Receiving Ashes

A Reflection for Ash Wednesday at Outer Banks Presbyterian Church, Kill Devil Hills, N.C.

February 14, 2018 Thomas E Wilson, Celebrant

Receiving Ashes

It is a strange thing for me to be here this day at the Outer Banks Presbyterian Church and doing an Ash Wednesday service with ashes. My Mother was raised a Presbyterian in Youngstown, Ohio in the Scottish Covenanter Tradition. The minister of the church she attended was from Northern Ireland who would find an opportunity in almost every sermon to warn about the Papist threat and the selling out of the Old Covenanter Tradition. There is a story told about when the King of Scotland and England, Charles I, had his Archbishop, William Laud, try to force the Scottish Church to accept the English Prayer Book, Bishops, and the Episcopalian form of Governance. At St. Giles Cathedral in Edinburgh on July 23, 1637, when the Dean was reading the order from Laud during the Sunday service, a woman named Janet Geddis who was sitting on a three- legged stool stood up, threw the stool at the Dean, and shouted, “Villain, you wanna say mass in my lock; you won’t say mass in my ear.” Archbishop Laud was later executed by Parliament in 1645 with a little help from ticked off Presbyterians and Puritans. My mother’s family remembered with pride that one her family’s Covenanter ancestors, standing up for what he called his “freedom of conscience”, was executed during the “Killing Times” of 1683.

My mother came as a Junior transfer student to the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and, within months she fell in love with – horrors - a nice Roman Catholic young man from Asheville and brought him home to meet her parents. They loved their daughter and accepted my father out of that love. His parents accepted my mother out of love. They were married by a more accommodating Presbyterian minister in the rose garden of my grandparents’ summer home in Pennsylvania. After my father came back from service in World War II, my parents split the difference and raised their four children as Episcopalians. Neither set of grandparents ever attended the Episcopal Church when they visited for they held on to their own conscience, but I was taken by my grandparents’ to their Presbyterian church during my summers in Pennsylvania and taken to Roman Catholic Mass at my other grandmother’s church while visiting my cousins in New Jersey. I come to you today not to try to convert you but to share something I love.

In the Jewish tradition in which Jesus was raised, ashes were placed on the head for three different reasons - as a sign of (a) mourning, (b) a sign of repentance and (c) as a sign of humility.

(a)Mourning was grieving in which sackcloth and ashes were used as desolation over all that had been lost. It was used by widows and widowers at the death of spouses, by those who had lost children, and by Kings and leaders during a national catastrophe. The idea was that the outward form should reflect the inward desolation.

(b)Repentance was called for when someone was aware of their need to turn to God, as in the story of the city of Nineveh, that great city, when Jonah called for repentance before the LORD.

(c)Humility was when one wanted to be reminded that, by the love of God, we humans were made out of the dust of the earth and to dust we shall return. It was often a sign of atonement for shows of arrogance toward neighbor or community.

In the early church when people committed sins, the outward and visible signs of choosing to be out of love and charity with their neighbors, they were excommunicated, following the advice of St. Paul to the Corinthians. The offending parties were allowed to rejoin the community after a period of time of public penance, wearing sackcloth and ashes as an outward sign of their inner turmoil. After a period of this time out, they were brought back to communion, and God’s peace was shared with them. At no time was this ever seen as a way to earn God’s love and forgiveness, for love and forgiveness are gifts of grace and as such cannot be earned.

The great Reformer John Calvin wrote in his Institutes that, while he did not approve of Priests being the only ones who could hear confessions, he did speak persuasively about the need for confession:

"To whom do we confess them? To Christ certainly. That is, if with an afflicted and humbled heart we bow ourselves before Him; if in true sincerity, rebuking and condemning ourselves before His face, we ask to be absolved by His goodness and mercy. Whoever makes this confession of heart before God will also no doubt have a tongue ready to confess, when there is need to proclaim God's mercy among the people. And this not only to disclose the secret of his heart to a single person, once, in the ear, but freely to make known his poverty as well as God's glory, more than a few times, publicly and with all the world hearing.”

