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Dear People of Christ Church,
This week, I write with a mixture of joy and sadness. Joy at the amazing gift of the ten year anniversary of ministry celebration on Sunday—truly, it is a marvelous gift to be your priest—and sadness, with the death yesterday of Christ Church friend Paula Tatarunis. Paula had been on a complicated road of recovery from an AVM in her brain that came to light in February, and had been in various states of consciousness since then, almost recovering in April and having a setback when her brain began to bleed in a procedure intended to prevent future strokes. Paula was a brilliant, creative, dedicated, thoughtful, and just generally remarkable human being. She went from lurking in the back pew to being in charge of the altar guild in about five minutes, and helped to keep the choir together in some pretty lean times. She read everything from classical and medieval theology to inter-church debates over Anglican polity with the same intellectual fervor, humor, and some skepticism. She was a doctor at the clinic at Lawrence Memorial in Medford, but had also spent time as a “jailhouse doc” at MCI Norfolk, with a deep passion for justice for the men who were incarcerated there. Paula never rested on anything so simple as tradition or custom in her own spirituality, but was unfailingly dedicated to embodying the wider church tradition, setting the altar with a military precision pretty impressive for someone who was more of a pacifist.

Over the years, Paula came to find that she and Jesus were working through some differences that felt irreconcilable to her. The amount of translation she found herself needing to do to be in church was just too much. The mystery of God for Paula was silence and stillness, out taking pictures of dead weeds. God was harder to find for her in the particularity of Jesus and the practices of the church. We emailed off and on throughout her sojourn away—she was always still wrestling, always still seeking. Last December she came one Sunday and as we were emailing afterwards said it felt good, but that she felt like her vocation was in the outer darkness. She had so much light, though. It was a privilege to be her priest and a daunting wonder to plan her funeral for this Saturday.

I don’t know how other clergy do it, but I fall in love with each of you every single time, and it’s always bound for heartbreak. I cry at your funerals and your baptisms, just astonished at the grace of God and the fleeting nature of it all. This, of course, is the way of the cross—it’s the shape of human life that loss and grief weave through unbearable beauty. One of the graces of the time of accompanying Paula through her journey these last months has been getting to know her husband, Darrell, who, though he dismisses himself as an “agnostic Jewish heathen” shows a love for his wife so deep I can only see God there. The way of the cross is the way of life, as, too, resurrection. Whatever Paula finally thought about the theology of the Trinity, I am so sure that Jesus was just as in love with Paula as those of us who were blessed enough to know her in her life.

Services for Paula will be at Christ Church this Saturday at 1pm, with a larger memorial service with poetry and jazz planned for late October.

Blessings,
Sara+

Dear People of Christ Church,
Tuesday, June 2, I hope you’ll join me for our “end of life issues” conversation. This is the third or fourth year our parish has offered this time, and there just aren’t enough words to say how important it is to grapple with these hard questions.

I write about death in this space a lot. I write about death when someone beloved to our congregation dies. I write about death when we host these conversations every year. I write about death as we get close to Thanksgiving—having everyone at the table is a good time to talk about end of life questions. I think about death a lot. But thinking and writing about death a lot isn’t the same as being okay with it.

And that’s why we have to practice.
That’s why we have to talk about death again and again and again, until we can get it from our brains into our hearts and back to our brains that death is part of life, that we have reason to trust God and trust those we love, that the “One who raised Jesus Christ from the dead will also give new live to our mortal bodies” through God’s indwelling Spirit (BCP 501). God is love. The love that makes us grieve for one another is the same love that gives us everlasting life. Our love for each other and the love of God are of one piece. God’s love weaves in and out of our own lives in each of us.

For those of us who are left behind, though, death is terrifying. We know who we are in relation to those around us. Our parents, friends, spouses, children—they help make us who we are. We fear not having those we love. Who will we be without them? So it seems easier to save up the hard conversations for later. It seems like maybe if we don’t talk about death, it won’t be real. But our denial of death doesn’t make it less real. The less we talk about what we want for the end of our life, the harder it is to face when it actually happens.

What kind of care do you want in case of a traumatic injury? Under what circumstances would you want to initiate a “Do Not Resuscitate” order? Is it important is to you to be at home when you die? What hymns do you want to be sung at your funeral? Do you want someone to offer a eulogy about you? What Gospel do you want to have preached? Are you a “many dwelling places” kind of person, or do you go for the beatitudes? Have you filled out a health care proxy form, and does your doctor have a copy? Would you consider leaving a gift to your church, or other organizations that are important to you, in your will?

The Apostle Paul wrote to the church in Rome,
I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Romans 8: 38-39)

Thanks be to God!

