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Dear People of Christ Church,
This week I’ve continued to mull over what it means to remain spiritually grounded in such a time as this; I preached on Sunday about having God’s vision of the beatitudes to see blessing in places where the world does not. Poverty, mourning, hunger, persecution—those are not particularly comfortable places to be. But Jesus calls them blessed, and calls us to see that as well.
This is a profound discipline: we must be grounded in the vision of God’s love and power as equally as we are opposed to hatred and violence. On the one hand, spiritual sustenance is easy to understand. Of course it’s important. What actually happens when we pray, though, can use some thinking-through. Prayer brings us before God, of course. We make ourselves available to love and be loved. The other important thing about prayer is that we are better able to put struggle, anxiety, and conflict in context. Prayer helps us to widen our view. We are not the saviors of the world. We have some work to do, but it’s not up to us completely.
Hopefully, being able to put ourselves and the world in the context of God’s love, we can also do so for those with whom we disagree. In all the best activism on the part of those who are oppressed, it can be easy to forget that it is hatred and fear that are the enemy, not the people who seem to promote them. In prayer, we glimpse a unitive reality in which we are equally in need of God’s grace and compassion. Even if just for a moment! Jesus tells us, “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled. When we are hungry for justice, we must know that even in our hunger we are being filled by the grace of God, as that hunger is God’s life living within us.
This evening, take a moment and really pray the beatitudes. Look with God’s eyes to see blessing in the world, and allow your heart to perceive it.
“Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
“Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.
“Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.
“Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled.
“Blessed are the merciful, for they will receive mercy.
“Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.
“Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God.
“Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
“Blessed are you when people revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.”

Blessings,
Sara+

Dear People of Christ Church,
Continued Advent blessings!

Every year we come to this season, and every year we need the Advent call to contemplation, wakefulness, and hope like the desert needs water. This year the Advent invitation to hope, in particular seems very timely. This is the one thing we are called to do in this season: to hope in preparation for the birth of Jesus, to hope in preparation for God’s presence in the world, and to hope for God’s presence in our own lives. One of my favorite explorations of Advent comes from the medieval monk Bernard of Clairvaux. He says there are actually three Advents. The first one is the one we know: the birth of God in the person of Jesus Christ, God taking on our human flesh. We spend these days counting down, lighting candles and eating chocolates, in preparation to be ready. The third Advent is the coming again of Christ, at the end of time: as we say in the Eucharistic prayer, “Christ has died, Christ is risen, Christ will come again.” Those are visible, in-the-world Advents. But there’s an Advent that comes in between those two in our chronological time. The second Advent is is the Advent of Christ every day: in our hearts and in our world. God invites us to cultivate a space for Jesus every day, not just Christmas. Bernard tells us: “If you wish to meet God, go as far as your own heart.” Thomas Merton was a great interpreter of Bernard: he emphasizes that part of how we connect to this second Advent is in humility, to accept that we must receive all from Christ and not lean on our own power or ego.

One of the fruits of this kind of humble living, I think, is non-judgment. That’s one of the lesser-heard Biblical values we’re looking at in our Advent series. This week we read the story of Jesus and the woman caught in adultery in the Gospel of John. Trying to whip Jesus into their frenzy of condemnation, the scribes and Pharisees ask him what they should do to her. But he ignores them; writing in the sand he stays apart, silent. When they push him, he replies: “Let anyone among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.” One by one they leave, and she’s alone. I chose that particular story because that line is so memorable, but as we read it together I was most moved by Jesus’ solidarity with her. I pictured the woman, afraid for her life, fearful that there would be no one to take her part. She’s alone; the other adulterous participant is not named, and not anywhere present. She has no recourse for justice. Jesus takes her side. Not only will he not condemn, he does so in the face of significant pressure to do so.

This Advent, here’s my wish list: to live in hope with that woman, that Jesus might come to my side. To live in trust, with Thomas Merton, that God will give me the grace to embody Jesus’ solidarity in this fragile world. To find time for silence, to find God in my heart in today’s Advent, as well as tomorrow’s.

Blessings,
Sara+

Dear People of Christ Church,
This week, I’ve been fortunate enough to take some retreat days at the convent at the Sisters of St Anne in Arlington. Rather than fill this space with words, I wanted to invite you to take a minute of prayer with an image of Jesus the sisters have in their garden. Jesus, here, is pictured as a king: crown and jewels and the whole nine yards. But he’s still on the cross.

He’s not the quarterback, not the class president, not the tycoon. There is nothing victorious about this king. That’s the point.

Where do you meet Christ on the cross, still a king, still vulnerable and dying? What ministry does he make possible in you? How can you find ways to serve that Christ in the world?