Micah said, “What does the LORD require of you; to do justice, love mercy and walking humbly with your God.” To me, the accepting of ashes reminds me: (1) that I recommit myself to doing justice in this broken world. Too often I accept the status quo of injustice, exploitation, and greed. I am called to remember my own Baptismal vows to work for justice, freedom, and peace and to respect the dignity of every human being. (2) To love mercy and to care for my family, neighbor, and enemy and to forgive promiscuously as a gift which is not to be bartered for; and (3) to walk humbly to remember that I am loved outrageously by God and by Jesus who gave his life for me.

Emerging church leader Brian McLaren speaks of:

“The belief that God’s sphere of concern is not just the church, but all of creation. The church is God’s agent of transformation and healing for the sake of the world. . . ., the gospel is a transformation plan, not an evacuation plan. It is focused not on airlifting souls to heaven, but on transforming lives so they can be agents of God’s will being done “on earth as in heaven.” Those are easy words to say, but deeply challenging – and unsettling – and liberating – if we take them seriously.”

Now, if you are choosing to receive ashes as a way to show that you are a much better person than any others who did not show up here, then please, for the sake of your immortal soul, wash those ashes off as quickly as you can. We ask God to lead us not into temptation and rushing into temptation by pampering your religious pride is not something the LORD wants you to do, as you may have heard in the Gospel lesson for today.

If you feel pressured to go along with a nice little piece of religious fluff, don’t come up; life is too short to waste time on things that don’t mean anything. I believe in what my Presbyterian ancestors called “freedom of conscience” and, while I invite all of you to come forward, I must say “all may, some should and none must.”

Receiving Ashes

“Dust you are and to dust you shall return”

is a reminder to me of our God’s loving

act in all creation and in me life giving;

it was a sign of free gift not one to earn.

Dust isn’t worth a thing but is gathered

by the potter and fashioned into a vessel

for others to drink from deeply and nestle

into a divine love which is then slathered

onto friend and enemy alike freely given,

even if you didn’t ask for it with a please

or thank you, but with the Spirit’s breeze

sweeping away all so to be fully forgiven.

We’d come together from paths different

while we all swim in God’s same current.

Transfigurations

A Reflection for Last Sunday of Epiphany (Quinquagesima) All Saints’, Southern Shores, NC

February 11, 2018 Thomas E. Wilson, Rector

2 Kings 2:1-12 2 Corinthians 4:3-6 Mark 9:2-9 Psalm 50:1-6

Transfigurations

In today’s Gospel lesson Jesus and his disciples have a vision. Visions are those things that we tend to be skeptical about because they are outside of our usual scientific rational mind where things are real or they are not real; there is either an objective reality in which we place our trust or there is a subjective feeling which cannot really be trusted - end of story. When I was a therapist, if someone came in having a vision, I would make the assumption that they were having a break with reality, either caused by stress or by some organic problem. 

 

Now, decades later, I know visions are indeed breaks from reality - our puny concept of reality, when we can see that, not only are some people crazy, but our whole concept of reality is crazy, the world is crazy. Jesus came to point out our crazy tendencies in how we see people divided by class, caste, race, enemies, and kin and about in who or what do we place our trust. In the name of God, people are willing to kill images of God or allow them to suffer because they don’t have enough resources even though there are more than enough to go around if we would only share, where people are treated as objects of plunder rather than subjects of love, where wealth is worshipped and truth is debased. This is crazy but it seems to pass as normal.

Many cultures used to have organized into their culture the idea of a vision quest, where a young man or woman would be pushed to break with what was normal in order to see what is the deeper reality. Now we just spend time hoping our children will adjust and prosper in this world’s insanity where one’s worth is determined by our being in control and by the amount of possessions we have accumulated and by selling ourselves out for the approval of others. 

