began to be concerned about such things only when it saw the harm that some “choices” wrought on a comprehensive and healthy Christian life.  

 

Judging even by today’s inclusive standards, many of these condemned ideas are problematic.  Believing that the Son was created or begotten in time, and that Jesus thus became the Son, technically called Arianism or subordinationism, suggests that the only relationship possible with God is simple submission to higher authority.  This works all sorts of mischief in the life of the Church and society. 

 

Believing that the father, son, and holy spirit are simply three separate masks of, three separate ways we experience, or three different functions of, the one person God, technically called modalism or patripassionism, also robs us of community at the heart of all things and leads to submission to domination as the sole way of relating to God and to each other.  It makes it hard to see the Godhead as the Greek fathers saw it, a perichoresis, or great dance. 

 

Believing that the farther, son, and holy spirit are three separate persons, or beings, even tightly connected ones, is technically polytheism.  And abandoning the idea of God as a monad, as a unity, at the heart of all things entails all sorts of strange ideas, most often “any one’s opinion is as good as the next persons.”  

 

I know how beloved some of the newer more gender inclusive three-fold ways of talking about God are for many of us here.  “Earth maker, Pain bearer, Life Giver” touches us because it is grounded in things we touch and feel.  But I fear it obscures the inter-relationships at the heart of God: it is modalist.  “Father, Son, and Holy Spirit” may seem too androcentric.  But when Jesus taught us to call God our father, our abba, he was not emphasizing gender, but parental intimacy.  Perhaps the Order of St. Helena’s use, “Source of Being, Incarnate Word, and Sacred Breath” might work.   I think, though, St. Augustine of Hippo, in his great classic de Trinitate, said it best:  Lover, Beloved, and Love Itself.   This preserves the relationships in the Trinity rather than giving us different functions and reducing each of the persons to one of these.   It is important to be inclusive, and to keep a clear mind on the social nature of God. 

 

Beloved family members here at St. Mark’s:  We are blessed to be here in a loving and serving, and welcoming community.  We are blessed to be gathered here seeking further guidance in our sail out on the ocean, in our walk in the beautiful wood around us, in our contemplative mysticism.  God is love, and where love is, there is God.  

 

Thanks be to God. Amen

 

 

A Reason for Eating Japanese Food this Week (Ember Days)

 

A Reason for Eating Japanese Food this Week

Fr. Tony’s Paw Prints  Message 

the e-zine of St. Mark's Episcopal Church, Medford, OR

June 10, 2022

 

Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday this week are in the liturgical calendar called “Ember Days.” These days of fasting or abstaining from eating flesh took place four times a year to allow, like Rogation Days, for special prayers for a good agricultural cycle.   They traditionally take place on the Wednesday, Friday and Saturday of a week during European Spring planting (after the First Sunday of Lent), Summer growth (after Pentecost), Autumn harvest (after the feast of the Holy Cross on September 14), and Winter fallowing and early plantings (near the third Sunday of Advent, close to the Feast of St. Lucy, December 13, which was the Winter solstice under the old Julian Calendar). A late Medieval couplet served as an aide-memoire for when these fasts took place:

“Fasting days and Emberings be
Lent, Whitsun, Holyrood, and Lucie.” 

(Rood is Middle English for a crucifix; Whitsunday “White Sunday” is Pentecost, when baptisms took place, the candidates all arrayed in white.)

“Ember” here doesn’t have anything to do with coals or campfires.  It comes from Anglo-Saxon ymb-ren, “a run around [the sun].”  These agricultural fasts were called in Latin Quatuor Tempora, “the four times,” a phrase that gave rise to a Japanese term for a special way of preparing seafood and vegetables.  Jesuits from Portugal set up their mission to Japan in Nagasaki in the 1500s.  They asked local cooks to prepare meatless meals suitable for fasts by deep-frying shrimp and vegetables, very much in the style of Portuguese peixinhos da horta, hearty deep-fried vegetables, and its cousin in Goa, the Portuguese colony in India, pakora.  The Japanese cooks made the dish their own, creating a lighter, less starchy crust.  Mistaking the Portuguese missionaries' name for the occasion for this food for the food itself, they called their new dish tempura.  Yum. 

Fifth century Western Church fathers like Leo the Great and Jerome speak of Ember Days as special seasonal fasts for agriculture.  By the end of that century, they had become associated with ministers, those sent out to work in “the Lord’s vineyard and harvest”: Pope Gelasius (d. 496 CE) says that Ember Days are appropriate times for ordinations.   In modern times, they serve as occasions for reflection, reporting, and prayer for those preparing for Holy Orders, who are required to write on Ember Days reports to their Bishops on their progress. 

We all in baptism are called as ministers of the Gospel, regardless of our status as clergy or lay.  Ember Days give us an occasion to reflect on our ministries. 

 

How are you doing in fulfilling the charge you received in baptism?  The baptismal covenant in the Prayer Book tells us what the calling of all Christians is: 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 the Lord; proclaim by word and example the Good News of God in Jesus Christ; seek and serve Christ in all persons; work for justice and peace and treat every person with dignity.

 

Making this our own starts always in a process of discernment, by which we come to understand what our own particular vocation is, what it is that God is calling us specifically to.  Presbyterian theologian Frederick Beuchner defined vocation as where our deepest joy meets the world’s deepest need.  Finding out where we are energized, “in the flow,” and in sober deep pleasure, and matching this to the needs and hunger of those about us is the principal task of discernment.  Attentiveness is key, paying close attention to where our joy lies.  

 

Your efforts in the ministry you are called to individually—are they sufficient?  Do they have enough focus?  Could they be broader, wider, or deeper?    How might you better equip yourself for more effective ministry?  

 

I encourage all of us this week of Ember Days to reflect on our ministry and find ways to better fulfill our vocation.   And maybe we should at some point go out for Japanese food. 

 

Grace and Peace,    Fr. Tony+

 

 

The four seasons, depicted in paintings by Pieter Bruegel.