Sunday, October 11, 2009
The Rev. Natasha Brubaker Garrison
Year B, Proper 23
Amos 5:6-7, Ps. 90:12-17, Hebrews 4:12-16, Mark 10:17-31
Whenever I hear or read this passage of the Gospel I am shaken. I want to look for the loophole or the escape hatch. The obvious one is to say that, well, this command to sell all and give to the poor is for him specifically and not for me. But that delusion vanishes as I read further and here the words of Jesus saying how hard it is for the rich to enter the kingdom. Suddenly, the story has a universal applicability. I am reminded once again of how diametrically opposed the vision of the kingdom of God is from the vision of the American Dream. I claim to follow Jesus and then realize yet again how enmeshed I am in the world about me. See, I understand myself to be like the rich young man, or perhaps somewhere between the man and the disciples who chime in that they’ve left everything. As I thought about what to say today in response to such a full and rich passage, two opposing pairs come to my mind: God’s love and challenging invitation and what is consecrated—our lives to God or our lives to the world.
Let’s look at the first one: God’s love and challenging invitation. The hope in the story that I hear is always in that phrase, “Jesus, looking at him, loved him.” This rich young man is a decent man. He is honest, faithful, caring and sincere. He lives a good and upright life within the culture that is his. Jesus honors this. But the young man coming to Jesus signifies, at least to my mind, that even though he has lived this decent life he is hungry for more. He feels deep in his being it is not enough; there is something more, something deeper, something even more life giving. Jesus is where he sees this and so he runs up to him and prostrates himself—a rich man to whom others would bow himself bows at the feet of a wandering, disturbing man of a lower social strata. He wants to hear the Good News.
Before we hear the words that surely must have been hard to hear, Jesus looks with love, with compassion, on this earnest, decent person. His words are direct, but said with care: “You lack one thing; go, sell what you own, and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me.” Often we tend to hear these words as said with scorn or harsh judgment. Not so. Jesus, who is so keenly aware of the power of wealth and the chimera of security to lure us away from a focus on God and by extension our fellow human beings, is also aware of how fragile, how vulnerable we are. We are pulled by our obligations and responsibilities to provide for ourselves and those closest to us. If we choose a life that doesn’t seem to put us or our children on the path to upward mobility we are put down and criticized. We are in a tough spot.
Jesus though sees the promise underneath and gives it a challenging, but encouraging nudge. But most importantly he starts the whole encounter with a reminder that the unearned, unconditional love of God for us exists first. Then from that love we are invited to live into the challenging vision of the kingdom of God. All too often we hear it, either in our mind or from others, inverted: we must live up to the challenge successfully and then we will receive God’s love. As Jesus demonstrates, it is just the opposite. Love for us comes first; and when we can accept this, the challenge becomes less grievous and more joyful.
And this bring us to look at that second opposing pair I mentioned: the idea of what we consider consecrated.
There are several definitions of the word consecrate. In reading the Gospels and the vision Jesus lays out of the kingdom of God it seems that this definition is the operative one: set apart as sacred; dedicate solemnly to a sacred or religious purpose; make fit for religious use. In living our lives in such a way as to follow Jesus, to take the radical and difficult steps of letting go of the things of this world to be builders of the kingdom, we are in effect consecrating our lives to serve God. We do this as persons and even more so as the Church—a different type of community. All that we are and have is consecrated to this purpose: our time, our things, our money, our dreams, our suffering. And the promise is a new family of many houses, members and fields, along with persecution, for to live this life is to engage fully the suffering and pain and evil of the world. It is not an escape; it is an active engagement. It is a communal vision and one that hopefully can inspire the larger world around it.
There is another definition of consecrate and it is this one that all too often is what happens. It is this: to make an object of veneration or regard. Too often in the course of human life since human life as such began we get the focus wrong. Instead of consecrating our lives and its fruits to God, as things to serve the Holy One, we consecrate the things themselves. Just think of all the things that are “consecrated” in our society in this way: good looks, hip clothes, prestigious jobs, money, sports, sex, etc. These become the ends that are served before God.
Part of the core of our life as followers of Jesus is learning to truly see other people for who they are, warts and all, and to enter into relationship with them. To cultivate this ability we need to learn silence and presence. We are consecrating ourselves to the service of others rather than our own success or ego. We need to have time to be with people without a goal: we go for a walk and sit by a river rather than network; we have dinner with our family instead of another power lunch; we sit vigil by a sick person’s bedside; we sit and look at the world instead of working more overtime or taking on more activities we really can’t manage; we allow ourselves to see the heart of someone not all the surface stuff. The gift is the brothers and mothers and sisters and children of the kingdom of God.
For at the end of the day it matters not how much or how little we have but if we have connection, vital connection to other people. At the end of the day a fancy title cannot replace the ability to sit with someone in their pain or suffering as a steady, silent presence that will not leave. At the end of the day the gift of seeing all people no matter how flawed or messed up as reflections of part of God’s being gives us stores of compassion, the freedom to try new things, the openness of heart to embody a new society. At the end of the day it is not our net worth that matters, but if we have been able to see the worth of all people and live into relationships of dignity, respect and equity. This is the realness of life, the stuff that matters: authentic life with others not a ceaseless striving for outer trappings that at the end of the day can perhaps give us a sense of security but not love, not connection, not belonging, not the kingdom. Perhaps with God we can learn this sooner rather than later, now and not tomorrow, and live into it in our own lives and in the life we advocate for ourselves and others.
Which is why the community of faith is so important. Here we receive another vision, one that rejoices in who we each are with our gifts and abilities, and strives to live a different kind of life that honors all people. We come to learn about ourselves, those things in us that break our connection to one another, so that we can see another way to live. We strive to consecrate our lives to that vision drawn by Jesus time and again. We intentionally turn our lives over to God for with God all things are possible. We come to consecrate ourselves to be part of that kingdom of God and to live, struggles and all, for the sake of the good news.
Tuesday, October 13, 2009
October 4, 2009, The Feast of St. Francis
October 4, 2009
The Feast of St. Francis
The Rev. Tasha Brubaker Garrison
During my last year of college I took a course in nationalism. It was a fascinating course. On one of the first days we were asked to list the ways we identified ourselves. We each came up with our words and then we shared them. Often what pops into our minds first are the identities that hold the most weight for us. And while I don’t remember my list exactly or in the order I wrote them down completely accurately, I do have a decent recollection. My list went something like this: woman, white/Euro-American, Christian, Californian, student, only child and perhaps one or two more. Others list were similar or markedly different. Some included identities I didn’t claim though others would certainly see me from those angles. Today that list would probably look different, with Christian or Christian disciple probably being first given the pattern my life has followed and the way God has worked on my heart.