 

Challenging our concepts of reality is what prophets do. They are see-ers, seers, people who see differently, seeing what God is doing. They tend to speak using mythopoetic language which explodes our narrow view of creation, where God is up there, somewhere far away, and we are safe down here away from divine pesky interference. Elijah and Elisha in the Hebrew Testament lesson from 2^nd Kings have been struggling against the corrupt governments of Israel and Judah that want to act as if God is on vacation and out of communication range and people are thought of as just so much prey at the mercy of the predators in power. Elijah is coming to the end of his time on earth and everybody knows it. Elisha in the vision sees that Elijah’s death is not just the end of his narrow earthly life, but a continuation of his life in God’s reality. They both have a vision about the flaming chariot carrying Elijah into uninterrupted union with God; this is the deeper reality using mythopoetic language.

Paul is writing to the Church in Corinth warning them of the puny gods of this world which try to blind people to the light of Christ. He is saying that the world is crazy but we need to break the so-called reality to see deeper and see the Christ, the image of God, Jesus who was once dead but is in union with the Christ that lives in our very being. Paul himself had visions where he saw the Risen Christ blinding him to the so-called real world in which Paul had placed his trust in order for Paul to see with new eyes the deeper reality.

The Transfiguration story in Mark’s Gospel is also a vision of how Peter, James, and John are able to see the union of this Jesus, who they knew as an ordinary human being, with the fullness of God and of the other see-ers, Moses and Elijah. If we stop the story there, what we end up with is that Jesus was an exception to the rule of God and humans, but the Gospel tries to tell us that Jesus is not an exception but the rule of the deeper reality that all of us are called to be transfigured by having God’s light, the Christ light shine through us. The reality of what happens to Jesus in mythopoetic language is what those of us who claim to follow Jesus will be called to experience in everyday life and not just in church.

Many of my moments closest to Christ happen away from the service times. Let me stop myself with a caution and say that I find the service times helpful to get me ready to want to have moments close to Christ in the larger world. Church is like the dress rehearsal for the performance of the rest of the week.

Here on the Outer Banks I find those moments when I am walking on the beach feeling the quiver of the sand as the waves come in, reminding me that there is a power greater than myself. When I feel that in my feet, I am more aware of the majesty of creation. In my time away from religion when the Priest would say, “The Lord be with you” I would be thinking ,“Not in this place!” I would find the Christ without the Episcopal Church in things like Joan Sutherland singing the first act, first scene aria from Bellini’s Norma , where she follows the Druid Priests in Ancient Gaul who are praying in the Sacred Woods for strength to destroy the Roman Invaders, and she alone sings Casta Diva, Chaste Goddess, the Spirit of the Moon, who she asks to shine over these ancient plants and “spargi in terra quella pace” Scatter peace across the earth. For a good version see: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iK2LwLyZAlc] 

 

It is Bel Canto singing at its best with trills and runs lifted heavenward. I still pull it up on YouTube since I wore my vinyl record out playing it. When I hear it I am reminded of my faith to scatter peace over every path I take.

In all three of the Synoptic Gospels, Matthew, Mark and Luke all lead up to this story with the caution given by Jesus that “If anyone wants to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake and for the sake of the Gospel will save it. For what will it profit them to gain the whole world and forfeit their life?” If you make a choice to hold on to all the bankrupt delusions of this world, you will miss what life is really all about.

I have a weekly meeting with some people where we discuss three questions: 1) What was your moment closest to Christ since we last met?, 2) How have you grown closer to Christ through study?, and 3)What was your action in this world to share that reality of Christ’s presence? The three questions are part of the classic Christian Spiritually where 1) you try to get a deeper vision other than the world’s delusions, 2) you open yourself up to learn, and 3) you see yourself as operating in union with Christ in healing the world. Each week as I know those questions will be asked I start making choices for those seven days. 

 

Spirituality is fundamentally about making choices with our free will instead of spouting dogma while just going along with an insane culture - about how I will see, about how I will open my mind, and how I will spend my resources of time, energy and money. I have been attending such meetings on and off since 1977 and I am still working on those three questions. There are times when Christ’s light shines through me, and at times I grab ahold of empty darkness in my fears of missing the shiny objects that look so alluring.

