stars not crosses (except maybe yes crosses)

Monday night I was gchatting with Batshua and she asked:

How do you feel about prayer beads?
I am drooling at them.
I already have two sets and am not buying more.
But this woman does lovely prayer beads for … pretty much anyone.

I'm not much of a prayer beads person myself, but I browsed and we had this conversation:

me: I keep looking at the Jewish ones and going "ooh!" and then remembering that oh, that's a Jewish symbol, not a generic star. Why's my religion gotta have its core symbol be one I'm so not into?
her: Well, I don't think there's anything WRONG with having something with a Jewish star on it just because you like it?
I mean, it's not like you're gonna nail Jesus to it.
That would be weird.
me: Fair -- it still feels somewhat appropriative to me, though.
her: <— is an eclectic pagan
her: <— politely appropriates all kinds of stuff

Later, I read Sarcastic Lutheran's "Sermon about Mary Magdalen, the masacre in our town, and defiant alleluias," and was surprised to find that in reading it I found a way to approach/embrace the Cross that makes it more palatable for me.

Nadia writes:

My Bishop Allan Bjornberg once said that the Greatest spiritual practice isn’t yoga or praying the hours or living in intentional poverty although these are all beautiful in their own way. The greatest spiritual practice is just showing up.

And in some ways Mary Magdalen is like, the patron saint of just showing up.

Because showing up means being present to what is real, what is actually happening. She didn’t necessarily know what to say or what to do or even what to think….but none of that is nearly as important as the fact that she just showed up. She showed up at the cross where her teacher Jesus became a victim of our violence and terror. She looked on as the man who had set her free from her own darkness bore the evil and violence of the whole world upon himself and yet still she showed up.

[...]

And then after Beer & Hymns we sat in a noisy Denver bar and sang Vespers together, we sang our prayer to God, and in our singing I heard a defiant tone. The sound of a people who simply will not believe that violence wins, a people who know that the sound of the risen Christ speaking each of our names drowns out all other voices.

It drowns out the sound of the political posturing, the sound of cries for vengeance, the sound of our own fears and anxieties and the deafening uncertainty – because all of it is no match for the shimmering sound of the resurrected Christ calling our name. Because in baptism we are a people marked by the cross of Christ. Upon our foreheads is the mark of violence and death but this violence and death has been overcome by the love of a God who in the 3 days between Good Friday and Easter reached into the very bowels of hell and said even here I will not be without you. //This is the God to whom we sing. A God who didn’t say we would never be afraid but that we would never be alone. A God who shows up. In the violence of the cross, in the darkness of a garden before dawn, in the gardener, in a movie theater, in the basement of a bar.

[...]

Singing in the midst of evil is what it means to be disciples like Mary Magdalen.

Because to be disciples like Mary Magdalen is to show up. It is to be a people who stand – who stand at the cross and stand in the midst of evil and violence and even if we are uncertain we are still unafraid to be present to all of it. We are unafraid to name the dark demons of evil and to call a thing what it is. And to be disciples like Mary Magdalen is also to be a people who weep. A people who show up to the tombs and weep. Weep for ourselves and weep for each other and weep for our city and weep for dead 6 year old girls. And to be disciples like Mary Magdalen is to be a people who listen and turn at the sound of our names. Amongst the sounds of sirens and fear and isolation and uncertainty and loss we hear a sound that muffles all the rest: that still, small voice of Christ speaking our names. And finally, the very reason we can do these things is not because we happen to be the people with the best set of skills for this work. Trust me, we are not. But the reason we can be disciples like Mary Magdalen – the reason we can stand and we can weep and we can listen is because finally we, like Mary are bearers of resurrection. We know that on the 3rd day he rose again. We do not need to be afraid. Because to sing to God amidst all of this is to defiantly proclaim like Mary Magdalen did to the apostles, that death is simply not the final word. To defiantly say that a light shines in the darkness and the darkness can not will not shall not overcome it. And so, evil be damned, because even as we go to the grave, still we make our song Alleluia. Alleluia. Alleluia.

Amen.

The idea of thinking about the Cross as (Deity) facing the horrors of the world, showing up, knowing that this is not the end of the story, persisting in and through the darkness.

In some ways I worry that this is retrojecting the Resurrection onto the Cross (I don't think my theology is that the Resurrection was already contained in the Cross), but Nadia's sermon reminds me about showing up in the darkness. At interfaith discussion last night, Jane(?) talked about having faith ... not necessarily that things would turn out "well" but being at a point where "good" and "bad" don't matter in a way (I didn't think of this language at the time, but I think relaxing into that it Just Is).

And at Rest and re/New this week, we heard an excerpt from Living Buddha, Living Christ in which Thich Nhat Hanh talks about the Eucharist using language of "the body of God" (instead of the "Body of Christ" language I'm more familiar with) and talking about the cosmos.

(The fancy crosses still creep me out, though. The Cross is not a fancy decoration.)

[Jesus and Kink] Thomas and Jesus' wounds

Apparently our current Rest and re/New series topic is "ways to/of faith," and this Wednesday (April 11) we began with our bodies/senses.

This upcoming Sunday (Easter 2), the lectionary Gospel is the story of Thomas who refuses to believe without touching the wounds of the Risen Christ.

Jeff said he thinks Thomas gets a bad rep. (I was reminded that at EDS' Second Sunday ~service on Easter Sunday, Eda said she wishes we would call "Doubting Thomas" e.g. "different epistemology Thomas" -- he just has a different learning style :) )

First he pointed out that no one else in John's post-Resurrection story had believed without evidence. Mary finds the empty tomb, runs and tells Simon Peter and the beloved disciple, who come to the empty tomb and also do not believe.

(I pointed out that John tells us the beloved disciple believed, he just didn't understand -- at H!PS on Monday, Becky had preached on Ecclesiastes 3 and John 20:1-16, and in reading the John I was struck, as I always am, by John telling us that the beloved disciple believed and then in the very next sentence telling us that they did not yet understand that Jesus had to rise from the dead [which makes me ask: so what did the beloved disciple believe?!].)

Jesus appears to Mary in the garden, who goes and tells the disciples: "I have seen the Risen One!" John doesn't explicitly tell us that the disciples don't believe Mary, but the next story we read is of Jesus appearing to the disciples locked up in the room, who THEN go on to proclaim, "We have seen the Risen One!" And Thomas just has the misfortune of not being in that room.

Jeff M. went on to say that Thomas wants more than to just see -- Thomas also wants to touch; Thomas wants a Close Encounter not just of the First kind but of the Third kind (though looking at that scale, I think it maybe doesn't mean exactly what Jeff M. was presenting it as meaning).

He said there's lots of art of the scene -- with Thomas sort of poking at Jesus' wounds, and that seems almost pornographic to him... that he imagines it as more of an embrace.

He talked about Jesus' willingness to let Thomas touch Jesus' "most intimate, most vulnerable, most wounded places," which I found a really powerful framing.

I was reminded of the "Jesus and Kink" series we'd talked about last week*, and the thoughts/conversations I'd had since then about how to do such a series. I'm less interested in proof-texting that Jesus condones/endorses kink than I am in the really queer ways people have engaged with Scripture/Divinity -- like the polyvalences of Christ's wounds ... interaction with bodily orifices as sexual, interactions with wounds as kink, the ways in which Jesus' blood on the Cross can be coded as generative/reproductive, the ways in which fluid-producing orifices can be coded as feminine, etc., etc.

I'm making my way through my best friend's copy of Queer Theology: Rethinking Western Body (ed. Gerard Loughlin), and in Chapter 7, Gerard Loughlin says, "for all these elements [Averil Cameron's 'central elements in orthodox Christianity -- the Incarnation, the Resurrection, the Trinity, the Virgin Birth, and the Eucharist'], the body is not just a symbol of their truth, but the site where it is realized."

---

*Before Rest and re/New last Wednesday (April 4), Keith and Jeff M. were talking about doing a Mindfulness series next (in a way which suggested it was continuing a conversation they'd had previously). Keith talked about maybe using the upstairs Sanctuary space. And then I don't know how we got there exactly, but Keith was joking about Jesus on the cross and hitting people with reeds.

me: "I don't think that would exactly draw the kind of crowd you're looking for."
Jeff M.: "Oh, it would definitely draw a crowd. (This is Davis Square, after all.)"
me: "Oh, I know -- that's what I was getting at. I just don't think it would be quite the crowd you're looking for."
Keith and Jeff M.: [make noises about being an inclusive and welcoming, big tent kind of church]
Jeff M.: (deadpan) "Jesus and Kink is our next series after Mindfulness."
me: "If I thought you were being serious, I would be so excited -- but you're not."
Jeff M.: "How do you know I'm not?"

[Rest and re/New] "this is a day of new beginnings..."

At Rest and re/New last night, Jeff Reflected on Psalm 98. He okayed the Inclusive Bible version (noting that it changed "strong arm" to "holy arm," which I found interesting given that it included "Ruler of All"). I refuse to "pronounce" the Tetragrammaton, and Keith suggested that instead of my usual "HaShem" I say something more accessible, like "God." Jeff suggested "Baby Jesus," and while this ultimately got ix-nayed, I thought it worked well, so:

1. Sing a new song to Baby Jesus,
who has worked wonders,
whose [] hand and holy arm
have brought deliverance!
2. Baby Jesus has made salvation known
and shown divine justice to the nations,
3. and has remembered in truth and love
the house of Israel.
All the ends of the earth have seen
the salvation of our God.
4. Shout to the Most High, all the earth,
break into joyous songs of praise!
5. Sing praise to Baby Jesus with the harp,
with the harp and melodious singing!
6. With triumph and the blast of the shofar,
raise a shout to Baby Jesus, Ruler of All.
7. Let the sea and all within it thunder;
the world and all its peoples.
8. Let the rivers clap their hands
and the hills ring out their joy
9. before Baby Jesus, who comes to judge the earth,
who will rule the world with justice
and its peoples with equity.