I wonder what the list would have looked like for St. Francis before he became St. Francis. Francesco Bernadone was a brash, spoiled youth. His life was that of privilege and wealth though not great education. The son of a successful cloth merchant he was surely the life of the party. He got into brawls, went off on a crusade or two seeking fame and adventure, and eventually spent a rather long time in jail in Perugia, I am not sure for what act of hooliganism. I imagine his list looked like this: man, rich Umbrian, adventurer, upper class, and perhaps a few more with Christian somewhere at the bottom. Like much of the world since Christianity became the official religion of Rome and other kingdoms, many if not most people were born into it and followed it as a matter of course—one among many identities. It was not an intentional, life-altering conversion as it was for the first generations. But that conversion still does happen. Francis came out of jail a transformed man intent on following the Gospel literally. If he had to list his identities I think it would have boiled down to one: disciple of Christ.
As legend goes his father was none to pleased with his son’s behavior and wanted him to settle down and take on responsibilities to the family and the business. The dénouement came in church when Francis quite literally stripped himself naked, tossing beautiful clothes and cloaks on the floor, and left to take up the life of an itinerant servant of the Gospel married to Lady Poverty. People did not know what to make of him. Surely many whispered behind raised hands and the eyebrows of upper crust Assisi reached new heights. What was that ridiculous child doing! Much the same was said about Jesus. Even his family was at a loss. And yet while confounded and repelled by his extreme change in lifestyle, people were also drawn to it and intrigued by it for there was a honesty, a courage, a purity of motive that shown through and reminded them of deeper truths and hopes. He was seen around Assisi barefoot, in simple, rough clothes, begging for food and preaching purity of heart and peace to all. He loved all creatures with an infinite love that reflected God’s love. He lived in companionship with animals as diverse as wolves and birds. He worked with his hands, swept and cleaned churches, cared for the sick and lepers, and sent food to brigands with greetings of affection. He spent much time alone in prayer. He owned nothing beyond the clothes on his back and as others joined his order things could be given or lent to them but they could have no money and no property.
In his literal following of the Gospel he clearly grasped one of the central points of Jesus’ teaching. More than any other topic Jesus speaks of the dilemma of money and wealth, even modest financial security, and serving God. He is clear that one cannot serve both. The pursuit of things, of money, pulls us into a way of life that places self at the center. It is that life that then tempts us even more strongly than we already are into jealously, rivalry, selfishness, power and control over others. Conversely, serving God does not mean that we are to have nothing at all for anyone and simply lie down and die. Rather, it is to use what we have modestly and first and foremost for the well-being of others. In caring for one another we ultimately will have enough for ourselves, but only if our hearts have God, love of God and service to all things created by God, at our heart and as our prime motivation.
There is an old saying for preachers. It goes like this: the Gospel is meant to afflict the comfortable and comfort the afflicted. It’s helpful as far as it goes. It can easily slide into giving guilt trips to those who are comfortable in worldly terms without recognizing that affliction comes in many guises, and it can treat the afflicted with pity and as perpetual victims without realizing that the marginalized in this world are often in need of empowerment and spiritual challenge as well. Francis embodies this tension for us. He afflicts, niggles, disturbs us and at the same time comforts and inspires us. No other saint is as popular as he. Outside of Mary who else more frequently adorns our gardens? We may be more at ease with him in a corner with the flowers where his radical message doesn’t confront us too often, but he is there all the same.
This tension of attraction and repulsion was present from the start of his ministry. In time a few joined with him. His witness grabbed the souls of enough men and women to turn them into a recognized movement within the Church. Yet many were bewildered. As he wrote in the Franciscan Rule of 1223: “The brothers shall have nothing of their own, neither house, nor land, nor anything, but as pilgrims and strangers in this world serving the Lord in poverty and humility, let them confidently go asking for alms. Nor let them be ashamed of this, for the Lord made himself poor for us in this world. Let this be your portion, which leads into the land of the living. Cling wholly to this, my most beloved brothers, and you shall wish to have in this world nothing else than the name of the Lord Jesus Christ.” What he asked was difficult and utterly counter-cultural. I doubt I could give up all I own to follow him if he walked by today. I would fight desperately to keep my dog and my oboe, assuming Blaine wanted to go with me. In effect, I would become homeless in a world that sees the homeless as generally a nuisance to be dealt with and something we would rather not see. Talk about scary. But I sense that his vision would also draw me.
Now, I doubt that anyone is going to have a moment of stripping naked in worship today and starting a new life just like that of Francis. Though nothing is impossible with God. But perhaps by remembering and recalling the intense incarnation of the Gospel in Francis we can find the way into the next step on our journey into a life centered in and having at its center God. For myself it invites me to engage with more concentrated prayer the thought of joining an order, something that has long played at the edges of my heart even as I work to give more away, live with less and less, and try my very best to serve others. For you, it will be whatever it is that is poking at your edges.
As Sam Portaro writes: “ Traveling without encumbrance, these roving monks have been a constant reminder through the ages that we are not hostages to creation, but the blessed recipients of its bounty, and stewards of its riches. Francis and those who follow in his way preach to us by living as though the gospel were a reality; they live as though the kingdom of God were present, the victory of Christ over this world as real as the closing Dow Jones average and the morning commute. They are an icon of vocation for every Christian, searching us and compelling us to see what we might be, and to live it.
The Feast of St. Francis
The Rev. Tasha Brubaker Garrison
During my last year of college I took a course in nationalism. It was a fascinating course. On one of the first days we were asked to list the ways we identified ourselves. We each came up with our words and then we shared them. Often what pops into our minds first are the identities that hold the most weight for us. And while I don’t remember my list exactly or in the order I wrote them down completely accurately, I do have a decent recollection. My list went something like this: woman, white/Euro-American, Christian, Californian, student, only child and perhaps one or two more. Others list were similar or markedly different. Some included identities I didn’t claim though others would certainly see me from those angles. Today that list would probably look different, with Christian or Christian disciple probably being first given the pattern my life has followed and the way God has worked on my heart.
I wonder what the list would have looked like for St. Francis before he became St. Francis. Francesco Bernadone was a brash, spoiled youth. His life was that of privilege and wealth though not great education. The son of a successful cloth merchant he was surely the life of the party. He got into brawls, went off on a crusade or two seeking fame and adventure, and eventually spent a rather long time in jail in Perugia, I am not sure for what act of hooliganism. I imagine his list looked like this: man, rich Umbrian, adventurer, upper class, and perhaps a few more with Christian somewhere at the bottom. Like much of the world since Christianity became the official religion of Rome and other kingdoms, many if not most people were born into it and followed it as a matter of course—one among many identities. It was not an intentional, life-altering conversion as it was for the first generations. But that conversion still does happen. Francis came out of jail a transformed man intent on following the Gospel literally. If he had to list his identities I think it would have boiled down to one: disciple of Christ.