Today make your choices in your own free will to answer those three questions; what were the moments closest to Christ, how did you try to learn more about Christ and how did you unite with Christ to scatter peace over your path on earth.

Transfigurations

Today I’ll make choices in my free will

that I will look for Christ in all of things,

like beach walks or Sutherland singing

Bellini’s Casta Diva with notes that trill.

Beaches don’t have many wooden pews

and Norma is singing to a Druid sprite,

but both are giving all without respite

as a way of guiding us by giving of clues

of that which is important to hold on to

beneath all the smoke and mirrors false

that should be taken with a dose of salts

to see clearly what is life’s treasure true.

Today I seek and trust the deeper reality

so might thy light shining as You in me be.

Priceless Treasure

Response to Bishop’s Address                           February 10, 2018

East Carolina Diocesan Convention, New Bern , NC

Eric Moulton -St. John’s, Wilmington

Francisca Rios -La Sagrada Familia, Newton Grove

Tom Wilson -All Saints, Southern Shores

Melissa Glen -The Well, ECU Campus Ministry

Jettie Pelletier -Christ Church, New Bern

Priceless Treasure

Thank you Bishop Rob for your address, which was a treasure, and after four conventions you are still uncovering treasures of old and new. One of the Treasures we discovered in the Committee for the Bishop’s Response was to find out how diverse we were on this committee of five. We are different and we all were facing transitions in our lives, our churches and communities. We were especially touched by the question you asked us to "pray for those who live in fear and for those who bear the responsibility for making difficult decisions."  In your workshop you expanded that circle of compassion of how to enter into listening with those with whom we disagree. You shared the story of your sharing a Holy Space as you listened to a fellow child of Christ with his love for guns, less important than the love of his family. It seemed to us that you were a model of changing the empty time in a flight into Kairos time, the time which had fully come for both of you. You remind us that we who follow a rule of life in Christ are caught in a crossfire of love for people of all sides of the argument and how the path to advocacy must avoid the trap of demonizing our opponents, who remain our sisters and brothers in Christ.  Richard Rohr in his meditation yesterday wrote: “The best criticism of the bad is the practice of the better.” Thank you Bishop for practicing the better

You never tire of reminding us of the commandment not to be afraid and let me let the other members of this committee share one of their fears and ask how the church may help, or has helped, us live with those fears and not be overwhelmed by them and we invite you to follow our example to practice the better.

Jettie Pelletier -Christ Church, New Bern:

“Our follow up discussion following the Bishop’s address lead us to discussion of FEAR regarding the hot topics he touched on this morning. So we decided to share what our fear might be? My fear is that our young people will become more desensitized through the continued use of social media. I can already see the loss of conversations among many of our young people. How can we prevent this and what are we doing as a church to include our youth and young families in more dialogue assuring them of God’s love and helping them with their “rule of life”?”

Eric Moulton -St. John’s, Wilmington:

“In an increasingly secular age, and with the dramatic rise of the religiously “unaffiliated”, known as “The Nones,”  my fear is that the church is ill-equipped to respond both to the challenge and opportunity of Gospel engagement within a ‘cross-pressured’ society that is asking huge life-questions and seeking answers anywhere but the church.”

Francisca Rios -La Sagrada Familia, Newton Grove:

“When Bishop Rob visited La Sagrada Familia last year, he shared a very powerful and meaningful message;"Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest" Matthew 11:28

My fear is that all the commotion caused by our world's troubles (as mentioned in the Bishop's address) but in particular our nation's broken immigration system (as I experience firsthand the impact on those affected) will cause us to become so weary that we let the burdens overshadow that powerful and meaningful message which gives us love and hope.”

Melissa Glen -The Well, ECU Campus Ministry:

“My fear: I am afraid that if we keep letting our selfish and prideful attitudes keep us from being honest about our feelings, especially our fears then all open communication will disappear as we know it, but more importantly that love will disappear as we know it

Fear. 1 word, 4 letters. It's something logically no one should have if they have faith in God. However, it is something realistically everyone has, because they are human. It is in our opinion that the issues and the hate our world is facing are most often fueled by fear-- fear of the future, fear of what's different from us, and fear that we will individually one day become obsolete.