***

Jeff talked about how after the season of waiting that is Advent, the Christ Child is come and what do we do now? What newness is breaking into our lives now?

I have become really cranky at church people talking about January 1 as "the new year" since hi, the church new year starts at Advent 1. (me: "secular Gregorian new year" / Shoshana: "Wasn't Gregory Pope?" / me: "... You with your logic." The Gregorian calendar was based on the Julian month system, though -- hay thar Wikipedia...) But Jeff's framing provides me a way to be thinking about newness in a way which overlaps with the dominant culture but is also authentic to the liturgical year.

[30] What are we asking for? [Pentecost +6(A), CWM]

[This is the text I preached off of. The actual delivery was more colloquial.]

Proper 12A/Ordinary 17A/Pentecost +6
July 24, 2011

Genesis 29:15-28
Psalm 105:1-11, 45b
Romans 8:26-39
Matthew 13:31-33, 44-52

What are we asking for?

In between two really great Jacob stories -- the ladder last week and wrestling with the angel next week -- we have the purchasing of Leah and Rachel.

Not really my favorite story, even leaving aside the women’s total lack of agency. Jacob loves Rachel, agrees to work for SEVEN YEARS to marry her -- that’s like a doctoral degree (provided you’re not Scott, who got his in 2 years) -- and then gets bait-and-switched into marrying the older daughter. He still gets to marry the younger daughter, TOO, don’t worry. And yeah, I could say a lot about Biblical models of marriage here, but I won’t.

The triumph of the younger is a big theme in the Bible -- subverting the status quo, the triumph of the underdog. Jacob himself is a younger sibling -- who’s already used trickery to subvert the status quo. At least in today’s story, Jacob is more sinned against than sinning -- unlike in some of the Jacob stories.

Two weeks ago, the 4th Sunday after Pentecost, a friend told me about her pastor’s sermon on the story of Jacob buying Esau’s birthright. The sermon was basically, “This is one of the stories of our faith, so you should know this story. Also, what does this story tell us about God?” I said, “It tells us that God is a dick.” Because Jacob, who is kind of a heel, is the one who triumphs, is the one who becomes the father of the people Israel. Yes, we are an Abrahamic people, but it is Jacob who is renamed “Israel” -- struggling with God. At least in that story Jacob is upfront with Esau about what he’s doing -- the lectionary skips the story where Jacob uses outright trickery to steal the paternal blessing intended for Esau. But the point still stands that Jacob is not exactly someone I would be proud to say, “Yes, that is where I come from.”

I’m uncomfortable making grand pronouncements about the Good News this story tells us about God -- even though that’s my default response to Scripture, to wrestle good news out of it.

Perhaps it is the influence of Rachel Barenblat’s Torah poems. I have an unfinished sermon about the akedah (the binding of Isaac, second Sunday after Pentecost) which is heavily informed by her poems.

In the last of her 10-poem cycle on the akedah -- a "sermon in poetry" on the second morning of Rosh Hashanah last year -- Barenblat writes:

In this season of turning        and returning
we long for heroes    we want to be able to say
I take after my parents        with uncomplicated pride

But that’s not how it goes    our forebears had
marriages & children    relationships & arguments
sometimes they missed    even the widest of marks

All we can do        is tell their stories
around our campfire        around our festival table
with the polished kiddush cup    and challah round as the moon

all we can do is pray          for a year as sweet
as mother’s milk, a year    when we don’t make
the same mistakes    for the millionth time

or, when we do,    resolve not to wait
until next Rosh Hashanah    to seek forgiveness
All we can do        is remember

This story isn’t about God. It’s about us. It’s about us, about where and who we come from. Yes, these stories tell us about God, because everything tells us about God. But the main point of these stories isn’t necessarily to tell us about God.

But in rereading today’s Genesis passage on Tuesday, I was struck by this portion:

Jacob finishes his term of labor and asks for his agreed-upon reward.

29:22 So Laban gathered together all the people of the place, and made a feast.

29:23 But in the evening Laban took his daughter Leah and brought her to Jacob [... 29:25b] And Jacob said to Laban, "What is this you have done to me? Did I not serve with you for Rachel? Why then have you deceived me?"

Maybe it’s just because I finally read Rob Bell’s Love Wins recently (my Sunday morning church is doing a sermon series), but I thought of the wedding feast and then the, “But I worked so hard! Why am I not getting what I thought was coming to me?” Rob Bell talks about the prodigal son’s older brother -- about the party that is right there and the free will we have to keep ourselves away. Bell says:

Your deepest, darkest sins and your shameful secrets are simply irrelevant when it comes to the counterintuitive ecstatic announcement of the gospel.

So are your goodness, your righteousness, your church attendance, and all of the wise, moral, mature decisions you have made and actions you have taken.

(p. 187, “The Good News Is Better Than That”)

Now, I don’t want to say that Laban is a stand-in for God here, that being tricked into marrying someone is what the Kindom of God is like. Laban in fact directly represents a counter to God’s plan of lifting up the lowly and bringing down the mighty -- Laban says, "This is not done in our country--giving the younger before the firstborn,“ but in God’s country this happens all the time.

But I do think this disruptive moment is interesting.

Rest and re/New, my Wednesday evening church, is this month doing a series on “Winning, Losing, and Things in Between.” Our text this Wednesday was the story of the people freed from slavery in Egypt, complaining that they don’t have anything to eat and it would have been better if they’d just stayed in Egypt. Keith commented that sometimes after we get what we ask for, we’re not so sure it’s what we want after all.

What is it that we’re asking for?

Today’s complementary Old Testament reading is from 1 Kings, in which God asks Solomon, “What shall I give you?” and is pleased that Solomon asks, “Give me the skills to be a good leader of your people,” rather than, “I would like to live forever, have my enemies dead, and be really wealthy,” which suggests that one of the themes for today is asking for the right things -- aligning our will with God’s will. After all, the Gospel passage talks about the angels coming at the end of the age to separate the evil from the righteous.

So what is that we are asking for? Today’s Psalm reminds us that God will not forget God’s promises to us, and specifically invokes God’s promise to Abraham and Jacob -- "To you I will give the land of Canaan as your portion for an inheritance."

Yeah, that’s kind of problematic, huh? How much blood continues to be shed as people fight over land they insist was promised to them?

While I’m not well-versed enough in the Torah to speak to the question of whether those people Moses led out of Egypt asked for a land of their own, per se, but the Exodus story is certainly full of, “Is that really what you wanted?”

The promise God made, however, was not just about land. Last week we heard:

the land on which you lie I will give to you and to your offspring; and your offspring shall be like the dust of the earth, and you shall spread abroad to the west and to the east and to the north and to the south; and all the families of the earth shall be blessed in you and in your offspring. (Genesis 28:13c-28:14)

All the peoples of the earth will be blessed in you and in your descendants. “A light for revelation to the Gentiles and for glory to your people Israel,” we might say -- as Simeon does in Luke 2:32.

The land of Canaan, mentioned in today’s Psalm, frequently makes me think of the Indigo Girls song:

I'm not your promised land
I'm not your promised one
I'm not the land of Canaan

Do we go looking for our promised land in all the wrong places? Having been freed from slavery in Egypt, do we seek new bondage that is just as unhealthy -- not trusting God’s plans for us, or perhaps confusing the Will of others (ourselves included) for the Will of God?

When Jesus said, “I am the Way and the Truth and the Light, and no one comes to the Divine Parent except through me,” I think one of the things Jesus might have meant is that while God works all things toward the good, as we heard in today’s Psalm, the way to God is through Love Incarnate. And also that in order to fully access God, one is going to have to give up false dichotomies -- like Divine vs. human, like mine vs. yours.

So back to the Promised Land. The biblical land of Canaan already had people living in it when our spiritual ancestors showed up to claim it. That’s not necessarily the model I want for a land God has promised to me and to my family.

Where do we find our Promised Land?

Today’s reading from Romans is pretty awesome. Nothing shall separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus. That love is a place we can find a home -- now and always.

Again, might not be what we had in mind when we asked -- Paul is aware that, "For your sake we are being killed all day long; we are accounted as sheep to be slaughtered" -- but we are assured that there is no one who can bring any charges against us, who can condemn us, who can separate us from the love of God.

And this isn’t just about some post-death absolution. Paul tells us that, “the Holy Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but that very Spirit intercedes with sighs too deep for words.”

Paul was very familiar with the conflict between what we say we want and what we act as if we want. In the previous chapter of this letter to the Romans, Paul says, “I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. [...] For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I do.” (Romans 7:15, 19)

But the Holy Spirit whom Jesus sent after the Ascension -- the Paraclete, the Advocate, the Helper -- this Sophia Wisdom and Love is always with us, always drawing us into closer relationship with God.

Now, speaking of relationship with God, I want to wrap with talking about the Kindom of God.

The Gospel tells a lot of parables about what the Kindom of God is like. Near the end of today’s Gospel reading, Jesus asks the disciples, "Have you understood all this?" and they answer, "Yes," at which I can only laugh, because, REALLY?