Blessings,
Sara+

Dear People of Christ Church,
I’ve been continuing to think about the sound of “sheer silence” that we heard God speaking in to the prophet Elijah in the book of Kings reading for Sunday. At vestry we always have a check in question for people to share something of themselves before we start our work. My question for this month was “Where have you heard God in sheer silence lately?”

Our answers were, I think, pretty typical for any group of 21st century people. Kissing a sleeping child goodnight is about as exquisite as any silence can be, and holy, too. There’s silence in listening for God to invite us into the next step in our lives, silence in being with a person who is dying, silence in being finished with a huge project, our anxieties stilled for a moment. We’re all doing our best to find God in stillness. The lovely thing, too, is that you are also all doing your best to be present with God in the noise. That came up in our Episcopal Church newcomer class as well—as people of faith we long for a deeper sense of connection with God and want to include God in more places in our lives, wherever we find ourselves and whatever we’re doing. Praying for others and finding ways to pray always—and all ways—is all part of a life of seeking God.

This message from the SSJE brothers’ daily “word” came through on Tuesday morning:
Silence invites slowing down, restoring sleep, savoring food, being attentive to self and the Divine. It’s a “healing gift” we intentionally foster to give and receive. Compared to the cacophony of the world, silence keeps catching us off-guard, inviting wonder at being so loved by God. —Br. Luke Ditewig

Brother Luke, I think, nails something here—that any time we can be more intentional and focused on what’s in front of us is a time for interior silence, no matter what is going on outside of us. Silence leaves us open to God, allowing us to close off our own busy-ness and sense of anxiety and responsibility. Silence isn’t the same as quiet. You can have an interior monologue that shouts all alone in an empty room; the background noise can take over: What do you have to do later? What’s the weather going to be like when you’re on vacation? What if your babysitter is late again? And on and on. Not silent. At the same time, you can have an enormous crowd around you shouting and laughing, while you take a single sip of the drink in front of you and feel an interior stillness that can’t be shaken.

Where’s your quiet? Where’s your noise? Where is God waiting in the silence under both of those?

Blessings,
Sara+

Miss the sermon on 6/19? It’s here!

Dear People of Christ Church,
As we continue to unfold ourselves, both personally and culturally, from the grief of the violence in Orlando last week, I wanted to share instead of more words, more prayers. Others have offered wonderful words of challenge, comfort, and Christ—most recently two posts from my Lutheran friend, The Rev. Angel Marrero, pastor of Santuario Waltham: A Pastoral Response from a Gay Latino Priest and, for considering the place of the church in anti-LGBT sentiment, The Pulse Martyrs: Confession Before Communion.

In the meantime, I offer only prayers—here are some I compiled for our Interfaith Vigil service on Monday. We had a beautiful service of light and prayer, and our collection for Waltham House, our local LGBT group home for teens, raised close to $300.

From one another and from God, we pray forgiveness for our part in the way our communities have been bruised and our world torn apart. We repent for words and deeds that provoke prejudice, hatred, and revenge. God of compassion and healing
Hear our prayer

Deliver us from suspicions and fears that stand in the way of reconciliation, particularly holding in love those who are Muslim who experience discrimination. God of compassion and healing
Hear our prayer

Deliver us from our unwillingness to confront our own privilege: racial, economic, by gender or sexual orientation, God of compassion and healing
Hear our prayer

For the community of the Pulse nightclub. For bartenders and bouncers, for DJs and dancers. For all who made it a place of refuge and safety, that a sanctuary may be restored. God of compassion and healing
Hear our prayer

We pray in hope that our beautiful world can be transformed through love and beauty. For all who are lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender. For hearts to know God’s love revealed in all God’s children. God of compassion and healing
Hear our prayer

We pray in thanksgiving for our many religious traditions, and for the many names by which you are known, O God. For Yhwh, Allah, Spirit, and Christ. God of compassion and healing
Hear our prayer

We pray for fair politics and brave leaders. For an end to gun violence, for an end to the quiet assumption that nothing can be done and that carnage is inevitable. Give us the gift of holy hope,
And by your grace and healing presence join our hearts to yours.

Blessings,
Sara+

Miss the sermon on 6/12? It’s here!

Dear People of Christ Church,
When in my sermon on Sunday I talked about the place of fear in American culture, about the latest shooting in Colorado when a gunman murdered three people at a Planned Parenthood clinic, I did not expect so soon to need to review my comments in light of yet another attack, yet another tragic scene of mayhem and tragedy. Whether at the hands of Christians or Muslims or white supremacists, our world knows tragedy, suffering, and evil. Jesus knew these as well.

What I said on Sunday still holds—the Gospel good news of Jesus’ invitation to lift up our heads and not be afraid (Luke 21:25-36). Even as the National Rifle Association insists that guns make us safer. Even as every politician, from Donald Trump to Barack Obama, insists that war can lead to peace, Jesus tells us to lift up our heads and not be afraid. Even as it seems the world is spinning out of control, Jesus’ answer is the same: do not be afraid.