As legend goes his father was none to pleased with his son’s behavior and wanted him to settle down and take on responsibilities to the family and the business. The dénouement came in church when Francis quite literally stripped himself naked, tossing beautiful clothes and cloaks on the floor, and left to take up the life of an itinerant servant of the Gospel married to Lady Poverty. People did not know what to make of him. Surely many whispered behind raised hands and the eyebrows of upper crust Assisi reached new heights. What was that ridiculous child doing! Much the same was said about Jesus. Even his family was at a loss. And yet while confounded and repelled by his extreme change in lifestyle, people were also drawn to it and intrigued by it for there was a honesty, a courage, a purity of motive that shown through and reminded them of deeper truths and hopes. He was seen around Assisi barefoot, in simple, rough clothes, begging for food and preaching purity of heart and peace to all. He loved all creatures with an infinite love that reflected God’s love. He lived in companionship with animals as diverse as wolves and birds. He worked with his hands, swept and cleaned churches, cared for the sick and lepers, and sent food to brigands with greetings of affection. He spent much time alone in prayer. He owned nothing beyond the clothes on his back and as others joined his order things could be given or lent to them but they could have no money and no property.
In his literal following of the Gospel he clearly grasped one of the central points of Jesus’ teaching. More than any other topic Jesus speaks of the dilemma of money and wealth, even modest financial security, and serving God. He is clear that one cannot serve both. The pursuit of things, of money, pulls us into a way of life that places self at the center. It is that life that then tempts us even more strongly than we already are into jealously, rivalry, selfishness, power and control over others. Conversely, serving God does not mean that we are to have nothing at all for anyone and simply lie down and die. Rather, it is to use what we have modestly and first and foremost for the well-being of others. In caring for one another we ultimately will have enough for ourselves, but only if our hearts have God, love of God and service to all things created by God, at our heart and as our prime motivation.
There is an old saying for preachers. It goes like this: the Gospel is meant to afflict the comfortable and comfort the afflicted. It’s helpful as far as it goes. It can easily slide into giving guilt trips to those who are comfortable in worldly terms without recognizing that affliction comes in many guises, and it can treat the afflicted with pity and as perpetual victims without realizing that the marginalized in this world are often in need of empowerment and spiritual challenge as well. Francis embodies this tension for us. He afflicts, niggles, disturbs us and at the same time comforts and inspires us. No other saint is as popular as he. Outside of Mary who else more frequently adorns our gardens? We may be more at ease with him in a corner with the flowers where his radical message doesn’t confront us too often, but he is there all the same.
This tension of attraction and repulsion was present from the start of his ministry. In time a few joined with him. His witness grabbed the souls of enough men and women to turn them into a recognized movement within the Church. Yet many were bewildered. As he wrote in the Franciscan Rule of 1223: “The brothers shall have nothing of their own, neither house, nor land, nor anything, but as pilgrims and strangers in this world serving the Lord in poverty and humility, let them confidently go asking for alms. Nor let them be ashamed of this, for the Lord made himself poor for us in this world. Let this be your portion, which leads into the land of the living. Cling wholly to this, my most beloved brothers, and you shall wish to have in this world nothing else than the name of the Lord Jesus Christ.” What he asked was difficult and utterly counter-cultural. I doubt I could give up all I own to follow him if he walked by today. I would fight desperately to keep my dog and my oboe, assuming Blaine wanted to go with me. In effect, I would become homeless in a world that sees the homeless as generally a nuisance to be dealt with and something we would rather not see. Talk about scary. But I sense that his vision would also draw me.
Now, I doubt that anyone is going to have a moment of stripping naked in worship today and starting a new life just like that of Francis. Though nothing is impossible with God. But perhaps by remembering and recalling the intense incarnation of the Gospel in Francis we can find the way into the next step on our journey into a life centered in and having at its center God. For myself it invites me to engage with more concentrated prayer the thought of joining an order, something that has long played at the edges of my heart even as I work to give more away, live with less and less, and try my very best to serve others. For you, it will be whatever it is that is poking at your edges.
As Sam Portaro writes: “ Traveling without encumbrance, these roving monks have been a constant reminder through the ages that we are not hostages to creation, but the blessed recipients of its bounty, and stewards of its riches. Francis and those who follow in his way preach to us by living as though the gospel were a reality; they live as though the kingdom of God were present, the victory of Christ over this world as real as the closing Dow Jones average and the morning commute. They are an icon of vocation for every Christian, searching us and compelling us to see what we might be, and to live it.
Monday, September 28, 2009
September 27, 2009, 17th Sunday after Pentecost
September 27, 2009
The Rev. Natasha Brubaker Garrison
Year B, 17th Sunday after Pentecost
Numbers 11:4-6, 10-16, 24-29; Psalm 19:7-14; James 5:13-20; Mark 9:38-50
It's pretty hard to make a connection between the portion of Mark's Gospel we hear today and baptism. The closest we get at first glance is the mention of the cup of water. But actually there is quite a bit, for baptism is both a sacred, mysterious and complete event and a moment along the path of conversion into a Christian—a follower of Jesus. At the heart of this is the notion of illumination. This is an old and orthodox understanding of baptism: it is about illuminating our hearts and minds with the knowledge, the wisdom, of Jesus. The process of illumination transforms us and turns us more and more into the image of Jesus. It's a risky road. It might lead to being cast out, called naïve or impractical or unpatriotic or heretical. It might lead us to suffer or die for the love and life of others who are ground down by the ways of the world. We can forget how serious this process is. And serious it is once we really open ourselves up to it.
It is that power, that seriousness, that perhaps we see a hint of in Jesus' comments about cutting off limbs. I think it describes the paradoxically painful and life-giving process of opening ourselves up to the God of all creation that created us for goodness, for love, for mutual interdependence. We discover attitudes, beliefs, stances, behaviors and such that we realize can no longer live in us as a follower of the Anointed One. And it is often a radical act of will, a hard act of will, to give them up. As we are illuminated in our hearts we see what we are stumbling over. The cost of not removing the stumbling blocks is nothing less then the loss of our very soul. Perhaps that is what is meant by being thrown into hell—living a life with a lost soul.
The act of receiving the Sacrament of Baptism is a profound and intentional act of claiming our souls. It is an act of naming that our souls fully live when brought into the life of Jesus and under the shining light of God's glory. We become little ones, children of God, beginning to be grow again in a new life marked by Jesus’ life. The hope, I think, is that when people see a Christian it is somehow apparent in how they live, how they speak, and how they love.
The reason that I am going on about Baptism is that today we are, as a community, going to celebrate the preparation of a member of this congregation for this holy Sacrament. One of our parish will be admitted to the catechumenate, the preparation process for baptism, as soon as this sermon is over. It is a beautiful and powerful act and by having the community mark and honor this step we take seriously the importance of baptism. It is not just something we do; it is utterly and completely life-changing.