Rev. Russell at TheHardestQuestion.org suggested that the disciples had sort of tuned out during this litany of parables -- “Have you understood all this?” / “Yeah, totally, of course I get it.” [mime: “Totally didn’t get it. Did you get it?”]

My biggest problem is that Jesus does not seem troubled by unclear antecedents. Anyway. Let’s recap.

We start out well. "The realm of heaven is like a mustard seed that someone took and sowed in their field; it is the smallest of all the seeds, but when it has grown it is the greatest of shrubs and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come and make nests in its branches." Great. The kindom of God is something that starts out so tiny and small but grows into the greatest of things and many creatures make their home in it.

Next: "The realm of heaven is like yeast that someone took and mixed in with three measures of flour until all of it was leavened." Great. The kindom of God is something that mixes in with our lives, lifts us up, grows us.

Third: "The realm of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which someone found and hid; then in hir joy ze goes and sells all that ze has and buys that field.” Okay, a hidden treasure, which one is willing to sell all one has in order to obtain. We’re likely familiar with that imagery. Though in reading one bloogger’s sermon notes for today, I noticed that all we are told this person wants is the treasure, and yet the person buys the whole field. God is incredibly wasteful and extravagant in Hir love for us. This isn’t a marketplace transaction where the buyer tries to get the goods for the lowest possible price, this is God saying, “I want you and all that contains you, all that surrounds you.”

I’m reminded of Lee Harrington’s keynote at the Transcending Boundaries Conference last November. Harrington talked about the book The Omnivore’s Dilemma -- which I must admit I haven’t read. Harrintgon shared the story of Joel Salatin -- who raises cows and chickens but who describes himself as a grass farmer -- explaining that all 550 acres of land he has are important, refusing to let Michael Pollan privilege the 100 acres that happen to be “active farmland.”

We do not exist in isolation. Our relationship with God does not exist in isolation. Harrington says, “I live in a complex ecosystem of the heart."

The fourth parable sounds similar: "The realm of heaven is like a merchant in search of fine pearls; on finding one pearl of great value, ze went and sold all that ze had and bought it.” Usually when we tell this story, the kindom of God is the pearl -- something that we are to sacrifice everything for -- but Jesus actually says the kindom of God is like the merchant. Does that make us the pearl of great value, whom God sells all that He has in order to ransom? Each and every one of us is a fine specimen, is of great value, is dearly beloved by God.

Fifth and last: “The realm of heaven is like a net that was thrown into the sea and caught fish of every kind; when it was full, they drew it ashore, sat down, and put the good into baskets but threw out the bad.” This gets followed up with the angels at the end of the age, coming and and separating the evil from the righteous. But Jesus doesn’t say the reign of God is like the fishers or even like the angels; Jesus says the reign of God is like the net. Which was thrown into the sea and caught fish of EVERY kind.

God always desires to be in relationship with us -- regardless of what we ask for or of what we think we want, God is still seeking us. And we can trust that at the end of the age, all wickedness will be purged and we and the whole of Creation will be restored.

Amen.

[Rest and re/New] on anger at God

Last night's Rest and re/New theme was being angry with God.

James mentioned Jacob wrestling with the angel and Laura T. commented that she really likes that Jacob doesn't leave the encounter unscarred.
She also said that often we're wrestling with the wrestling, and that that just makes things worse for ourselves.

Have I mentioned that everything makes me think of DBT these days? I talked some about "radical acceptance" -- which I said is not my strong suit :) -- and "doing what's effective." I said that lots of us come from backgrounds that encouraged us to deny/repress our anger at God and that's definitely not healthy, and so we need to find a middle ground -- to experience our anger, but not dwell in it, and to do what we need to with it, that sometimes you need to go and yell at God and sometimes you need to go for a walk and try to let go of the anger.

Lisa talked about William Schultz's article "What Torture Has Taught Me." Apparently he has done a lot of work with Amnesty International with torture survivors and is also a minister and he found himself wondering... if those survivors showed up at his church, what would they think of the theology he espoused? would they find it naive? would they find it deep and meaningful?
I thought of Mariella at Art Night last week talking about someone saying that your theology shouldn't be anything you "can't say in front of burning children."

I Googled just now for [theology "burning children"] and yay, GoogleBooks:

Irving Greenberg's principle that no statement, theological or other, can be made "that would not be credible in the presence of the burning children."⁹ (p. 128, Long night's journey into day: a revised retrospective on the Holocaust by Alice Eckardt & Arthur Roy Eckardt)
9. Greenberg, "Cloud of Smoke," p. 23
[which I think (doing more GoogleBooks search) is: Irving Greenberg, "Cloud of Smoke, Pillar of Fire: Judaism, Christianity and Modernity after the Holocaust," in Auschwitz: Beginning of a New Era? ed. Eva Fleischner (New York: KTAV, 1997), pp. 1-55]

In skimming through the footnotes, Moltmann's Crucified God, and possibly I have a new reading project...

P.S. Regular Google got me a top hit of a blogpost that opens with the quotation:

“No statement, theological or otherwise, should be made that would not be credible in the presence of burning children.” Irving Greenberg

From the blogpost:

“Weep with those who weep,” St. Paul said, and indeed, sometimes as a chaplain that is almost all you can do. [...]

A theology that has everything figured out is not particularly helpful at such a time. My friend Jenny calls that “2 a.m. Theology” – and in fact, it was two in the morning – two a.m. theology cries in pain. It doesn’t have answers. Two a.m. theology just says, I don’t get it, but I’m here, and I believe you’re here, too, God. Even though I’m mad at you. Two a.m. theology believes God is crying, too.

[27] "Incarnation in the holiday season" [Rest and Bread; Wed. Dec. 8, 2010]

[Preached at Rest and Bread on Wednesday, December 8, 2010. Thanks to la bff for helping me select a Scripture passage.]

[Inspired by The Advent Conspiracy, Keith and I picked 4 alternative themes for Advent this year -- relationship, incarnation, sharing, and activation. Today is Incarnation.]

All you who are thirsty,
come to the water!
You who have no money,
come, buy food and eat!
Come, buy wine and milk,
without money, without price!
Why spend your money for what is not bread,
your wages for what fails to satisfy?
Heed me, and you will eat well,
you will delight in rich fare;
bend your ear and come to me,
listen, that you may have life
I will make an everlasting Covenant with you--
in fulfillment of the blessings promised to David.
-Isaiah 55:1-3, The Inclusive Bible

"You who have no money, come, buy food and eat."

What a message that is for this season, when so many are struggling with economic scarcity.

The kindom of God, for which we wait expectantly this Advent season and all days, is a place where sustenance and abundance are available for all.

This passage also speaks to the goodness of nourishing our bodies.

While this season is full of pressures to buy more stuff, our physical bodies, the very stuff that houses our spirit, often become our enemy. Facing the glut of holiday sweets, we are deluged with tips and tricks for how to not have "too much," how to not "overindulge." We are pulled in opposite directions -- retailers invite us to gift ourselves and our loved ones with chocolates from Godiva, fruit baskets from Harry and David, colorfully foil wrapped candies from Hershey's ... while the morning shows are full of advice about how to enjoy the ubiquitous holiday parties without using up all our Weight Watchers points.

Hear again the word of God: "Heed me, and you will eat well, you will delight in rich fare."

I'm not saying that God wants you to eat nothing but processed sugar, but God's table is a table of abundance. The Communion table there, around which we will all gather later in the service, holds bread and fruit of the vine ... food to nourish and sustain you, food for you to enjoy. And of the surplus you are invited to eat and drink more after the service is over.

Food is central to so much of Jesus' ministry. Jesus eats with everyone -- from the Pharisees (scholars of the religious law) to tax collectors (agents of the oppressive Empire).

In Matthew's Gospel, we read Jesus saying:

     What comparison can I make with this generation?
     They are like children shouting to others as they sit in the marketplace, "We piped for you but you would not dance. We sang you a dirge, but you would not mourn."
     For John the Baptizer came neither eating nor drinking, and they say, "He is possessed."
     The Chosen One comes, eating and drinking, and they say, "This one is a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners."
     Wisdom will be vindicated by her own actions.
(Matthew 11:18-19a, The Inclusive Bible)

Jesus experienced the same opposing cultural pressures as we do today. Wear a cloak of camel's hair out in the desert and eat locusts and honey, and people will say you're possessed. Say you're not buying Christmas gifts for anyone this year, and people will say you have no sense of the holiday spirit. Share meals with those who are "socially unacceptable," and people will say all sorts of nasty things about you. Head directly to the chocolate fondue station at the office party, bypassing the veggies and low-fat dip, and people may call you a glutton (though probably not to your face).

Our culture gives us lots of conflicting messages about bodies. I want to give you one message to take home: God likes bodies.

God thinks bodies are so good that God said, "I will have one of these myself."

"And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us."

This is what we anticipate and remember during the season of Advent -- that God, who had shown up in the world plenty of times before, in booming mountaintop and still small voice, in pillars of fire and cloud, chose to take on flesh, to be embodied...

{I extemporized an ending and as usual don't remember what I said -- I think it was about loving the bodies that God gave us, that God so loves, that God who formed us in our mother's womb called good.}

[26] "3 thoughts, approaching Advent" [Pentecost +25(C) Wednesday, Rest and Bread]

[Preached at Rest and Bread on Wed. Nov. 17, 2010. Thanks to Scott for last-minute editing.]