An image from the New York Daily News front page response to politicians’ weak announcements of “prayers for the victims” declares boldy that “God isn’t fixing this.” Some people have said they’re condemning prayer, but I don’t think that’s it at all. The condemnation is of empty prayer, prayer that isn’t backed up by action. We do need to pray. Sometimes it feels like it’s all we can do, and surely it’s the first thing we should do. But we also need to allow our prayers and God’s will for the world to soak into our lives, to permeate every cell, so they also lead us to act. The guns used in the San Bernardino shooting were purchased legally. The guns were operating as intended. God can’t fix that. God can only fix us.

And the Spirit moves in the world. That’s the other thing—Advent reminds us that God is acting. That’s where there is cause for hope. Hopefully, we will cease to fear each other. Hopefully, as the Spirit moves in the world, Muslims will cease being targeted for their faith. Hopefully, as the Spirit moves in the world, our hearts and minds will be moved to act to prevent violence. My friend Tom, who pastors at First Lutheran, told a story today in our interfaith clergy group about how he had gone to the Mosque on Moody Street the day after the Paris attacks to ask how he and his congregation could be of support in the days ahead. Imam Abdallah told him just one thing—to know that Islam is a religion of peace and love. Peace and love. As a Christian, I don’t want to claim the person who committed the attacks in Colorado last week any more than he wants to claim any terrorist acts committed in the name of his religion. We need to know and respect one another for who we are.

Finally, in our prayer and sadness, it seems important also to remember that these are the places where God enters. I’ll share this quote from Jean Vanier, a theologian who founded the L’Arche communities for those who are developmentally disabled and those who are not to live together.

Our brokenness is the wound
through which the full power of God
can penetrate our being and transfigure us in God.
Loneliness is not something from which we must flee
but the place from where we can cry out to God,
where God will find us and we can find God.
Yes, through our wounds
the power of God can penetrate us
and become like rivers of living water
to irrigate the arid earth within us.
Thus we may irrigate the arid earth of others,
so that hope and love are reborn.

– Jean Vanier
The Broken Body (1988, Paulist Press). Quoted by Suzanne Guthrie at www.edgeofenclosure.org

Blessings,
Sara+

With so many occasions for lament this week, I’m feeling drawn back toward the good shepherd we heard about in our readings and psalm last week. I admitted it’s not been my favorite image, but when in the valley of the shadow of death, the table set before the enemy is something we need again and again. This week, I want to pass along a poem I encountered from a newly discovered blog, that of Andrew King, a Canadian Anglican layman. Fast-food worker by day, poet by night, he’s set himself the goal of writing for each week of the church year. I’m grateful.

We need the shepherding of Jesus. For Paula Tatarunis, whose health has taken a turn for the worse and for her husband Darrell, who has hard decisions to make. For Nepal, for towns so remote it takes two days for rescuers to get there to assess the damage, much less offer aid. For Baltimore, for an end to racism in this country. I don’t usually watch much broadcast news, but this week I caught some of the Baltimore coverage on CNN—as they showed two single scenes of property destruction on a continuous loop. How many more people walked peacefully? How many more people cleaned up the next day? And how do the media talk about incidents like that when perpetrated by, for example, white college students? Nobody says “thug” or “riot” at those times. The valley of the shadow of death for all of us in this country is the legacy of racism that sees the bodies of people of color as less-than. As Andrew King writes, “may the cup of joy overflow for those whose suffering has been their drink.” Amen.

PRAYER TO THE SHEPHERD
(Psalm 23, John 10: 11-18)
O Lord our Shepherd,
may your flock not want
in the refugee camps
of Yarmouk, of Darfur, of Dadaab.
May life-giving pastures of nourishment be theirs
in Sudan, in Niger, in Chad.
May waters of peacefulness and healing flow
in Somalia, in Syria, in Ukraine.
And may souls be restored in our own cities and towns
where violence and hunger still live.
O Lord our Shepherd,
death shadows the valleys
and the houses and hills of our lands.
May the strength of your grace and
the assurance of your love
ever with us and ever embracing,
bring comfort to the grieving and alone.
May there be a table of reconciliation prepared
where enemies may sit down in peace
and may the cup of joy overflow for those
whose suffering has been their drink.
Let your goodness and mercy attend your flock,
O Shepherd, our Lord,
and may all your flock dwell
in the unity of your love
as long as life endures.

Dear People of Christ Church,
This week in our Lent series, we continued our conversation about prayer, along with several of the SSJE brothers’ meditations on work. Brother Geoffrey talked about how he’d learned from their experiences with sustainable farming at their retreat place in West Newbury. As the brothers have experimented with raising pigs, chickens, growing plants, and collecting seeds, they’ve learned about sustainability: you don’t take out more from the land than you put in.