The solution we see is not to merely  try harder to be less afraid but rather to acknowledge these fears and share them with others to find common ground and a common answer.

So with that being said we would like to invite everyone here to be bold. . When you get your evaluation form by e-mail take a moment to use the comment section and share one of the things about which you might have some fear and share it and it will be forwarded to the Bishop for his better understanding of what is happening with his friends in the diocese and as a way of asking for his prayers”

Bishop, we are encouraged by your commitment to Safeguarding all of God's children and while working for justice, holding on to the hope of reconciliation and healing in ways that are beyond the imagination of us mere mortals, but our reach should exceed our grasp as the poet reminds us.

We applaud your ideas that the Diocese is not only in a waterlogged building in Kinston but wherever two or three gather in worship and work. We are scattered in this diocese but are strengthened by your attempts to gather us together in new structures of ministry to face the economic and social problems that have not lessened in the time you have been with us. We are asked to remember Dr. King's words that while the ark of the universe does bend toward justice, it is very long.

You proposed an action plan and were reminded about a "rule of life". On that idea we would like to point out that a "Rule of Life" in not about things to DO, but a rhythm of life - how can one live fully into who they created to be 

We called you as our Bishop, knowing that you were in a committed loving relationship with Sandy and we ask that you continue to be a role model for us on how to take time off from all the work that you (and every one of us) do not have the time to do and to take the time to love and cherish your family. You point out how the church has a habit of ignoring exploitation and you are right but there is also the exploitation of the people who work for us by demanding ALL of their time.

If you remember last week's Gospel lesson from Mark, Jesus had hundreds of requests for healing and after a VERY busy day-- he goes off by himself to a lonely place to nourish his soul. Jesus knew, and Mark passes on to us who are members of the body of Christ in this world, that God's indwelling Spirit feeds us with vision and strength away from all that we "DO".

Also as we come to this coming Sunday's Gospel lesson Jesus takes a few of his disciples to the Mount. There they enter into silence to hear God. Peter ruins it by going into a list of building projects.

Knowing that you are an introvert we are worried that you Plans of Actions, which are wonderfully focused on healing the problems of the world and what we can "DO”, leaves a hole in Being.

A suggestion might be that you lead by example and attend a quiet day a quiet day for clergy and lay persons in each deanery where a local Spiritual Director leads the Quiet Day and side conversations, questions or consultations with the Bishop by other persons at the retreat be strictly prohibited. Come BE with us. Remember we begin our services with "The Lord BE with You" instead of "May the Lord give you a series of tasks to accomplish in the next hour!" We must be aware that the response is always "And also with you (or "With thy Spirit)" is always the reply. 

 It has been good for us to have you BE with us for these last four years we have been blessed and we pray that we will also be a blessing for you.

One of the ways I like to think is to do a poem

The Priceless Treasure

That one treasure was buried there they knew

from long ago said filled with jewels and gold.

Unearthing a lock of which they'd been told

dug two scribes; hands of one old, one new.

Lock melted in their touching hands becoming

a beating heart pulsating in that lonely place

changing time to Kairos and air to Holy Space,

two hands; like on an instrument strumming.

Hands had none in common in the body except

of remembering vaguely of the old ancient tale

about the one speaking Word to void the sale

of souls to the Gods of violence and disrespect

Hands pulled out string of pearls, long out of fashion

to wrap round their shoulders a sign of compassion.

Going to a Lonely Place

A Reflection for V Epiphany             All Saints’ Episcopal Church, Southern Shores, N.C.