For our end of life issues “workbook,” see A Christian Prepares for Death

Blessings,
Sara+

Dear People of Christ Church,
Whenever I send out the e-crier during Thanksgiving week, I always share the litany from the prayer book for thanksgiving—a very theological idea for a secular holiday. This year, though, in addition to my gratitude for my life and our life together in this parish, I’m also carrying a heaviness of heart for our country, for the family of Michael Brown, and for all of the conflict, sorrow, and oppression that we are all enmeshed in in twenty first century America. There are so many wise people analyzing and speaking on this, so I won’t add to the sound waves other than to invite you to prayer and to remind us of our faith in a God who “makes all things new,” who also needs our hands and voices to make justice in the world. Every life, of every person of every color, matters. For an excellent reflection, see this from Bishop of Washington Marianne Budde and Dean Gary Hall of the National Cathedral. Our readings for the first Sunday are about keeping awake; we need to be awake not just to where Jesus is coming, but where we need to bring him.

On a very different note, but yet another question of life and death, I also want to pass on resources for conversations about end of life care. Every year, our own Rob Atwood, a social worker for hospice care and I lead a conversation about planning for the end of life. What kind of medical interventions do you think you want? Who is authorized to make those decisions for you? What hymns shall we sing at your funeral? Answering as many of these questions in advance as possible is one of the greatest gifts you can give your loved ones. The guide Rob and I put together is here.

Some other resources:

MOLST Medical Orders for Life-Sustaining Treatment is a Massachusetts state document that presents clear and concise summaries of choices that are made at the end of life; this is filled out by a patient in cooperation with their doctor

A 2013 WBUR story on home death care has fabulous information. One of the people they interview likens it to the choice for a home birth as not right for everyone, but still a right that everyone has.

The Conversation Project was founded by journalist Ellen Goodman and has locals like Liz Walker and Donald Berwick among their advising team, has great conversation starters and a “starter kit” you can download to get yourself thinking about what you want for the end of your life.

Finally, the Litany for Thanksgiving…
Let us give thanks to God for all the gifts so freely bestowed upon us.
For the beauty and wonder of your creation, in earth and sky and sea,
We thank you, God.
For all that is gracious in the lives of your people, revealing the image of Christ,
We thank you, God.
For our daily food and drink, our homes and families, and our friends,
We thank you, God.
For minds to think, and hearts to love, and hands to serve,
We thank you, God.
For health and strength to work, and leisure to rest and play,
We thank you, God.
For the brave and courageous, who are patient in suffering and faithful in adversity,
We thank you, God.
For all valiant seekers after truth, liberty, and justice,
We thank you, God.
For the communion of saints, in all times and places,
We thank you, God.
Above all, we give you thanks for the great mercies and promises given to us in Christ Jesus our God;
To Christ be praise and glory, with you, O Father, and the Holy Spirit, now and for ever.

Blessings,
Sara+

Dear People of Christ Church,
This week, of course, I’m still reeling a little after Bishop Tom’s funeral on Saturday, which was just marvelous. You can find the text of Brother Geoffrey’s sermon here. One of the things that I have long loved about being an Anglican is that our worship is actually intended to accomplish something—at Holy Week I always talk about how we do the last week of Jesus’ life, with foot washing and prayers at the cross and celebration of the resurrection. It’s not an abstraction. The funeral on Saturday, too, did what it was supposed to do.

We laughed at stories like Tom telling a visitor to the monastery who asked about it that he was the only one wearing a cross because he was “monk of the month.” We cried when we sang “King of Glory, King of Peace,” Tom’s favorite hymn. We cried when the silence seemed to stretch forever when Brother James, who was to begin the Prayers of the People, just couldn’t speak.

We shared in the Eucharist that is the Body and Blood of Christ who unites us and in whom we find our peace, in whom, the dead are not dead and we all rise to life again. We cried—again—when the brothers sang the Song of Simeon—“ Lord, you now have set your servant free to go in peace as you have promised/ For these eyes of mine have seen the Savior, whom you have prepared for all the world to see.”

And so he is set free, and so are we.
There’s a really important tension to hold when we stand in the middle of life and death. We can say that Tom is set free, along with all of those names we printed in the bulletin on Sunday for All Saints Day, and believe that he is free and sees the glory of God face to face. We hold that reality in one hand. We treasure that promise that Jesus Christ has gone before us and by the grace and miracle of God defeated the power of death. In our other hand, we hold the reality that life is a wonderful, astonishing, and precious gift. In its messiness and mud as well as in its joy and laughter, life is a gift. To welcome death as also a gift is not to diminish the importance of our course on earth—holy as the dying was, the living was holy, too.

Brother Geoffrey quoted the second century bishop Irenaeus of Lyon—“the glory of God is the human person fully alive.” Fully alive includes grief as well as joy. For now, I’m trying to take my time for both.