The early Church took the preparation for baptism very seriously. Rites and courses of instruction varied from Jerusalem to Byzantium to Rome, but what they all had in common was that it was a lengthy process and the baptismal rite itself was elaborate and complex. In the Byzantium rite people were enrolled at the third week of Lent and had to take instruction during the week. Each candidate underwent three exorcisms after which he or she was now a catechumen. It is important to realize that these exorcisms weren’t in the vein we understand them now: a radical cure for possession. Rather, it was a cleansing and a purifying from the contamination of the world. Along with this the celebrant said a prayer over the candidate, breathed on her three times and sealed her three times with oil—on the forehead, the mouth and the breast. Lovely litanies for those to be enlightened (as they were called) were prayed by the community. On Good Friday there was the Rite of Renunciation and Allegiance. At the Easter Vigil the font is blessed with breath and signing and incense. Lengthy prayers were made. The oil of gladness was blessed. The catechumen was anointed with oil before baptism and heard these words: Blessed be God, who enlightens and sanctifies everyone who comes into the world, now and forever and unto the ages of ages. Then the person was submerged three times (and one was naked for this) and then anointed again afterwards, as well as being dressed in a new white robe.
In early Rome the rite was similar. Upon admission the catechumen was given a morsel of blessed salt upon the tongue as a sign of wisdom and God's favor. Then in the coming weeks, the catechumen underwent instruction and a series of scrutinies. Again, an exorcism was performed. The Creed and the Lord's Prayer were handed over and these were to be memorized. Before baptism there was a final exorcism and something called the Effeta and Anointing before Baptism wherein the priest touched the ears and nostrils of the catechecum with spit saying Effeta, that is, be opened, unto an odor of sweetness. But thou, O devil, take flight, for the judgment of God has drawn near. After submersion, there was a custom of blessing water, honey and milk. Water was the spirit of truth and the milk and honey was a reminder of the promised land flowing with milk and honey. The mixture of the milk and honey signified the union of heavenly and earthly substance in Christ. The newly baptized were given this mixture at the time of communion, their first communion.
In looking at our history we see how tame our baptismal rites have become in comparison. In many places people are reclaiming some of the lost ritual. More and more people ask for full immersion, for example. I think much of this is to help us remember through the action the profound, the life-altering nature, that Baptism is for those of us who seek it. The language of the early prayers invokes that earth-shattering significance of what was taking place. They are full of the language of being born, of emerging anew from the womb of the Church, the enlightening of the heart and the mind, the seeing ourselves as infants, little children, children in Christ, leaving the old world and its ways behind once and for all to join into this new reality, this new life. This language was woven throughout the entire liturgy not just the time right before baptism. There was a deep symbol being enacted through stripping of clothes, prayers, anointing, etc. that pointed to one’s death, indeed were the very actions done to a person’s body at death, and then the symbol of being born through the submersion and coming out of the water naked, the dressing and blessing of the person by the priest, deacons and deaconesses—spiritual midwives—and the reception into the new family by being fed and given drink. Life is transformed into new life through this act that recalls the death and resurrection of Christ. What we are after is what we were, yet so much more than that. We are different; we are part of another reality that exists within this world, yet is not the same as it. This is a bold and audacious claim! And it is the one we make at baptism.
Clement of Alexandria, one of the great figures of the early Church, wrote extensively on the centrality of baptism. To him we are the children, we the baptized. Our life is now intimately involved in God, Christ, Spirit, resurrection, forgiveness and hope. We are a new people—our first task is to grow as disciples. Here is a little summation of Clement’s main understandings of baptism as distilled by Richard Norris, a contemporary church historian:
The first [theme] is that Christian initiation, with the formation and discipline it involves, marks, for Clement, a definite boundary: a boundary in people’s relation to God, a boundary in their inner sense of who they are, and a social boundary that marks out a “new people”—a people who live out the human enterprise in a new way. The second theme can be summed up in the two words “child” and paideia (training). Clement will not allow that Baptism needs supplementation of any sort; it sets people in the way of salvation firmly and surely. The baptized are “children of God”. Nevertheless they are children, and the living out of the new life is therefore, in his eyes, an affair of continuous learning and growing. To put the matter briskly, what Baptism creates is a collection of disciples, apprentices of the divine Word, whose common life is, in every sense of the term, a practice.
Now on this picture we need to reflect—carefully and, for that matter, critically. The baptismal community as Clement pictures it is not, when one peers closely at it, a phenomenon that we find very familiar. In spite of the fact that he was, in his time and place, a notorious liberal, and quite possible suspect in some circles for just that reason, he is clear in his mind that the Church is not a religious institution in the service of its society; it is another society, living a new and different sort of life, which one enters only through a personal revolution and which for that reason is inevitably set apart in its world. It is a collection of people whose business it is constantly to rehearse a divinely authored play whose first actual, full performance will occur in the Age to Come. What its member are presently engaged in is the enterprise of learning their parts; …a continuing process of paideia. Christ “is to us a spotless image; to him we are to try with all our might to assimilate our souls.”
As we prepare and baptize new little ones we too are reminded that as part of this other society we also are children growing into the stature of Christ. Baptism isn’t the end; it is just the beginning. We are to look at our baptismal vows and see what makes us stumble in living them out. We are to look and see at how we are growing as a community and as individuals in prayer, worship, love, forgiveness and resembling Jesus. We pray together, confess together, walk together following Jesus in peace. After all, that is the community we have joined and it is our God-given task. We are assured of salvation, but we are simultaneously charged to live into that salvation actively here and now. We are to retell and retell the story and see how it is being told today in our world. A holy task for we, holy children, a holy people, of God.
The Rev. Natasha Brubaker Garrison
Year B, 17th Sunday after Pentecost
Numbers 11:4-6, 10-16, 24-29; Psalm 19:7-14; James 5:13-20; Mark 9:38-50
It's pretty hard to make a connection between the portion of Mark's Gospel we hear today and baptism. The closest we get at first glance is the mention of the cup of water. But actually there is quite a bit, for baptism is both a sacred, mysterious and complete event and a moment along the path of conversion into a Christian—a follower of Jesus. At the heart of this is the notion of illumination. This is an old and orthodox understanding of baptism: it is about illuminating our hearts and minds with the knowledge, the wisdom, of Jesus. The process of illumination transforms us and turns us more and more into the image of Jesus. It's a risky road. It might lead to being cast out, called naïve or impractical or unpatriotic or heretical. It might lead us to suffer or die for the love and life of others who are ground down by the ways of the world. We can forget how serious this process is. And serious it is once we really open ourselves up to it.
It is that power, that seriousness, that perhaps we see a hint of in Jesus' comments about cutting off limbs. I think it describes the paradoxically painful and life-giving process of opening ourselves up to the God of all creation that created us for goodness, for love, for mutual interdependence. We discover attitudes, beliefs, stances, behaviors and such that we realize can no longer live in us as a follower of the Anointed One. And it is often a radical act of will, a hard act of will, to give them up. As we are illuminated in our hearts we see what we are stumbling over. The cost of not removing the stumbling blocks is nothing less then the loss of our very soul. Perhaps that is what is meant by being thrown into hell—living a life with a lost soul.
The act of receiving the Sacrament of Baptism is a profound and intentional act of claiming our souls. It is an act of naming that our souls fully live when brought into the life of Jesus and under the shining light of God's glory. We become little ones, children of God, beginning to be grow again in a new life marked by Jesus’ life. The hope, I think, is that when people see a Christian it is somehow apparent in how they live, how they speak, and how they love.