 February 4, 2018                                Thomas E. Wilson, Rector

Isaiah 40:21-31           1 Corinthians 9:16-23             Mark 1:29-39              Psalm 147:1-12, 21c

Going To a Lonely Place

The question I asked you to consider during meditation before the service is "How do you get your strength to go on?” I think this is one question that the lessons are addressing. The first lesson is from the School of the Prophet Isaiah, the one who we suggest might be Second Isaiah writing in the 6^th century BC in the spirit of the 8^th century Prophet Isaiah. 2^nd Isaiah is singing a song to the exiles in Babylon after the Persian Emperor Cyrus has given the exiles permission to return to Judah. They have been in exile for several generations, and many of them are not all that sure they want to go back. It is going to be a rough road back, and the place was a mess when they left after the Babylonians had destroyed the walls of the city and the Temple.

They are making a lot of excuses and whining about the difficulties ahead, and in response, Isaiah writes to remind them that it is not their strength they have to rely on but the strength of the One who is greater than they. He sings: “Have you not known? Have you not heard?”, suggesting that the LORD already has a day job of running the universe and can do this in his spare time if they will agree to do their part.  He points out that he knows that they don’t have enough strength by themselves. The lyrics continue:

He does not faint or grow weary; his understanding is unsearchable. He gives power to the faint, and strengthens the powerless. Even youths will faint and be weary, and the young will fall exhausted; but those who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength, they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.

Listen to that phrase: “They shall mount up with wings like eagles”.  That tells them that they need not be trapped in Babylon any more as a result of relying on God’s strength for the strength they need. The end of the exile is not because of their own power; they did not win their victory by the force of arms. Look at Psalm 147 for today, probably written in the same time frame as 2^nd Isaiah.  In the Prayer Book translation, verse 11 reads, “He is not impressed by the might of a horse; he has no pleasure in the strength of a man.” Poet Robert Alter’s translation suggests that this verse is a transitional verse from nature of the young ravens to the horse, but the horse represents the horses of the cavalry they would have used in the battle they did not need to win their homeland back. Altar’s next line is “Not by a man’s thighs is HE pleased”, by which Alter explains, “the line moves on to the power of the warrior concentrated concretely in the muscles of his thighs (with perhaps as well with a metronymic glance at his sexual power).” The next line is “The LORD is pleased by those who fear (meaning “in awe of”) HIM, those who long for HIS kindness.” A Wilson translation would be something like: “Hey Studley; you are going to need help to get through this!”

Paul, when he writes to the Corinthians, reminds them, “To the weak I became weak, so that I might win the weak.” Paul’s work was not by his own power but by continually opening himself up to the power of the Spirit.

This is the place where Jesus finds himself in the Gospel lesson from Mark. He has entered into a ministry of healing by being kind to Peter’s mother-in-law and finds himself overwhelmed by the number of people rushing in for help. He realizes that he is in over his head and makes a dash out the back door to return to the strengthening silence of God’s presence that he finds when he is able to get off by himself to be still and long for God’s kindness. Jesus goes to the Lonely Place to be honest with himself about his need to be connected to God.

As I keep mentioning, I don’t think Mark was at all interested in doing a fact-packed biography of Jesus, but instead setting up an outline of how Mark’s Community was to follow Jesus in ministering to this broken world. It is a human temptation to want to be seen as the all-sufficient hero of our own story. We want to swagger while flexing our muscles and endurance in our adventure of derring-do. I think of the old Andy Griffith Show where Andy played the folksy and kindly Andy Taylor, Sheriff of a small Southern town, and most of us would like to have that part of the one who could do it all by himself - raise a son all by himself, being the one competent figure who holds it all together. In my dreams I would like that part, but all too often I find myself cast as the Don Knotts Barney Fife character, who talks big and tries to do it all by himself and becomes overwhelmed because he needs a power greater than himself. Life is a comedy in so many ways, and we need to go to a lonely place often to be with God so it does not turn into a tragedy.

We are about to come up to Lent in ten days where we like to cast ourselves as the hero in our faith journey. What I will urge you to do is to become weak and rely on the power of One who offers kindness to us each day.

Going To a Lonely Place

“How are you able to do all this?” they asked

him while smiling a bit longer than necessary,

while he had visions of fleeing to a high aerie

looking for an opening to get out of there fast.