Matthew 23:37-24:14

³⁷“Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often have I desired to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing! ³⁸See, your house is left to you, desolate. ³⁹For I tell you, you will not see me again until you say, ‘Blessed is the one who comes in the name of our God.’”

24 ¹As Jesus came out of the temple and was going away, the disciples came to point out the buildings of the temple. ²Then Jesus asked them, “You see all these, do you not? Truly I tell you, not one stone will be left here upon another; all will be thrown down.” ³When Jesus was sitting on the Mount of Olives, the disciples came privately, saying, “Tell us, when will this be, and what will be the sign of your coming and of the end of the age?”

⁴Jesus answered them, “Beware that no one leads you astray. ⁵For many will come in my name, saying, ‘I am the Messiah!’ and they will lead many astray. ⁶And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars; see that you are not alarmed; for this must take place, but the end is not yet. ⁷For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and there will be famines and earthquakes in various places: ⁸all this is but the beginning of the birthpangs. ⁹“Then they will hand you over to be tortured and will put you to death, and you will be hated by all nations because of my name. ¹⁰Then many will fall away, and they will betray one another and hate one another. ¹¹And many false prophets will arise and lead many astray. ¹²And because of the increase of lawlessness, the love of many will grow cold. ¹³But the one who endures to the end will be saved. ¹⁴And this good news of the kingdom will be proclaimed throughout the world, as a testimony to all the nations; and then the end will come.

One metaphor for Advent is that of pregnancy -- we, like Mary, wait in joyful (and perhaps more than a little fearful) anticipation for the Promised One -- Emmanuel, God With Us.

In today's reading, however, we are reminded that Christ is already mothering us. Jesus weeps over the city of Jerusalem, crying out, "How often have I desired to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing!" How familiar that must sound to parents of willful children...

Confident in her own power and security, Jerusalem has rejected the prophets God has sent to her, has refused the transformative calls from her God and Maker.

Jesus prophesies the destruction of the Temple -- the focal point of religious power and authority. The coming of the Kingdom of God on Earth means the overthrow of all the human kingdoms that are already here on Earth, even the ones we might have a strong personal investment in -- "Truly I tell you, not one stone will be left here upon another; all will be thrown down."

The disciples ask, "Tell us, when will this be, and what will be the sign of your coming and of the end of the age?"

Typical, Jesus avoids answering the question directly. Instead, Jesus cautions them not to be led astray -- and also not to be afraid. "Be not afraid" is a greeting we hear often from divine messengers throughout Advent and Christmas. When God shows up, you can be assured that you are going to be asked to make some radical changes in your life -- and the more we have to lose, the less that appeals to us (one of the many reasons God has a preferential option for the poor).

Jesus also cautions the disciples that there will be much conflict ahead. I don't think this is necessarily to be read as an assertion that all of this disaster will be a sign that the Second Coming is at hand -- famine and disaster are as old as the Fall; they predict nothing, though they indicate quite a lot. Rather, Jesus exhorts the disciples to endure; "you will hear of wars and rumors of wars; see that you are not alarmed; for this must take place, but the end is not yet."

All this pain and suffering and disaster? This is not the end. "This is but the beginning of birthpangs."

I have never given birth -- and I really have no desire to, in fact -- but I have it on good authority that it can at times be an incredibly painful and difficult process. If that's true of bringing a regular human baby into the world, would we expect any less of bringing a whole new world to fruition?

And unlike pregnancy, where we have at least an approximation of a due date, we don't know when this Second Coming will be. We hear over and over again throughout the Gospels that no one knows the date or the hour, and so we must always be prepared. We can ask, "What would you do if you knew that Jesus was coming back next month?" or "What would you do if you knew that Jesus wasn't going to come back during your lifetime?" but the reality we have to work with is: "What would you do if you were assured that Jesus would return but you had no idea when that would be?" Every year, during Advent (and also during Lent) we take time to intentionally practice both waiting and preparing ourselves.

So as we approach the season of Advent, let's review Jesus' advice:
* you will not see me again until you say, "Blessed is the one who comes in the name of our God."
* Beware that no one leads you astray. For many will come in my name, saying, "I am the Messiah!" and they will lead many astray.
* you will hear of wars and rumors of wars; see that you are not alarmed
* the love of many will grow cold. But the one who endures to the end will be saved.

I'm intrigued by the twinning of these first two -- the second one is perhaps more salient, connected as it is with all the doom and gloom foreshadowing, but the first is no less important. Jerusalem is exhorted to proclaim: "Blessed is the one who comes in the name of our God." While we should be wary of those who claim divinity for themselves, we are also exhorted to be open to the presence and call of God in our lives.

Be not afraid. An exhortation used throughout the Advent and Christmas stories to assure us not to be afraid of the new thing God is doing in our lives and in the world -- but here we are also reminded not to be afraid of all that is happening in the world. For we have so great a hope... as we heard Paul proclaim on Sunday: "For 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."

Do not let your love grow cold. "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind; and you shall love your neighbor as yourself." "Love one another as I have loved you." Over and over again we hear this exhortation, this love which is at the heart of the good news.

And so I invite you, as we move into this this season, to remain open to God, to be not afraid, and to not let your love grow cold.

[25] praying in tune [Rest and Bread; Wednesday, September 22, 2010]

[I gave the Reflection at Rest and Bread on September 22, 2010 -- feeling tired, hungry, and ill-prepared; I extemporized the second half of my Reflection and I think it went okay, though after the service was over I couldn't tell you what I said.]

¹First of all, then, I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for everyone, ²for kings and all who are in high positions, so that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and dignity. ³This is right and is acceptable in the sight of God our Savior, ⁴who desires everyone to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth. ⁵For there is one God; there is also one mediator between God and humankind, Christ Jesus, Christself human, ⁶who gave Christself a ransom for all—this was attested at the right time. ⁷For this I was appointed a herald and an apostle (I am telling the truth, I am not lying), a teacher of the Gentiles in faith and truth.
(1 Timothy 2:1-7, NRSV)

We are exhorted to pray for everyone, even the rulers -- which I think also pointedly means, "even the people we don't like much."

Because there is one God and one Mediator -- and neither of them are us. In the prayer that Jesus taught us, we pray "Thy will be done" -- God's will, not ours. Yes, we are Called to be agents of God's Will here on Earth, but that doesn't mean we get to dictate the Plan.

Paul understands himself to have been commissioned to share this Good News. That there is one God -- and one mediator between God and humankind, which is to say, Christ.

We are not God. We are not even mediators between God and humanity. Now, many of us went on retreat in February to reflect on the topic of "prayer," and one of the things we discussed there was the idea that prayer changes God. The Jewish tradition that Paul and Jesus and most of the early Church had inherited was rich with a culture of arguing with God. And I support that. As does Paul, I think. After all, he lists intercessions and supplications in his prayer list.

But I think there's also an important lesson here about getting out of the way a bit. To remember that it is not all about us, that it does not all rest on us, and to shift our focus appropriately. Sometimes all we can do is pray, and sometimes the most useful thing we can do is pray.

One of the powerful images I have encountered for prayer is "getting in tune with God." Sometimes God is (or seems) out of tune, and that's where righteous arguing comes in -- but often we are the ones who are out of tune, and so we are exhorted to recenter ourselves in the one in whom we live and move and have our being.

Gerasene demoniac!!!

At Rest and Bread last night, Jeff V. reflected on the story of the Gerasene demoniac (Luke 8:26-39). I love this story so much. I think I was properly introduced to it by Amy-Jill Levine at Convo 2008 -- though I can't actually remember much of what she said about it.

Jeff talked about how people often fear the liberator (unknown) more than the oppressor (known).
He said that Tillich defines the demonic as that which we treat as God and which turns on us.
Jeff used the example of the oil in the Gulf of Mexico -- we all agree that what happened was a disaster, but the changes we would have to make in our lives and in society to wean ourselves off of oil seems to be much more frightening than this disaster. [Yes, I know there's no risk-free energy source, but I think the general point stands: that sometimes even when we can indicate a particular problem and a particular solution, we aren't willing to take the risks/make the sacrifices that solution would require of us -- which I think is a common story throughout the Gospels.]

In the shared reflection time, Ian H. said that while Tillich's idea makes sense for some of the demon stories, it doesn't work for him in this story, because Jeff's examples were money, success, etc. -- stuff which if this guy had, society would have welcomed him in. Ian said that this story reminded him more of PTSD -- demons that we created and which we then can't bear to be a witness to, and so we send them away.

Masha commented on the fact that while the man's words (which were really the demon's words) rejected Jesus, the man's physical actions drew him toward Jesus.

At JPLicks afterward, Masha talked about how she grew up in a context where the idea of modern-day miracles was taken for granted, and that she found the prospect of a miracle happening to her really frightening -- because it means we live in an irrational world (what ELSE you thought couldn't happen could?) and also there's the concern: what if there are strings attached?

In the post-service discussions, people kept mentioning the destruction of the swine herd. I pointed out that this story was being told to Jews about non-Jews, so for Jews it would make perfect sense that the unclean demons were sent into the unclean swine who were then sent over the cliff -- that this continuum would have made perfect sense to them (I think credit goes to the bff for this framing of it). [I love that the text Jeff gave me refers to the country of the Gerasenes as being "opposite Galilee."]

At JPLicks, either Al or Masha commented about how people fear that which they cannot understand/control -- in this case, both the demoniac and Jesus.

I read the Sacred Text aloud, both before and after the Reflection, and I am having the same problem now as I did at shared reflection time -- that I have so many thoughts that I don't know what to say.