The reason that I am going on about Baptism is that today we are, as a community, going to celebrate the preparation of a member of this congregation for this holy Sacrament. One of our parish will be admitted to the catechumenate, the preparation process for baptism, as soon as this sermon is over. It is a beautiful and powerful act and by having the community mark and honor this step we take seriously the importance of baptism. It is not just something we do; it is utterly and completely life-changing.
The early Church took the preparation for baptism very seriously. Rites and courses of instruction varied from Jerusalem to Byzantium to Rome, but what they all had in common was that it was a lengthy process and the baptismal rite itself was elaborate and complex. In the Byzantium rite people were enrolled at the third week of Lent and had to take instruction during the week. Each candidate underwent three exorcisms after which he or she was now a catechumen. It is important to realize that these exorcisms weren’t in the vein we understand them now: a radical cure for possession. Rather, it was a cleansing and a purifying from the contamination of the world. Along with this the celebrant said a prayer over the candidate, breathed on her three times and sealed her three times with oil—on the forehead, the mouth and the breast. Lovely litanies for those to be enlightened (as they were called) were prayed by the community. On Good Friday there was the Rite of Renunciation and Allegiance. At the Easter Vigil the font is blessed with breath and signing and incense. Lengthy prayers were made. The oil of gladness was blessed. The catechumen was anointed with oil before baptism and heard these words: Blessed be God, who enlightens and sanctifies everyone who comes into the world, now and forever and unto the ages of ages. Then the person was submerged three times (and one was naked for this) and then anointed again afterwards, as well as being dressed in a new white robe.
In early Rome the rite was similar. Upon admission the catechumen was given a morsel of blessed salt upon the tongue as a sign of wisdom and God's favor. Then in the coming weeks, the catechumen underwent instruction and a series of scrutinies. Again, an exorcism was performed. The Creed and the Lord's Prayer were handed over and these were to be memorized. Before baptism there was a final exorcism and something called the Effeta and Anointing before Baptism wherein the priest touched the ears and nostrils of the catechecum with spit saying Effeta, that is, be opened, unto an odor of sweetness. But thou, O devil, take flight, for the judgment of God has drawn near. After submersion, there was a custom of blessing water, honey and milk. Water was the spirit of truth and the milk and honey was a reminder of the promised land flowing with milk and honey. The mixture of the milk and honey signified the union of heavenly and earthly substance in Christ. The newly baptized were given this mixture at the time of communion, their first communion.
In looking at our history we see how tame our baptismal rites have become in comparison. In many places people are reclaiming some of the lost ritual. More and more people ask for full immersion, for example. I think much of this is to help us remember through the action the profound, the life-altering nature, that Baptism is for those of us who seek it. The language of the early prayers invokes that earth-shattering significance of what was taking place. They are full of the language of being born, of emerging anew from the womb of the Church, the enlightening of the heart and the mind, the seeing ourselves as infants, little children, children in Christ, leaving the old world and its ways behind once and for all to join into this new reality, this new life. This language was woven throughout the entire liturgy not just the time right before baptism. There was a deep symbol being enacted through stripping of clothes, prayers, anointing, etc. that pointed to one’s death, indeed were the very actions done to a person’s body at death, and then the symbol of being born through the submersion and coming out of the water naked, the dressing and blessing of the person by the priest, deacons and deaconesses—spiritual midwives—and the reception into the new family by being fed and given drink. Life is transformed into new life through this act that recalls the death and resurrection of Christ. What we are after is what we were, yet so much more than that. We are different; we are part of another reality that exists within this world, yet is not the same as it. This is a bold and audacious claim! And it is the one we make at baptism.
Clement of Alexandria, one of the great figures of the early Church, wrote extensively on the centrality of baptism. To him we are the children, we the baptized. Our life is now intimately involved in God, Christ, Spirit, resurrection, forgiveness and hope. We are a new people—our first task is to grow as disciples. Here is a little summation of Clement’s main understandings of baptism as distilled by Richard Norris, a contemporary church historian:
The first [theme] is that Christian initiation, with the formation and discipline it involves, marks, for Clement, a definite boundary: a boundary in people’s relation to God, a boundary in their inner sense of who they are, and a social boundary that marks out a “new people”—a people who live out the human enterprise in a new way. The second theme can be summed up in the two words “child” and paideia (training). Clement will not allow that Baptism needs supplementation of any sort; it sets people in the way of salvation firmly and surely. The baptized are “children of God”. Nevertheless they are children, and the living out of the new life is therefore, in his eyes, an affair of continuous learning and growing. To put the matter briskly, what Baptism creates is a collection of disciples, apprentices of the divine Word, whose common life is, in every sense of the term, a practice.
Now on this picture we need to reflect—carefully and, for that matter, critically. The baptismal community as Clement pictures it is not, when one peers closely at it, a phenomenon that we find very familiar. In spite of the fact that he was, in his time and place, a notorious liberal, and quite possible suspect in some circles for just that reason, he is clear in his mind that the Church is not a religious institution in the service of its society; it is another society, living a new and different sort of life, which one enters only through a personal revolution and which for that reason is inevitably set apart in its world. It is a collection of people whose business it is constantly to rehearse a divinely authored play whose first actual, full performance will occur in the Age to Come. What its member are presently engaged in is the enterprise of learning their parts; …a continuing process of paideia. Christ “is to us a spotless image; to him we are to try with all our might to assimilate our souls.”
As we prepare and baptize new little ones we too are reminded that as part of this other society we also are children growing into the stature of Christ. Baptism isn’t the end; it is just the beginning. We are to look at our baptismal vows and see what makes us stumble in living them out. We are to look and see at how we are growing as a community and as individuals in prayer, worship, love, forgiveness and resembling Jesus. We pray together, confess together, walk together following Jesus in peace. After all, that is the community we have joined and it is our God-given task. We are assured of salvation, but we are simultaneously charged to live into that salvation actively here and now. We are to retell and retell the story and see how it is being told today in our world. A holy task for we, holy children, a holy people, of God.
Tuesday, September 22, 2009
September 20, 2009, 16th Sunday after Pentecost
Sunday, September 20, 2009
The Rev. Natasha Brubaker Garrison
16th Sunday after Pentecost, Proper 20
Jeremiah11:18-20, Ps 54, James3:13-4:3,7-8a, Mark 9:30-37
Have you ever experienced being a non-person? By that I mean, being viewed as invisible or without social value? Or visible but with a negative, harmful social value? Most of us have on a small scale: the time we were teased and cast out for a day or week at school, the relative that dismissed us or has cut us off. Some of us have experienced it socially depending on our station in life and the way we are identified. Most women have known a time when they were treated as a non-person in a world still struggling with equality and rights for the female sex. Some current non-persons in our collective life are illegal immigrants, the homeless, convicts and in all too many places those who constitute the group called GLBT. Non-persons are at the bottom of the social scale of least to greatest. And most of us don't want to be at the bottom end for good reason. The system is founded on enshrined maltreatment, from neglect to killing (think of Matthew Shepherd, James Bird and the homeless man called Pac-man who was beaten to death here just a few months ago) of those on the lower end of the spectrum.