He had come to end of his own great strength

starting to entering in to doing things by rote

by giving lip service followed by a right quote

wondering if they'd tell a difference at length.

He shook off the grasping hands holding him

as he made way to escape door to quiet place

where he could enter into silence of God face

to face not having say words or sing a hymn.

“Let divine breath rush over me,” he sighed

letting a Holy Strength wash in as new tide.

Service for Scott and Buckley Fricker

A Reflection on the Occasion of a Celebration of Life for Scott and Buckley Kuhn Fricker

All Saints’ Church, Southern Shores, NC.    January 27, 2018    Thomas E. Wilson, Rector

Ecclesiasticus 44                    Revelation 21:2-7                   John 1

 The first reading is from the Book of Ecclesiasticus, sometimes called the Wisdom of Jesus Ben Sira, or Sirach. If you are Roman Catholic or Greek Orthodox, it is part of your Bible, and for Episcopalians and other Anglicans, it is part of the Apocrypha which can be used for moral instruction. The Book is a collection of writings by a Jewish Rabbi in Egypt and was translated into Greek by his grandson in the 2^nd Century before the Christian era. It was a very popular book in the early church and was quoted often by the early church leaders as they tried to answer the questions “What is wisdom?” and “What makes the kind of life worth living which can be passed on to generations yet unborn?”

The Supreme Court was given the case of Jacobellis v. Ohio after Louis Malle's 1958 film, The Lovers, was ruled obscene by the censors, and Justice Potter Stewart said of the majority opinion's definition of obscenity: “I shall not today attempt further to define the kinds of material I understand to be embraced within that shorthand description, and perhaps I could never succeed in intelligibly doing so. But I know it when I see it.”

I find myself in that same kind of situation where words to describe Buckley and Scott Fricker's relationship with each other, their families, and their communities are so hard to say intelligibly, but I know it when I see it for it was in the love and compassion with which they treated each part of their lives. I baptized Elliot years ago in this church as an invitation for a deeper involvement in organized religion. In that I was a failure, but their spirituality was a success as they worked on keeping the promises they made in Eliot's name - “loving your neighbor as yourself” and “strive for justice and peace among all people, and to respect the dignity of every human being”. They were people who showed loving grace without religious trappings.

Roman Catholic Jesuit German Theologian Karl Rahner set a tone for the 2^nd Vatican Council in addressing this kind of situation: “"Anonymous Christianity" means that a person lives in the grace of God and attains salvation outside of explicitly constituted Christianity.”

14 billion years ago God spoke the Word, which the writer of the Gospel of John identifies with the Christ, whom the Christian community experienced in the person of Jesus. The Word was the beginning of all creation and the energy behind that Word exploded to create all that we know in the universe - and so much more that we do not know. Every atom of the universe is connected to that explosion – stars, planets, galaxies, rocks, seas, animals, humans, families, enemies, strangers, you, and me are all made of the same residual stardust. Spirituality worth its name is the one that recognizes how utterly connected we are with the very ground of our being and with each other and strives to make that union one that sees Holy Ground all around us. Many times that Spirituality is found outside of organized religion and the genius of 12 Step recovery programs is that they use the phrase “Power Greater than ourselves” as a way to help people damaged by toxic religion find the strength of who we, for convenience sake, call God.

For part of my life I felt unconnected to God and one of the openings I found was in the help of my thesis advisor in Grad school for Social Work, Dr. Alan Keith-Lucas. Keith had written a book, Giving and Taking Help, which was required in the Introduction to Social Work class I took. I skimmed the book and ignored the final two chapters, A Short History of Helping and Helping and Religious Belief, because they had so many references to religion. After Keith helped me do my final thesis two years later, I went back to read those chapters to find out what made this man so helpful to me and where he found his patience and strength. They were found in his faith in the Prophets’ message: “What does the Lord require of you; to do justice, love mercy and walk humbly with your God”. Faith was found in this formula for the basis of all helping - a Trinity of Reality, Empathy and Support.