I was struck by Jesus asking, "What is your name?" This man is afflicted and ostracized, and it feels so tender to me that Jesus asks him his name.
Other people mentioned the power of naming an affliction -- which is also a good point.

Oh, and one more thing: At JPLicks we talked about some about whether demons are real or not, and I said that whether this person was really possessed by demons or was mentally ill (leaving aside the issue of whether afflictions manifest differently depending on how a person's socio-cultural context understands them) or whatever, I felt like one of the major points of the story was that God through Jesus has the power to liberate us from that which oppresses us and keeps us in (nonconsensual) bondage, and can empower us to reintegrate into community.

[18.1] Easter Wednesday reflection - "It's spring, even at night."

Weeks ago, Keith invited me to offer the Reflection at Rest and Bread on this date.  It took until late this afternoon for this sermon to finish coming together, but as I've been writing catchup sermons in recent weeks, I've come to appreciate that a sermon I write today I couldn't have written last week or last month, that things happen that inform my engagement with a particular text, and that sermons don't have to be posted on the exact Sunday their lectionary is for.  My friend Scott said a while ago (IIRC), that a foxtrot is still beautiful even when it's to waltz music -- that I don't have to keep exactly to the lectionary calendar.  (Though this is one of the daily lectionary readings for today -- which is why I picked it in the first place.)

John 20:1-18

¹Early on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene came to the tomb and saw that the stone had been removed from the tomb.  ²So she ran and went to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one whom Jesus loved, and said to them, “They have taken Jesus out of the tomb, and we do not know where they have laid the body.”  ³Then Peter and the other disciple set out and went toward the tomb.  ⁴The two were running together, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first.  ⁵That disciple bent down to look in and saw the linen wrappings lying there, but did not go in.  ⁶Then Simon Peter came, following the other disciple, and went into the tomb.  Peter saw the linen wrappings lying there, ⁷and the cloth that had been on Jesus’ head, not lying with the linen wrappings but rolled up in a place by itself.  ⁸Then the other disciple, who reached the tomb first, also went in, and saw and believed; ⁹for as yet they did not understand the scripture, that Jesus must rise from the dead.  ¹⁰Then the disciples returned to their homes.

¹¹But Mary stood weeping outside the tomb.  As she wept, she bent over to look into the tomb; ¹²and she saw two angels in white, sitting where the body of Jesus had been lying, one at the head and the other at the feet.  ¹³They said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping?”  She said to them, “They have taken away my Jesus, and I do not know where they have laid the body.”  ¹⁴When she had said this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not know that it was Jesus.  ¹⁵Jesus said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping?  Whom are you looking for?”  Supposing this person to be the gardener, she said, “Please, if you have carried Jesus away, tell me where you have laid the body, and I will take it away.”  ¹⁶Jesus said to her, “Mary!”  She turned and said in Hebrew, “Rabbouni!” (which means Teacher).  ¹⁷Jesus said to her, “Do not hold on to me, because I have not yet ascended to the Parent.  But go to my siblings and say to them, ‘I am ascending to my Parent and your Parent, to my God and your God.’”  ¹⁸Mary Magdalene went and announced to the disciples, “I have seen the Christ”; and she told them that Jesus had said these things to her.

(NRSV, edited)

"Do not hold onto me."

Jesus calls Mary of Magdala by name, and she responds in recognition, and then the next words the risen Christ proclaims to her are: "Do not hold onto me."

The whole point of Easter is that even death cannot keep Christ from us -- that She loved us so much that She passed through even death to bring us through to salvation with Her.

Easter, more than of the other holy days, is about abundance.

We vigil through the night.  We hear again the story of how God created the heavens and the earth and everything in them -- the seas and the lands, the plants and the animals, the fish and the birds, humankind --  and proclaimed ALL of Creation GOOD.  We hear again the story of how the Israelites just freed from Egypt cried out "It would have been better for us to be slaves to the Egyptians than to die here in the wilderness," and in response God proclaimed "The captors whom you see today you will NEVER see again" and parted the sea so that the Israelites could cross through, never again to taste Egyptian slavery.  We hear again the story of the prophet Ezekiel's vision of dry bones growing sinew and flesh, moving once again with the breath of God -- of the whole house of Israel being brought up from the grave.  And after hearing all those stories, perhaps we commemorate the sacrament of baptism -- welcoming catechumens into the new and abundant life that is the Body of Christ.  And it is at that moment -- after we welcome the newly baptized into the Body of Christ that is the Church universal, that we declare, though it still be dark night on Holy Saturday, "Alleluia.  Christ is risen!"  (Audience: "Christ is risen indeed!  Alleluia.")  We have increased the wholeness and fullness of the Body of Christ, and in that way we resurrect the Christ anew.  The dark of Lent is over and the light of Easter is come.  Having baptized this catechumen in a dark sanctuary, we now turn on all the lights -- for our light has come.

Some hours later, we greet the rising sun (with a "u") with alleluias for the risen Son (with an "o").

We co-opted a pagan celebration of spring for this holy day of ours [edit: or possibly we didn't].  We consume foods rich with fat and sugar -- those things that we have been lacking all Lent because in our forebears' time, here in the Northern Hemisphere, we wouldn't have had any this late in the winter -- fat and sugar in the shape of bunnies and eggs, more symbols of fertility.

The weary world rejoices that death does not last forever -- that life always triumphs over death, life abundant and life everlasting.

The One who has loved and led us returns, to love and lead us for all eternity.

And yet the Christ who has, in some traditions, literally been to Hell and back on our behalf, says, "Do not hold onto me."  I have work yet to do, work I cannot do if I stay here with you in the way that I was with you before.

I've talked a lot this Lent about letting go of things.  Things that do not feed us, that do not give us life.

I find it interesting that the Easter story is about letting go of our leaders, of our saviors.

I will soon be saying goodbye to my second pastor in less than six months.

It doesn't really make me feel any better to know that Mary had to say goodbye to someone who was so much more to her than Tiffany or Laura Ruth have been to me.

John is not especially helpful here.  We just hear that "Mary Magdalene went and announced to the disciples, 'I have seen the Christ.' "  We don't read any more about Mary's mourning for the Jesus she has lost.

My best friend points out that Mary's loss -- the loss of the Jesus she had journeyed with for so long -- was made tolerable BECAUSE she had encountered the risen Christ.

Those who have touched us, who have changed our lives -- that effect doesn't end just because their physical presence departs from us.

I don't get to keep my pastors forever, but I can carry with me the things they have taught me, and I am indeed a new creation because of them (and because of lots of other people as well, of course).

We are an Easter people -- forever transformed by our experience of the resurrection.  And so we are called to be an Easter people not just on Sunday, not just in church, but every day and every where -- to carry that new life to the world, to carry into a wounded weeping world the assurance that new life DOES come ... and to carry that assurance into our own wounded weeping souls as well.

There's a poem I read today -- "Black Dress" by Laura Kasischke (from Gardening in the Dark) -- and here is part of what it says:

When Herod sat down at the dinner table, the roasted
bird flew from the platter crying, "Christ lives! He is alive!"
It's spring, even at night.

Amen.

[sermon 15] Lent 5C - Preparing for the Desert Rain

Lent 5C - March 21, 2010

Isaiah 43:16-21
Psalm 126
Philippians 3:4b-14
John 12:1-8

Preparing for the Desert Rain

I can tell we're nearing Holy Week.

And not just because we've stepped out of Luke for a detour into John with the foreshadowing of Jesus' betrayal and death (and resurrection).

Through Isaiah, God proclaims, "I am about to do a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it?  I will make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert" (Isaiah 43:14).  We often talk about Lent as "desert days."  We give up things that bring us passing pleasure to help us draw closer to the Source and Life of Being who brings us true joy and peace.  We practice resisting temptation just as Jesus resisted temptation during 40 days in the literal desert.  In the Northern Hemisphere, Lent begins during the end of winter, when the sky is still dark and the land is still hibernating, not yet bearing fruit.  In the Southern Hemisphere, Lent begins during the end of summer, so the parched land very much echoes desert.

But rain will fall in the desert.  Such rain that there will be rivers.

Okay, this is a bit of an uncomfortable statement here in the Northeastern USA where we had so much rain and wind last weekend that many roads and schools and workplaces shut down, where many people stayed home not just because it was unsafe to travel but because their basements were flooding.  One of my friends who works in graphic design lost huge portions of her high school and college art portfolio when her parents' basement flooded while they were out of town.

But this is not that kind of unwelcome river -- well, maybe it is.  God is not always welcome in our lives.  "My ways are not your ways," we heard God say two weeks ago (Isaiah 55:8).

This week, God says, "Do not remember the former things, or consider the things of old" (Isaiah 43:18).  That is difficult.  My friend who lost much of her portfolio?  One of her friends commented: "Jim Morrison once permanently destroyed all of his writing by intentionally setting it on fire. He said it gave him the freedom to write new things that were completely original. I've thought about doing the same to everything I have before, but never had the guts..."  She said, "I like that thought... freedom to create new things. I'll keep that in mind, thanks," but I don't imagine that was easy.