Jesus today not only turns that system on its head, but subverts it. None of us would consider children non-persons. Children are valued and treasured in our culture. They are seen as full of wonder and innocence, human beings to be formed and nurtured. And while our understanding and the reality on the ground with the number of children living in poverty and need continuing to grow may not be in synch with each other, none of us would simply not see a child as a human being. It's a truism in fund raising that people can't say no to children and we see that used in appeals and campaigns all the time. And that is likely due to this Gospel today.
In Jesus' time children were non-beings. The world of antiquity didn't begin to take notice of offspring until they reached adolescence and were thus nascent adults. The Roman world, which Palestine was a part of at the time of Jesus' life, was clearly a non-child focused culture. This is not to say that children were unloved or neglected, but that children simply didn't signify in public life. So, when Jesus puts a child in the midst of the disciples as an illustration, his followers are gob smacked. A child had no business hanging out with a bunch of adults and a respected teacher. In fact, this child might even have been a household slave. Even more scandalous!
When Jesus tells the disciples that those who want to be first must be last and servant of all he isn't simply saying let's shake up the distribution pattern. Let's just switch people's places within the same structure. That really isn't changing anything is it for the structure remains the same. He effectively calls for a re-creation of the structure with the words “servant of all”. When we are being a servant to all we aren't basing our decisions on who is greater and who is lesser. We aren't being kind to someone because they have power and influence and this is a chip we can call in later. We aren't being helpful to someone who is lesser to get an advantage over him. Servant to all is an equalizer of worth. It flattens the curve and the line points directly to God. Why is this so? Because Jesus makes the explicit connection that a servant child is a reflection of God, of the Holy One. To receive this non-person with welcome and care is the exact same thing as welcoming God. Now talk about a radical notion.
The only thing that limits us is our thinking. Today's Gospel is the perfect reading for an impassioned social justice sermon, and boy was I tempted! Jesus had a vision of radical love and inclusion of all that takes us to a place beyond right and wrong, acceptable and unacceptable, to a transforming way of being with each other that shapes us to love and heals us of our sin. We start from a place where first all our welcome and all persons reveal in themselves the image of God and then move from there to construct our relationships, our right relationships, with each other. In our world, we tend to start by first sorting and then building, which keeps us spinning in circles. But this isn't going to be a social justice sermon per se.
And here is why. The first disciples upon hearing this were dumbfounded. They couldn't wrap their minds around this notion. They had a failure of imagination and the ability to rethink things. Before social justice, before any truly real change, Jesus shows us we need to fire up and engage our imaginations!
The early church was a shock to the world around it because men and women worshipped together and shared the gifts of the Spirit. Slaves and free shared a meal. It was a radically different grouping of people and people couldn’t imagine it. But the earliest Christians could and did because of the imagination of Jesus, drawing on the very best, the very heart of his Jewish faith. In his world and the vision he shared there were no non-beings. No one was superfluous or expendable. The early Christians had to open their minds and imaginations to understand the resurrection, the meaning of the cross and the presence of Christ still among them. Were they scared? Yes, we hear it in today’s Gospel. Yet, their re-born imaginations were able to find a way to express this new hope to others and capture their hearts.
Imagination is the locus of creativity, revelation, flexibility and possibility. It is the home of hope. As we grow up our imaginations calcify, ossify, and we begin to only believe that the way of the world is possible. We become practical to the point of resignation. But life and the life of the spirit are living, active, pulsing things that needs our imaginations to work. Perhaps Jesus put a child in the midst of the disciples to remind them of the amazing gift that children’s imaginations are. Imagination spans the gap between what is and what can be—that vision of the divine kingdom that embodies the love of Christ and the essence of the beatitudes: blessed are the merciful, the hungry, the peacemakers…
Here are a few samples of what the spirit-filled imagination of the early Church was able to envision and make real. Though there was never an explicit command for it, many in the early Church quickly understood that slavery was incompatible with the life of Jesus. Manumission of slaves was a common occurrence in the early Church. Women served as deacons, teachers, leaders and probably even priests in the earliest days. For the first three hundred years the Church was pacifist for it could not reconcile Jesus’ hard command to love our neighbors and our enemies with war. The desert fathers and mothers laid the groundwork for the monastic option of life that grew within the Church. Most of us don’t realize that the option for a woman to live a theologically and socially valued life as a single, unmarried person was a revelation in antiquity. To become a nun was to gain an amazing freedom over one’s person and life. Hospitals and orphanages were fruits of the early Christians’ imagination and so much more. In time, the Church began more and more to accommodate the world as is so clearly seen, for example, even in the Epistles where woman are quickly put back into their old social place.
But the imaginative work of Jesus still has lived on. Whether recognized or not the idea of universal human rights comes from Christian roots. Every great movement for change that has lifted up the non-beings and the poor and the ignored has been a great act of imagination. The first abolitionists were considered crazy. It was impossible for America to survive without slavery. The movement to end segregation and legal disenfranchisement was likewise met with disbelief. But the imagination that is lit and sustained by the vision of Jesus can dream great dreams and not only dream them but find the way to get from what is to what is possible. That is the great task of our faith in God; not to make God fit into our world, but to call our world forward into God’s kingdom. And not only our faith in God, our love of Jesus the Christ, and our trust in his teachings are needed, but our imaginations as well. That is essential. Without it our churches too begin to ossify and calcify. They begin to look just like the world around them instead of being the leaven, the carbonation, the electrifying place where our souls come to be given the power to act for the future and the hope of God’s kingdom.
The invitation in today’s Gospel is, I think, that call to fire up our imaginations. As we read the Gospel, hear the Good News, what dreams does it spark in us? What impossibilities does it invite us to think just might be possibilities? What might it let each of us imagine for our own lives and for our common life together? What dream might it hold for the larger world in which we live that is struggling so hard now in the systems and relationships it has created? Ponder the texts. Pray with them. And in our prayer may we let our imaginations run wild and unfettered. May we let our convictions about what can’t be or what is impractical be put aside so the holy one can crack through our set patterns to the deeper creative wells still flowing underneath. And while it was said by Paul Valery, I think Jesus would agree: “To return what exists to pure possibility; that is the deep, the hidden work.” Amen.