Blessings,
Sara+

Dear People of Christ Church,
I’m passing on a letter to the diocese from Bishop Shaw, received this week. His date of retirement, as you may know, comes with the consecration of our new diocesan Bishop, Alan Gates, in just a few short weeks on September 13. This will be his last letter to us, as he says that Alan will take on such communication in the future. Bishop Tom was diagnosed with cancer not long after he announced his retirement in 2013, and has been a remarkable witness to the power of God’s love and healing in the midst of illness and the reality of death. His illness for him has been an occasion to trust in God, rather than fury against misfortune. Tom’s graceful sharing of his experience has been a profound gift, particularly for me, as I have been so shaped by his ministry. Please keep Tom and Alan in your prayers in these next weeks, as well as Tom’s family and his brothers at the Society of St John the Evangelist.
-Sara
* * * * *
My Sisters and Brothers,
As my date of retirement nears, I want to be in touch with all of you and to thank you for your continued expressions of care and concern. We have known since the beginning, when I was diagnosed with brain cancer in May of last year, that we are dealing with a difficult kind of cancer. We have been hopeful in the therapies we’ve pursued over these months, but we now know that for me there is no cure. At the recommendation of my medical team, I’ve now decided to pursue a course of treatment that will provide a good quality of life, though for how long, we can’t be sure.

As hard as this is to hear and to tell, I didn’t want this time to go by without letting all of you know where things are. My medical team continues to provide me with excellent care, and I have a wonderful community of support around me. My prayer feels different from day to day. Some days there is an expansiveness to it, and on other days, it isn’t so easy, though there aren’t too many of those days. But throughout, good days and more difficult days, I feel supported by you, the people of this diocese and beyond, and by your prayers, and I’ve felt my faith life grow in significant ways. I am looking forward to what God will bring in this new time.

You know, time too often in our culture is perceived as a problem; all of us, at some point, feel we don’t have enough of it. Yet, because of Jesus the Messiah, all time is now God’s time. It is part of the unfolding of God’s glory. We are invited into it as an experience of the presence of God. I believe that is where our prayer, where our life together in gathered community, where our participation with God in making all things new is taking us: into the heart of God.

May each of us be opened to the possibility and the hope offered through God’s gift of time.

Our bishop-elect, Alan, will keep you informed of changes in my condition going forward. I continue to cherish your cards and letters, and I want to say again how much I appreciate the years I’ve served as your bishop and all that you have taught me. I plan to be part of the upcoming consecration, and I look forward to joining you in welcoming our new bishop.

Please pray for me as I pray for you.

Faithfully,
Tom

Dear People of Christ Church,

I hope to see a lot of you this week-tomorrow, the art show, Saturday, the release of our own Gene Burkart’s posthumous work of collected essays (see below), and Sunday at the Mother’s Day Walk. Our walking is part of the diocesan-wide Season of Celebration and Service in honor of Bishop Shaw. It has been such a gift for me to be formed as a priest in his witness for justice and peace. Please join me in honoring Tom and in walking in the path of peace with those whose loved ones have been killed, whose deaths are not mourned with public grief and huge ceremony, whose killers are often not found.

In other topics of life and death, on May 18 we’ll have a conversation about end of life issues with our own Rob Atwood, who works as a hospice social worker while not helping out with Sunday readings. On Tuesday Christ Church hosted a day-long workshop for clergy and other caregivers about “Caring for Each Other in Life and Death” (see the tweets at #endlifecare) put on by the Massachusetts Council of Churches-it’s a conversation whose time has come.

Medical technology can do almost anything-life can be extended longer than ever before, and that’s a blessing. I don’t want to go back to a time before measles vaccines and chemotherapy. But our dedication to technology has also obscured the way that death is also part of life. Our bodies are gifts from God, wonderful gifts. In caring for ourselves we give glory to God, in using our skills and honoring our relationships and running and sleeping and loving. But we are also invited into a certain humility about our bodies-they are a gift, but they are also on loan.

As always, Anglican theology is pretty nuanced on the question. In our Church’s teaching about the end of life, we differentiate between “passive” and “active” ways in which death may be hastened. The passive withholding of treatment is an ethical choice; if there is no prognosis for recovery, the question becomes whether the patient’s dying process is being prolonged, as opposed to whether their actual life is being extended. When the ballot question on (depending on your position) physician assisted suicide/death with dignity came across, there were Episcopalians of good faith on both sides of the issue. I do think we need to be cautious about our judgments about what life is “meaningful”-one of the reasons I voted against the 2012 ballot initiative was that I worried about legitimating the notion that some lives are not worth living. From a disability rights perspective, that’s just not a precedent I want to be part of, even as I would be in favor of some of the outcomes of the adoption of such a law.

And there are a lot of legal issues-I learned this week that your next of kin may be the person the hospital calls first, but if there is a conflict with other family members about your care, only an authorized health care proxy has the right to make the final call. So please join us on the 17th-we’ll talk about some of the medical decisions that are made at the end of life, about Massachusetts law concerning decision making authorization, and also (and this part is kind of fun) planning your own funeral. There’s only one way to be sure that one hymn that you hate doesn’t get played… If you can’t make it check out the booklet we put together last year here or make an appointment to see me!

Blessings,
Sara+