This past Wednesday, Laura Ruth reflected on the passage in Luke (9:1-6) where Jesus empowers and commissions the disciples.  Jesus' instructions end: "If people do not welcome you, shake the dust off your feet when you leave their town, as a testimony against them" (Luke 9:5).  Laura Ruth talked about transitions -- about how difficult it is to know when to move on, to not leave too quickly and to not labor too long.  She wondered whether the disciples got the hang of it after a few times -- if these pairs of disciples had conversations like, "I think we should go -- I think we're not welcome here any more" / "What are you talking about?  We're definitely still welcome here."  I'd never thought about that part of this passage -- that it's one thing to not be welcomed into anyone's home and to shake the dust off your feet on your way out of town rather than try to wheedle your way under someone's roof for the night, but once you have lodging somewhere you still eventually have to leave.  At morning prayer this Lent we're following the PC(USA) lectionary, which Gospel readings take us through all of Mark, and earlier this week I commented on how every day or every other day we read that Jesus and the disciples got in the boat and went to the other side of the Sea of Galilee -- Jesus is forever leaving communities, moving on to new communities that also need to hear the proclamation of the dominion of God and to feel the healing touch.

As I said at Rest and Bread this Wednesday, I'm really bad at letting go of things.  I want to stay and try to fix them, even long after they have ceased to nourish me.  I'm kind of a control freak, and I want things done my way, and so I keep coming back and trying to make them better, to make them more like I want them to be.  I'm not good at shaking the dust off my feet and letting go -- moving on to places or people that might be more willing to receive me.  Oh, I'm happy to make my home in those communities that love me, that nurture and challenge me and allow me to nurture and challenge them in return.  But I still try to work in these other places as well -- struggling along in ill-fitting garments, in unfruitful lands.

In our Gospel reading today, we read about Mary (sister of Martha and the resurrected Lazarus, I presume) anointing Jesus' feet with a costly perfume made of pure nard, and wiping them with her hair.  Judas is outraged and points out that this perfume could have been sold for three hundred denarii (a year's wages) and the money given to the poor, but Jesus replies, "Leave her alone.  She bought it so that she might keep it for the day of my burial" (John 12:7).  There will always be opportunity to provide for the poor, but I, Jesus, will not always be with you.

In their book on Holy Week, Marcus Borg and John Dominic Crossan talk about the version of the story in Mark (14:3-9) and argue that the woman is the first to really realize what Jesus is saying.

    "She has done what she could," says Jesus, "she has anointed my body beforehand for its burial" (14:8).  She alone, of all those who heard Jesus's three prophecies of his death and resurrection, believed him and drew the obvious conclusion.  Since (not if) you are going to die and rise, I must anoint you now beforehand, because I will never have a chance to do it afterward.  She is, for Mark, the first believer.  She is, for us, the first Christian.  And she believed from the word of Jesus before any discovery of an empty tomb.
    (p. 104)

I'm intrigued by how to use this in my own life -- to create rituals that allow me to prepare for leaving, that prepare me for the deaths that are a part of life.

I show up at the door (of someone I have dwelt with before) and I am told, "I cannot receive you right now."  And I want to say, "But what about later?  Is there a time I could come back?  And can we talk about why you can't receive me?  I don't have to stay at your house; I could come in for just a little while, drink a glass of water and then leave.  Let's talk."  But the door is shut.  And I want to come back, to knock again, to have this clarifying conversation.  And I know that's not a good idea.  That I need to shake the dust from my feet and leave.  There are others in the village who know me, so if this person wants to welcome me back at some later date, they can find me.  I suspect they won't -- that even if circumstances change such that they would be willing to welcome me in, they won't be willing to make the effort to track me down and invite me back.  But I have to risk that.  For God is doing a new thing.

How do we pay attention for the signs that death is approaching?  That change is coming.  That our welcome is waning and it is time for us to move on.

I think one way to do this is to check in with ourselves regularly about whether the work we are doing is feeding us.  Has the earth we were tilling turned into desert somewhere along the way?  Yes, God is making a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert, but that means we have to actually follow that way, to move from our old patch of earth to a new one along the banks of the river.

The Psalmist tells us:

May those who sow in tears reap with shouts of joy.

Those who go out weeping, bearing the seed for sowing, shall come home with shouts of joy, carrying their sheaves.

    (Psalm 126:5-6)

I appreciate this reassurance.  That God will restore our fortunes, our mouths will be filled with laughter and our tongues with shouts of joy (Psalm 126:1-2).

The opening of this Philippians passage is familiar to me -- Paul establishing his credentials -- but I was struck when I hit verse 10: "I want to know Christ."

"I want to know Christ and the power of Christ's resurrection."

Wow.

That's such an incisive summary of what it is to be a Christian -- of why we are Christians.  That deep desire to know Christ and to know the power of Christ's resurrection.

What greater desire could there be than that -- to know the one who is the very face of God and to know the power that has defeated even death?  We're not at Easter yet, but there is always a certain cognitive dissonance in Lent (as in Advent) because we are anticipating an event which has already happened.  During Advent, we anticipate the coming of the Christ child alongside Mary and Joseph, who have had angelic visitors and even if they hadn't could certainly perceive the child gestating in Mary's womb.  In Lent, we are reenacting Jesus' forty days in the wilderness, which fall between baptism and the beginning of public ministry, so chronologically it's entirely out of order for the weeks leading up to Jesus' death and resurrection, but of course it makes a great deal of sense psychologically -- although Jesus' disciples continue to Not Get It about what awaits them, Jesus knows what's coming, and so we are traveling with Jesus, trying to be faithful companions, to be attentive to Jesus' teachings.

And what awaits us at the end of that journey?

Betrayal, death, and resurrection.

Not necessarily literally (though yes, death is the literal end of our journey until the resurrection), but there is a sense in which Christ calls us to die to our old lives so that we can be resurrected in Christ.

There are lots of parables about that -- you can't patch an old wineskin with new cloth or it will burst and the wine will run out and be ruined, instead you must put the wine in new wineskins (Luke 5:36-39); a seed must fall and die and break open in order to become more than just the single seed that it is in itself (John 12:24).  We could come up with our own parables -- like the caterpillar who metamorphoses into a butterfly.

In Trina Paulus' book Hope for the Flowers, we learn that in order to become a butterfly, "You must want to fly so much that you are willing to give up being a caterpillar."

Lent is about learning to give up being a caterpillar -- and about learning to want to fly.  Learning to give up the things that keep us attached to this desert ground so that we can soar, as we were always meant to.

Lent is about preparing ourselves for that new thing which God is desiring to do in our lives.  About preparing the desert places in our souls for God's quenching rain -- uprooting the weeds so that new life can blossom.

And so I send you forth -- back into the desert, back into the wilderness, back into wherever you are in the world -- to continue preparing for the rain which God is preparing to send, so that you may have resurrection life.

Amen.

a saint is just a sinner who fell down and got up again

From: RevLauraRuth Jarrett
Sent: Wed, January 20, 2010 11:14:32 AM
Subject: [FirstChurch Mailing List] The election, the earthquake, and Rest and Bread

Dear Beloved,

We had a little political earthquake in Massachusetts. Some of us thought that Martha Coakley would be a shoo in. Some of us thought that Scott Brown would be the best person to represent Massachusetts in the national Congress. Some of us were distracted or were too busy and didn't vote - all of this and a thousand other thoughts, wishes, hopes, and dreams exist in our congregation this morning.

Our work as a congregation is to be community together, to hear each other, to learn from each other, to listen for God's direction and walk Jesus' way of peace, to align ourselves with the divine. Instead of thinking about who is right (or wrong) or what should have happened, instead, I gently and respectfully request we speak together of our spiritual, physical and emotional needs and how our needs informed how we voted. In this way, we may know about how to pray for each other, how to serve each other, how to negotiate complicated ideas and complex needs with simple love and without judgment. In this way, we grow more centered in our purpose, grow flexible in our ability to see God. I pray this might be our journey.

We have a listserv called: First Church Chat for such discussion. You can join it here: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/firstchurchchat/

The real earthquake is in Haiti, complete with aftershocks. We raised $2560 to give to the Holy Bible Baptist Church, our sister church in Davis Sq. Owen Robinson, Christy, Simon, Izzy Zuzelo, and I walked it down. We got a quick hug and heartfelt thanks. How amazing it was to be welcomed with our gift into that community!

The folks at HBBC will be putting together survival kits for kids. Myriam from HBBC said they could use some hands to put these kits together. You can see what they're doing and what they need at http://www.holybiblebaptistchurch.org/.

Church World Service is doing the same. You can see what they're doing and what they need at http://www.churchworldservice.org/site/PageServer?pagename=kits_main

We can pray together about all these things, to reaffirm that we are the body of Christ regardless of whom we voted for, that we are all in spiritual need at Rest and Bread tonight at 6:30. Music for meditation begins at 6:15.

Church Council follows.

Peace, dear ones, and love from me,
Laura Ruth

I replied:

Thank you for the acknowledgment that not everyone in this congregation/listserv was necessarily anti- Scott Brown.

And for having a forum other than this main listserv for partisan conversation.

And for reminding us of what we as Church are called to.

<3
Elizabeth

Rest and Bread

The readings were Matthew 5:14-16 and part of an article from today's Boston Globe.

I was a little uncomfortable with Laura Ruth's Reflection because hi, I am just war girl, but I can't really argue with the fact that Jesus' message was about loving and taking care of people.

Afterward, we were invited to reflect aloud (and light a candle) on being a peacemaker, on being light in the world, on seeing light in others. Laura Ruth was the first to go, and she said that she thought that Scott Brown was a nobody, that she didn't have to think about him, but now she does; "I'm sorry." I know I'm not remembering the middle part exactly, but what really struck me was the "I'm sorry" that she said at the end, because what I heard in that was, "I'm sorry for discounting the humanity of a beloved child of God" -- because dismissing people as not worth thinking about is in some ways dismissing their humanity (though yes I know plenty of people just thought of course the Democrat would win and they were merely making a political calculus, not any sort of verdict on any person's inherent worth).