For Keith, Reality was a metaphor for the Creator God, the one who set the limits of the universe. Helping was to set the limits of the possible, and the work was to make the “good enough” better in the facts of human existence.

I remember 20-some years ago at another church where I had a habit of sitting on the chancel steps with the children sitting around me, looking up at me as I told an interpretation of one of the lessons which would form the basis of the sermon I would preach later for the adults. Children keep interrupting and that day was no exception as little Hannah Ackerman piped up: “You know what? You know what?” I smiled and said, “No, Hannah what?” And she replied, “You got boogers up your nose.” I was embarrassed but she was talking about the reality of life, speaking truth. We do not pretend but we live into a deeper and at times painful reality.

We do not enter into wishful thinking but ground ourselves in the truthful hard work of being the best persons in the best families in the best communities in which we find ourselves. I saw this in the work of both Scott and Buckley as they worked to make life more understandable for people - for Scott in Labor Statistics and for Buckley in helping people to understand and cope with aging. They both worked in teaching their children about the responsibilities in life. They both worked on finding help for their children instead of wishing it away. They both decided that hate had no part of a just society and in their family. It was that loving reality that undergirded the making sense of their lives  and their courageous commitment to this reality that led to their death.

For Keith the second part of the Trinity was Empathy, a metaphor for Christ. It meant getting involved and not staying at a safe distance away. It was not sympathy where one feels “sorry” for someone but feeling along with someone as an act of imagination and entering into the life of the other without losing one’s core identity. It was to enter boldly and vulnerably into the pain and joy of life. It was that courage not to enter into denial but to enter into the brokenness of lives that typified Scott and Buckley’s lives. It was that loving gesture of Christ to become the human Jesus that led to his birth, death, and resurrection

This last week I was coming out of the office area onto the gazebo to make a home visit, and there were some children from the All Saints School playing there. As I came out, I was greeted with calls of “Hey, Father Tom!” They came up to tell me about their joys, such as one little girl had painted fingernails, and their difficulties, as a series of kids pointed out their “boo boos.” That is what we do in life - share the joys and enter into solidarity of the “boo boos” of all sizes and magnitudes. It is why we are here to weep with families and to share the joys so present in the lives of their children.

For Keith the third part of the Trinity of the helping relationship was Support; the “I will be with you to share strength with you. I will not do it for you but I will walk with you each step of the way. As Jesus said; “Lo I am with you even to the end of the ages.”

No one part of the Trinity can exist without the others, and when we enter into helping relationships of Reality, Empathy, and Support is when we begin to live into being an image of God.

In all of that we come back to the promise from the passage from the Revelation to John for today "See, the home of God is among mortals. He will dwell with them as their God; they will be his peoples, and God himself will be with them; he will wipe every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more; mourning and crying and pain will be no more, for the first things have passed away."

Today we hold on to the reality, empathy, and support of that promise and give thanks to God for sharing Buckley and Scott with us.

Weeping With Rachel In Ramah
Scholars tell us there was no historical
    evidence of Bible's Slaughter of Innocents
       in Bethlehem from Herod's fear,
        and it was only a myth to have
        Jesus come across as the new Moses
      by Matthew's church finding solace
   when their friend died before his mother.
Burying child is obscene, a perversion
    of all we have tried to do as parents
       when we used to put them to bed
           kiss them good night, sleep tight.
          All the worry we did, all the advice
      all the cheering, the yelling,
    sighing and crying
all the mistakes,
    all the missed opportunities we wasted,
        all the hugs deferred and missed again,
            all the secrets shared and kept,
            all the birthdays still to come,
        all the joys still to be found,
    all the what-if's crowding in.
We were not able to fully protect them
     from all the threats of inattention,
       disease, broken hearts and violence.
           Yet we give thanks for all the love given
            and received to and from products of love,
       hope and grace of these precious gifts
    in this, our fleeting gifted universe
where it is no myth to join Rachel weeping in Ramah.