The Rev. Natasha Brubaker Garrison
16th Sunday after Pentecost, Proper 20
Jeremiah11:18-20, Ps 54, James3:13-4:3,7-8a, Mark 9:30-37
Have you ever experienced being a non-person? By that I mean, being viewed as invisible or without social value? Or visible but with a negative, harmful social value? Most of us have on a small scale: the time we were teased and cast out for a day or week at school, the relative that dismissed us or has cut us off. Some of us have experienced it socially depending on our station in life and the way we are identified. Most women have known a time when they were treated as a non-person in a world still struggling with equality and rights for the female sex. Some current non-persons in our collective life are illegal immigrants, the homeless, convicts and in all too many places those who constitute the group called GLBT. Non-persons are at the bottom of the social scale of least to greatest. And most of us don't want to be at the bottom end for good reason. The system is founded on enshrined maltreatment, from neglect to killing (think of Matthew Shepherd, James Bird and the homeless man called Pac-man who was beaten to death here just a few months ago) of those on the lower end of the spectrum.
Jesus today not only turns that system on its head, but subverts it. None of us would consider children non-persons. Children are valued and treasured in our culture. They are seen as full of wonder and innocence, human beings to be formed and nurtured. And while our understanding and the reality on the ground with the number of children living in poverty and need continuing to grow may not be in synch with each other, none of us would simply not see a child as a human being. It's a truism in fund raising that people can't say no to children and we see that used in appeals and campaigns all the time. And that is likely due to this Gospel today.
In Jesus' time children were non-beings. The world of antiquity didn't begin to take notice of offspring until they reached adolescence and were thus nascent adults. The Roman world, which Palestine was a part of at the time of Jesus' life, was clearly a non-child focused culture. This is not to say that children were unloved or neglected, but that children simply didn't signify in public life. So, when Jesus puts a child in the midst of the disciples as an illustration, his followers are gob smacked. A child had no business hanging out with a bunch of adults and a respected teacher. In fact, this child might even have been a household slave. Even more scandalous!
When Jesus tells the disciples that those who want to be first must be last and servant of all he isn't simply saying let's shake up the distribution pattern. Let's just switch people's places within the same structure. That really isn't changing anything is it for the structure remains the same. He effectively calls for a re-creation of the structure with the words “servant of all”. When we are being a servant to all we aren't basing our decisions on who is greater and who is lesser. We aren't being kind to someone because they have power and influence and this is a chip we can call in later. We aren't being helpful to someone who is lesser to get an advantage over him. Servant to all is an equalizer of worth. It flattens the curve and the line points directly to God. Why is this so? Because Jesus makes the explicit connection that a servant child is a reflection of God, of the Holy One. To receive this non-person with welcome and care is the exact same thing as welcoming God. Now talk about a radical notion.
The only thing that limits us is our thinking. Today's Gospel is the perfect reading for an impassioned social justice sermon, and boy was I tempted! Jesus had a vision of radical love and inclusion of all that takes us to a place beyond right and wrong, acceptable and unacceptable, to a transforming way of being with each other that shapes us to love and heals us of our sin. We start from a place where first all our welcome and all persons reveal in themselves the image of God and then move from there to construct our relationships, our right relationships, with each other. In our world, we tend to start by first sorting and then building, which keeps us spinning in circles. But this isn't going to be a social justice sermon per se.
And here is why. The first disciples upon hearing this were dumbfounded. They couldn't wrap their minds around this notion. They had a failure of imagination and the ability to rethink things. Before social justice, before any truly real change, Jesus shows us we need to fire up and engage our imaginations!
The early church was a shock to the world around it because men and women worshipped together and shared the gifts of the Spirit. Slaves and free shared a meal. It was a radically different grouping of people and people couldn’t imagine it. But the earliest Christians could and did because of the imagination of Jesus, drawing on the very best, the very heart of his Jewish faith. In his world and the vision he shared there were no non-beings. No one was superfluous or expendable. The early Christians had to open their minds and imaginations to understand the resurrection, the meaning of the cross and the presence of Christ still among them. Were they scared? Yes, we hear it in today’s Gospel. Yet, their re-born imaginations were able to find a way to express this new hope to others and capture their hearts.
Imagination is the locus of creativity, revelation, flexibility and possibility. It is the home of hope. As we grow up our imaginations calcify, ossify, and we begin to only believe that the way of the world is possible. We become practical to the point of resignation. But life and the life of the spirit are living, active, pulsing things that needs our imaginations to work. Perhaps Jesus put a child in the midst of the disciples to remind them of the amazing gift that children’s imaginations are. Imagination spans the gap between what is and what can be—that vision of the divine kingdom that embodies the love of Christ and the essence of the beatitudes: blessed are the merciful, the hungry, the peacemakers…
Here are a few samples of what the spirit-filled imagination of the early Church was able to envision and make real. Though there was never an explicit command for it, many in the early Church quickly understood that slavery was incompatible with the life of Jesus. Manumission of slaves was a common occurrence in the early Church. Women served as deacons, teachers, leaders and probably even priests in the earliest days. For the first three hundred years the Church was pacifist for it could not reconcile Jesus’ hard command to love our neighbors and our enemies with war. The desert fathers and mothers laid the groundwork for the monastic option of life that grew within the Church. Most of us don’t realize that the option for a woman to live a theologically and socially valued life as a single, unmarried person was a revelation in antiquity. To become a nun was to gain an amazing freedom over one’s person and life. Hospitals and orphanages were fruits of the early Christians’ imagination and so much more. In time, the Church began more and more to accommodate the world as is so clearly seen, for example, even in the Epistles where woman are quickly put back into their old social place.
But the imaginative work of Jesus still has lived on. Whether recognized or not the idea of universal human rights comes from Christian roots. Every great movement for change that has lifted up the non-beings and the poor and the ignored has been a great act of imagination. The first abolitionists were considered crazy. It was impossible for America to survive without slavery. The movement to end segregation and legal disenfranchisement was likewise met with disbelief. But the imagination that is lit and sustained by the vision of Jesus can dream great dreams and not only dream them but find the way to get from what is to what is possible. That is the great task of our faith in God; not to make God fit into our world, but to call our world forward into God’s kingdom. And not only our faith in God, our love of Jesus the Christ, and our trust in his teachings are needed, but our imaginations as well. That is essential. Without it our churches too begin to ossify and calcify. They begin to look just like the world around them instead of being the leaven, the carbonation, the electrifying place where our souls come to be given the power to act for the future and the hope of God’s kingdom.
The invitation in today’s Gospel is, I think, that call to fire up our imaginations. As we read the Gospel, hear the Good News, what dreams does it spark in us? What impossibilities does it invite us to think just might be possibilities? What might it let each of us imagine for our own lives and for our common life together? What dream might it hold for the larger world in which we live that is struggling so hard now in the systems and relationships it has created? Ponder the texts. Pray with them. And in our prayer may we let our imaginations run wild and unfettered. May we let our convictions about what can’t be or what is impractical be put aside so the holy one can crack through our set patterns to the deeper creative wells still flowing underneath. And while it was said by Paul Valery, I think Jesus would agree: “To return what exists to pure possibility; that is the deep, the hidden work.” Amen.