A friend today posted excerpts from G.K. Chesterton's "On Certain Modern Writers and the Institution of the Family," in Heretics, including:

We make our friends; we make our enemies; but God makes our next-door neighbour. Hence he comes to us clad in all the careless terrors of nature; he is as strange as the stars, as reckless and indifferent as the rain. He is Man, the most terrible of the beasts. That is why the old religions and the old scriptural language showed so sharp a wisdom when they spoke, not of one's duty towards humanity, but one's duty toward one's neighbour. The duty towards humanity may often take the form of some choice which is personal or even pleasurable. That duty may be a hobby; it may even be a dissipation. We may work in the East End because we are peculiarly fitted to work in the East End, or because we think we are; we may fight for the cause of international peace because we are very fond of fighting...We may be so made as to be particularly fond of lunatics or specially interested in leprosy...But we have to love our neighbour because he is there-- a much more alarming reason for a much more serious operation. He is the sample of humanity which is actually given us. Precisely because he may be anybody he is everybody. He is a symbol because he is an accident.

Much on my mind is this recent slactivist post on "The Logic of Hell" -- which I just read today. And this one, which points out that:

When Jesus stood to read in the synagogue he looked over the whole of the scriptures and selected the one thing he wanted to say out of all that he might have read and he read this as his motto, his mission statement, the signature and standard of his ministry and its meaning:

The spirit of the Lord God is upon me,
because the Lord has anointed me;
he has sent me to bring good news to the oppressed,
to bind up the brokenhearted,
to proclaim liberty to the captives,
and release to the prisoners;
to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor.

[unpreached sermon #4] All Saints Day 2009 (Our God is a God of Life)

[Yes, I wrote this as if I were preaching it on November 1, despite not finishing it until the next week.]

All Saints Day 2009 (Our God is a God of Life)

Pentecost 22 (Year B) - November 1, 2009

Ruth 1:1-18
Psalm 146
Hebrews 9:11-14
Mark 12:28-34

Our Old Testament reading is from the Book of Ruth.  Is *the* passage from the Book of Ruth.  Bringing heathens to the one true God through the power of queerness.  On this Sunday when Cambridge Welcoming Ministries celebrates and honors contemporary saints who have worked for the full inclusion of gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender persons at all levels of the United Methodist Church.

And then we get to the Epistle to the Hebrews, which makes explicit that blood atonement theology that so many of us find so problematic and even hurtful.

But when Christ came as a high priest of the good things that have come, then through the greater and perfect tent (not made with hands, that is, not of this creation), she entered once for all into the Holy Place, not with the blood of goats and calves, but with her own blood, thus obtaining eternal redemption.  For if the blood of goats and bulls, with the sprinkling of the ashes of a heifer, sanctifies those who have been defiled so that their flesh is purified, how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered herself without blemish to God, purify our conscience from dead works to worship the living God!

For this reason she is the mediator of a new covenant, so that those who are called may receive the promised eternal inheritance, because a death has occurred that redeems them from the transgressions under the first covenant.

The more time I spend at Cambridge Welcoming, the more uncomfortable I become with the body and blood language in Communion.  My mother was one of the people who pushed back on me about this.  She said:

I still think that the fact that Jesus was literally broken for us is core to the Christian faith. [...] And I thought that your birth required that I be cut open. It strikes me that the greatest treasures require sacrifice of some kind. Some are harsher than others.

It reminded me of the poem I wrote when George was born. Somehow it is important to me to remember that Jesus suffered for us. His pain was real because he was really human. And if we don't acknowledge his brokenness, somehow we are disrespecting his sacrifice.

My brother George and I were both born through caesarian section (yay modern medicine -- my mom would have died twice over otherwise).  The poem she refers to is about the experience of receiving Communion in the hospital after having given birth to him.  In it she says:

In my hand I hold the bread;
Cradling, blessing, my baby's head.
Rememb'ring when I was torn
That this new life might be born.

[...]

As I drink His holy wine,
My baby partakes of mine.
He takes his life from my breast,
His tender self in quiet rest.

Reenacted holy communion
With every birth, at each nursing breast.
Mother and child in holy union.

What strikes me in this is the LIFE imagery.  It's not about glorifying the pain and suffering that were a part of the journey to this moment; instead it's celebrating the life that has come out of this.

Hear again the Gospel:

One of the scribes came near and heard them disputing with one another, and seeing that Jesus answered them well, the scribe asked Jesus, "Which commandment is the first of all?"
    Jesus answered, "The first is, 'Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God, the Lord is one; you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength.'  The second is this, 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.'  There is no other commandment greater than these."
    Then the scribe said to Jesus, "You are right, Teacher; you have truly said that 'God is one, and besides God there is no other;' and 'to love God with all the heart, and with all the understanding, and with all the strength,' and 'to love one's neighbor as oneself,' — this is much more important than all whole burnt offerings and sacrifices."
    When Jesus saw that the scribe answered wisely, Jesus said to the scribe, "You are not far from the kingdom of God."  After that no one dared to ask Jesus any question.

I admit, the first time I read this lectionary passage this week, I only kind of skimmed it -- having heard this basic story so many times before. But when I went back to edit the gendered language, I noticed something I hadn't caught the first time: "this is much more important than all whole burnt offerings and sacrifices."  This -- to love God with all that one has and to love one's neighbor as oneself.

This reminds me of Jesus saying elsewhere in the Gospels (Matthew 9:9-13), "I desire mercy, not sacrifice."  He's quoting the prophet Hosea (Hosea 6:4-6, NIV):

"What can I do with you, Ephraim?
    What can I do with you, Judah?
    Your love is like the morning mist,
    like the early dew that disappears.
Therefore I cut you in pieces with my prophets,
    I killed you with the words of my mouth;
    my judgments flashed like lightning upon you.
For I desire mercy, not sacrifice,
    and acknowledgment of God rather than burnt offerings."

What is most striking to me in reading that Hosea passage is, "Your love is like the morning mist, like the early dew that disappears."  That's a harsh critique -- that our devotion evaporates under the slightest heat.  The verse that follows says, "Like the first human (or like humanity) they have broken the covenant — they were unfaithful to me there."  We don't offer burnt offerings these days, but there are many other ways in which we make as if to give to God without offering our hearts.  How many times have we failed to live into the covenant with God?

We call ourselves Christians -- at least most of us gathered here do -- and yet we are so very much "of the world."  We go on "diets," not because we want to honor the body we have which is created in God's image by feeding it food full of justice and nutrients and love, but because we believe the voices of the world that there is some magic number at which we are acceptable.  We mutter curses at those traveling the road with us rather than joining our hearts with theirs and praying for peace, patience, and safety.  We shake our heads at those we pass on the street who are begging for spare change rather than inviting them to sit with us in a coffee shop, to buy them something to warm their hands and fill their bellies.  Over and over we turn away from that Emmaus encounter, when the risen Christ was revealed to the mourning disciples in the breaking of bread -- the breaking of bread with an apparent STRANGER they encountered on the road.  Tiffany exhorts us to "look around," to see that "Christ is present" in the gathered congregation.  Far more challenging is a practice Anne Lamott writes about in one of her books -- to see each person she encounters when she is out walking her dog as if that person were Christ.  Because that person is Christ.  We can all recite Matthew 25 -- "whatever you did to the least of these, you did to me"... feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, caring for the sick, visiting the imprisoned.  And we are ALL "the least of these."  Everyone is hungry for something, sick from something, imprisoned by something.  And we are called to be God's hands and feet and voices and shoulders in the world -- to be the BODY of Christ in the world, ministering to this embodied world.

We are, to quote from Ann B. Day's liturgy in Shaping Sanctuary (p. 97, based on I Corinthians 12:14-31), "The hand clapping, toe tapping, heart pumping, mouth tasting, arms embracing, justice seeking, hymn singing, love making, bread breaking, risk taking, Body of Christ."

To return to the passage from Ruth... Ruth gives up EVERYTHING.  "Where you go, I will go; Where you lodge, I will lodge; your people shall be my people, and your God my God.  Where you die, I will die — there will I be buried."

That is some radical fidelity.

I'm less interested in wrestling with Paul and making peace with atonement theology than I am in challenging us to live in to this Call -- this Call to walk with God, to make God's ways our ways, to love God and our neighbor and ourselves all with our whole being.  Yes, I believe that just as we are called to love God with heart, mind, strength, and soul, so too are we called to love our neighbors -- for we are called to love our neighbors as ourselves, and how can we love ourselves except with all of our selves -- our heart, our mind, our strength, and our soul.

So why should we want to walk with this God?  This God who calls us to give up the walks, the lodgings, the people, and the gods of our former lives?  This God who births us into the world but exhorts us to not be "of" this world?

In the daily lectionary readings leading up to this Sunday, Tuesday's readings are Ezekiel 18:1-32 and Acts 9:32-35.  From Ezekiel:

Cast away from you all the transgressions that you have committed against me, and get yourselves a new heart and a new spirit!  Why will you die, O house of Israel?  For I have no pleasure in the death of anyone, says the Sovereign Lord God.  Turn, then, and live.  (Ezekiel 18:31-32, NRSV)

And from Acts:

As Peter traveled about the country, he went to visit the saints in Lydda.  There he found a man named Aeneas, a paralytic who had been bedridden for eight years.  "Aeneas," Peter said, "Jesus Christ heals you. Get up and take care of your mat."  Immediately Aeneas got up.  All those who lived in Lydda and Sharon saw Aeneas and turned to the Lord.  (Acts 9:32-35, NIV)

Our God is a God of life.