Sustainability is a concept that the Christ Church vestry has talked about a lot; how are we careful about the commitments we undertake as a parish to be sure we can be faithful to the core of our mission. There are so many things we could be doing in our own lives and as a parish—really good things!—but we have to choose the ones that God specifically calls us to at this time and this place, not just those things which might be good in general. The same goes for our own lives; there is a line between finding the joy in serving others and being trapped by the drudgery of more that you can do. And there are seasons, too—season of hard work and seasons of rest. Brother Geoffrey ends up on the word “balance;”—it’s a word that gets kicked around a lot, most often in reference to not having enough of it. I recently ran into a review of a book by poet and philosopher David Whyte, who writes:

[Work/life balance] is a phrase that often becomes a lash with which we punish ourselves … ; People find it hard to balance work with family, family with self, because it might not be a question of balance. 1

Instead of thinking of the things we do as outside of ourselves—a core “me” that spends its energy on parenting, then writing sermons, then parish administration, then being a spouse, then a friend—what if instead each of those identities were woven together in whole? Instead of a “me” as a fulcrum in the middle, what if you were yourself all the time? What kind of life would you live?

One place to start is to try to envision a different fulcrum; instead of “me” as the middle, what would it mean if God were the middle? This is what’s most striking to me about thinking about the Ten Commandments. At first glance they seem so ordinary and so like a general humanist way of living: who wouldn’t think a society based on avoiding theft and murder would be a good idea?

The difference comes in the reason for avoiding all kinds of bad behavior: I am the Lord your God. What it means for God’s providence and love for us to be the center fulcrum is a different sense of freedom, a new place of interpreting our lives. If nothing can separate us from the love of God, then we’re given a new freedom in Christ to offer ourselves. The Sabbath is the one place where this is made most concrete. And, of course, the Sabbath. The Sabbath is God’s making-sacred of time, God’s gift of taking hold of us in time for God’s self. No working, no buying, no selling. Because we are God’s.

There’s a lot at stake in shifting that fulcrum point away from our individual selves. If God has already reconciled me to God, then I’m judged by more than the quality of my last sermon or the readership on my last blog post. My kid messing up isn’t a wholesale condemnation on all of my parenting, it’s an invitation to come closer to each other and for us both to try something different.

Take a minute to re-center yourself in God’s grace. What does your work look like now? How do you feel about yourself? How can you let that grace be your fulcrum? What would help you bring that into each day?

Blessings,
Sara +

Dear People of Christ Church,
This week I am still mulling over this past Sunday’s children’s sermon experiment with The Jesus’ Love and Compassion Paper Shredder of Sadness and Fear (an idea I very gratefully pinched from a colleague). We talked a little about things we’re afraid of and drew pictures or wrote them down. Monsters and lions and bullies, failure and illness and grief. Inequality and homelessness and racism. We decided that Jesus could handle those things and would let us know how to help.

Our Gospel for the day was a healing story—Epiphany season is full of them, and there’s another this week. Last Sunday’s started off a bit differently, though—rather than being about illness, this one was about an “unclean” spirit. Not an easy subject—too often, categories of “clean” and “unclean” get attached to human beings and are used to judge and reject. Whether gender identity or social status or other categories, it seems like humans always are tempted to exclude each other.

In any case, there’s this fascinating bit in there about authority—the authority of Jesus. I asked the kids what that word means, and Eli said power—which is true. But the power and authority of Jesus comes from a different place than we’re used to. Often in our world, power is about domination: it’s the opposite of weakness. It’s a relative term. You can only have power if you have something another doesn’t have. The power we most often see is based in threats. Bigger bombs or bigger bank accounts. The authority of Jesus comes from a different place. The authority of Jesus is not a relationship of stronger vs weaker. The authority of Jesus is compassion—com-passion, literally suffering-along-with. The power of God in Jesus was compassion for those who are suffering. And in that compassion, he healed the person in the story.

Jesus can heal us, too—if we let him. That’s what was so important about the “authority” piece in the Gospel for last Sunday; Jesus was given authority over suffering, and that’s where healing came from. In our paper shredder experiment, we gave Jesus authority over our anxiety, too.

I don’t know what was “really” happening in the story—we can analyze back and label it epilepsy or mental illness or whatever, but what feels more important is to see that love cast out fear. As Jesus wasn’t afraid of the “unclean” person, he was able to be in community again.

This is a message I really need to take with me into the season of Lent. I need to remember that whatever sins I name on Ash Wednesday that, like that person with the demon, I can recognize the authority of Jesus to heal me from them. It’s not a passive healing, but an active participation in our salvation (though we aren’t the agents, for sure).

What do you need to hear as we enter Lent? What fear do you need Jesus to shred with love and compassion? What will help you to repent and be forgiven?

Blessings,
Sara+