God calls us to cast off that which keeps us from relationship with God and to repent, to turn back to God.  God lifts us out of our paralysis, calls us out of our beds, invites us to be a living sacrament pointing to the Creator, Sustainer, and Redeemer of all that is.

Every week at Wednesday night service I say, "This is the Bread of Life, that you might have life abundant."  I might also say, recalling my best friend's threefold reflections on the Bread of Life lectionary arc: "This is the Bread of Life, that you might have life, and have it abundantly, and have life everlasting."

Our God is a God of life.

"I desire mercy, not sacrifice."

The letter to the Hebrews speaks of the high priest Christ who entered into the Holy Place with her own blood.  But Ruth needed no blood to join with Naomi, she merely pledged her life to hers.  We have had enough of death when this story opens.  Naomi's husband Elimelech "died" we are told, and her two sons -- Mahlon and Kilion, the husbands of Orpah and Ruth -- "were killed."  Famine drove Naomi and her family from Judah to Moab, and famine (in some sense no less literal a famine, as she has no male kindred to provide for her in Moab) drives her back to Judah.  "So Naomi returned from Moab accompanied by Ruth the Moabitess, her daughter-in-law, arriving in Bethlehem as the barley harvest was beginning."  [Ruth 1:22, NIV, from Thursday's daily lectionary]  The famine in Judah is over, and Naomi is returning to her people, just as the harvest is beginning.

Our God is a God of life.  Of abundance and renewal, of welcome and family.

Hear again the Psalm:

Praise the Lord our God! Praise the Lord, O my soul!
I will praise you as long as I live; I will sing praises to my God all my life long.
Do not put your trust in princes, in mortals, in whom there is no help.
When their breath departs, they return to the earth; on that very day their plans perish.
Happy are those whose help is the God of Jacob, whose hope is in the Lord their God,
who made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them; who keeps faith forever;
who executes justice for the oppressed; who gives food to the hungry. God, you set the prisoners free;
you open the eyes of the blind. You lift up those who are bowed down; you love the righteous.
You watch over the strangers; you uphold the orphan and the widow, but the way of the wicked you bring to ruin.
The Lord will reign forever, your God, O Zion, for all generations. Alleluia!

I struggled with the lectionary texts this week, and also with how to preach a sermon on All Saints Day, particularly in light of the sudden losses suffered by some of my friends.

I finished reading Emil Fackenheim's What Is Judaism? this Saturday.  In a section titled "The World to Come and the Holocaust," Fackenheim writes, "Only if we share in the anguish of the victims dare we affirm their resurrection.  Only then dare we affirm the resurrection of anyone.  For if the world to come does not exist for them, it does not exist at all." (p. 274)

And yet we are a resurrection people.  A people who affirm that Weeping may come in the night, but joy will come with the dawn.

In our brokenness, our barrenness, and even in our bitterness, we are over and over again welcomed back to Bethlehem, just as the harvest is beginning.  We are called to work the fields and welcome the stranger, called to embrace long-lost family members and those they bring with them.

On this All Saints Day, I invite us all to help share in the long birthing process toward new life and renewal.

[atonement theology] still working it out

I've internalized a lot of CWM's discomfort with atonement theology (how much I have internalized so much of CWM's theology was made particularly clear to me at the RMN Convocation this year), and various (non-CWM) friends (plus my mother) have pushed back about this, so I've been thinking a lot about it, trying to figure out better what exactly it is that I believe.

I think it is True that Christ allowed Christself to be executed, that Christ shed blood and tears, that Christ was willing to suffer all this for the disciples who didn't understand and for all humanity. I think this willing sacrifice is really powerful. What I'm really uncomfortable with is the idea (which I think is perpetuated in a lot of the ways that the story is told) that God REQUIRED this sacrifice in order to reconcile Creation to Godself. What does it say that the spilling of innocent blood is necessary to bridge that gap between Creator and Creation?

***

I recently came across a blogpost titled "Vampires & crosses." An excerpt:

Vampire stories tell us, for example, than any of us can have great power if only we are willing to prey on others. Feed off the blood of others and great power will be yours. This is demonstrably true. It's how the pyramids were built. And Standard Oil.

The stories also tell us that there's a downside to this predatory choice. You become a creature of the night, unable to stand in the light of day.

And crosses will confound you.

Some mistakenly think that this is because the cross is a holy symbol, imbued with religious power. But this is wrong. The symbol, like the thing itself, is powerless. And that's the point. That is why vampires can't tolerate it.

Most vampires don't believe in the cross, but that hardly matters. It's the idea of the thing that gives them fits. The cross confronts vampires with their opposite -- with the rejection of power and its single-minded pursuit. It suggests that no one is to be treated as prey -- not even an enemy. The idea of the cross, in other words, suggests that vampires have it wrong, that they have it backwards, in fact, and that those others they regard as prey are actually, somehow, winning.

This notion is incomprehensible for vampires. The one thing they're certain of, the thing that drives them and tells them who they are and how the world works and that they've got it all figured out is that the key to immortality is in choosing to be the predator rather than the prey. The idea that this might be wrong is so befuddling, so contradictory to everything they have chosen to be that it forces them to recoil. They can't get past it.

This is somewhat reminiscent of part of a post I saw on the "when love comes to town" blog about what happened after the September 11th attacks:

• And that is precisely what [Renee] Girrard describes in his work regarding scapegoats: pinning all of our hatred and fear on the scapegoat always unifies a society - but only for a season - and then more violence is needed to bind people together. Further, societies rarely consider the consequences of scapegoating - history is never told from the perspective of our victims - so we rarely feel remorse or act in repentance.
• Which is why the story and reality of Jesus is unique: for the first time, Girrard suggests, history is told from the perspective of the innocent scapegoat. For the first time we can see the horrible consequences of our violence. Indeed, what makes the passion of Christ so important in NOT the horrible violence a la Mel Gibson. That, sadly, is all to ordinary. No, what makes the passion life changing is the awareness that Christ died to expose this horrible sin and invite us - with God's grace - to stop it.

[Pedantic me would like to point out that blogpost to the contrary, the correct spelling is René Girard.]

***

After Convo, I've been paying more attention to Communion liturgies, and below is an email I wrote to Laura Ruth (hyperlinks not in original) after Rest and Bread this week:

I really like using the traditional Words of Institution (or a close approximation thereto), and it sometimes makes me uncomfortable when we rewrite them so wholesale at CWM (though it feels organic and appropriate to CWM, so even when it does bother me, it bothers me less than it would in other contexts). But I want more. If all we say is, "This is my blood, the blood of the new covenant, poured out for many, for the forgiveness of sins," then I'm left saying, "So God requires innocent blood in order to forgive? And what is this new covenant anyway?"

I went to Sunday morning service at Somerville Community Baptist this past Sunday, and in their Communion liturgy they used the phrase, "Proclaim Christ's death until He comes again," and in thinking about it today, I thought, "But Jesus says "Remember ME," not "I'm going to die soon, and you should remember THAT." " (Okay, okay, when I actually Googled "Words of Institution," it's all "do this in remembrance of me," which sounds very much like a memorial... which just doesn't sit right with me, since WE ARE A RESURRECTION PEOPLE *cough* I have perhaps internalized Tiffany's Easter sermon ... anyway, the relevant chapter in Mark Allan Powell's book Loving Jesus has given me a lot to think about re: the idea of expectantly waiting for Christ's return, but I still incline more toward a focus on "Christ is with us now" than "Christ will come again" -- when we sing "Christ has died, Christ is ris'n..." that's CWM's alternative for the third phrase.)

In my various churches, I hear a lot of talk about coming to the Table to be nourished -- both spiritually and physically. I've never actually experienced this at Communion, because it's a bite of bread and a sip of juice/wine (not an actual meal) and the story doesn't tell me how it is that I am spiritually nourished/fed (or reconciled) through this experience -- I who grew up very low church Protestant where God is ALWAYS accessible to you. And I'm not asking for Communion to become a meaningful powerful experience for me. I have a Bible full of texts to wrestle with, and I live in a world full of grace and full of pain. (Earlier today I came across a quotation I'd forgotten -- "If the world was merely seductive, that would be easy. If it were merely challenging, that would be no problem. But I arise in the morning torn between a desire to improve the world and a desire to enjoy the world. That makes it hard to plan the day." –E.B. White) I have so so much.

But I so want church to be accessible to and meaningful for people, and I think, "What stories are we telling people? What stories are we embodying? How are we helping people to touch the face of God?" (Did I ever tell you that my best friend's pastor once said, "we go to church every week because we touch the face of God"?)

And so I think, What if after we recited the words from the Bible (the Words of Institution), we said, "And Jesus said: Whenever you do this, remember me. And so we do remember. We remember Jesus' ministry of sitting down at table and sharing a meal with the outcasts and the religious elite. We remember Jesus' body being broken by the authorities, and we remember the tomb being broken open. We remember the suffering and the resurrection. And in this meal, the fruits of the earth broken open for us, we remember and we are nourished for the journey that lies ahead."

Um, I'm not sure when I turned into someone who actually writes liturgy?