Monday, September 14, 2009
September 13, 2009, 15th Sunday after Pentecost, Year B
Sunday, September 13, 2009
The Rev. Natasha Brubaker Garrison
Year B, Proper 19
Isaiah 50:4-9a, James 3:1-12, Mark 8:27-38
One day Socrates, the great philosopher, came upon an acquaintance who ran up to him excitedly and said, “Socrates, do you know what I just heard about one of your students?”
“Wait a moment,” Socrates replied. “Before you tell me I’d like you to pass a little test. It's called the Triple Filter Test.”
“Triple filter?”
“That's right,” Socrates continued. “Before you talk to me about my student let's take a moment to filter what you're going to say. The first filter is Truth. Have you made absolutely sure that what you are about to tell me is true?”
“No,” the man said, “actually I just heard about it and...”
“All right,” said Socrates. “So you don't really know if it's true or not. Now let's try the second filter, the filter of Goodness. Is what you are about to tell me about my student something good?”
“No, on the contrary...”
“So,” Socrates continued, “you want to tell me something bad about him, even though you're not certain it's true?”
The man shrugged, a little embarrassed.
Socrates continued. “You may still pass the test though, because there is a third filter—the filter of Usefulness. Is what you want to tell me about my student going to be useful to me?”
“No, not really...”
“Well,” concluded Socrates, “if what you want to tell me is neither True, nor Good nor even Useful, why tell it to me at all?”
The man was defeated and ashamed.
This is the reason Socrates was a great philosopher and held in such high esteem.
James, in his own way, is also a great philosopher, though he speaks in a more colorful and theological style. His reference is always the love of Christ and our task as followers of his which is to imitate him as best we can with self-awareness and intention. As highly verbal creatures he calls us to confront that most basic of actions that we often engage in without thinking—talking.
Talking is rich in metaphorical meaning. It goes all the way back to the start of things. In Genesis we hear that God speaks the world into being. Speaking is a creative act. It is a powerful act. It is an act of relationship. And it is an act of forming identity.
In the story of creation the word that is spoken, the wind that blows over the face of the waters is the Spirit of God. The Gospel of John opens with the story of the Word becoming flesh, a renewing of the creation that God made and holds in being. That word is named as Jesus the Christ and a light that the darkness could not overcome. That word is what caused all to be and is life.
In some Native American traditions the power of word and speech is revered and accordingly used sparingly. There is the practice in some places to speak to the corn as it is sown, a ministry of the women. They speak to the corn as it is planted, as it sprouts and grows, calling it into becoming and growing as a force of life for their people. Such an act is not superstitious or unfounded. Science has proven the intuitive wisdom of this. Plants spoken to with love and gentleness thrive; plants that are spoken to harshly or treated brutally shrivel and die.
James is reminding us of the power of words, of speech. Speech has the ability to effect events, to shape realities, to steer a course of action. But our speech unlike that of the divine is tainted. Our tongues deal out not only life, but death; blessings and curses. Our speech is more powerful than we know. The evil of the tongue is not that we can speak, but that we use it so carelessly! We are victims to pride and ego, flinging words around carelessly and enjoying their power yet avoiding an awareness of how easily they are a force for destruction and harm.
Gossip, prejudices, distortion of facts, spin...all these are the consequences of a tongue not tamed to Goodness, Truth and Usefulness. All these are small things that can result in massive destruction and impact. Just think of the outright lies and distortions being spoken to undermine a rational, reasoned and thorough conversation about substantive reform, or public health care option. One senator yelling “you lie” has sparked a firestorm, and a distraction. If the stakes weren't so high it would almost by comical. As it is, tens of millions of people's lives and health are hanging in the balance.
Or at a more personal level we know the power of words in shaping our perceptions. When we are teased or made fun of we are marked by those words. They create a bit of the fabric that is our self-identity. Children who are called stupid or ugly believe it. It is their reality. And for some it turns into a destructive fire that consumes them and those around them.
James calls those of us who are Christians to remember how powerful our tongues can be. And while I suspect he would affirm all that Socrates said, he takes it further. It is a creative act. It is an act that binds us to God and to each other. It has real impact on who we become and what happens around us. It is theological in that it is revealing of who we are and what we are meant to be. Does our speech reflect the grace and love and forgiveness of God? Or does it play to our own purposes? Or even worse, does it play into our sin, which seeks to hurt and dominate and control others? Does our speech violate a fundamental truth: doing unto another that which we wouldn’t want done to us.
What do our words create? That is the question. It is a spiritual question and a spiritual reality. To tame our tongues to the law of love, to tie our words to only the good things that come forth in our hearts, is to make manifest the love and grace of God. As long as our speech pollutes the world with the things from within that contaminate us, we are still spiritual infants. We are harming our own souls at the same time we inflict pain on another. It is creating something, but not for good. But there is Good News in this. I think that the more we come to know our own souls as vessels of the creative light and life of God, residing within and around us, the more we grow out of the need to hurt or judge or control. If we can touch that light, we let God work in us and we see ourselves in a new way. We heal and let go and grow into an ever-increasing realization that to love another is the same as loving self is the same as loving God. We can grow in understanding without having to diminish another. We find new ways of accountability without vengeance and how to live with each other without dominance. But it all starts within and with the energy, the creative life of our words that pour forth from our tongues.
It is also a move towards humility. For when we speak of faith in God or our own religious path or the nature of the divine our words so quickly become weapons. My version is right and yours is wrong. I am saved and you are not. But to do so is to curse another is it not? And is it not the heights of arrogance to claim that one person or one group of people has the whole story on God? Even Jesus never claims that! Do we have a revelation? Yes. Is it true? Yes. Is it the totality of the nature of God? No, for it is imparted to and through we frail, limited creatures, which are really quite small. However, when we connect with the creative light within we touch the holy and find that it is more than we can ever put in to words. This is common of all mystical and spiritual events. And therein is our clue. Our faith has allowed us into the holy of holies and it is a place beyond words. We can only share it in part and listen when others share their way into that same space. How much more than we when teach or share our faith are we to do so in a way that blesses! How much more must our words be a spring of fresh water that invite without force! We can share our faith with a firm conviction, but always in a way that finds room for the other’s experience without condemnation or judgment. For it is from those we least expect that we often run smack into God’s ongoing revelation. See the Bible for multiple examples. And we can only fully experience God’s ongoing revelation when our tongues are harnessed for good, usefulness, truth…and life.
The Rev. Natasha Brubaker Garrison
Year B, Proper 19
Isaiah 50:4-9a, James 3:1-12, Mark 8:27-38
One day Socrates, the great philosopher, came upon an acquaintance who ran up to him excitedly and said, “Socrates, do you know what I just heard about one of your students?”
“Wait a moment,” Socrates replied. “Before you tell me I’d like you to pass a little test. It's called the Triple Filter Test.”
“Triple filter?”
“That's right,” Socrates continued. “Before you talk to me about my student let's take a moment to filter what you're going to say. The first filter is Truth. Have you made absolutely sure that what you are about to tell me is true?”
“No,” the man said, “actually I just heard about it and...”
“All right,” said Socrates. “So you don't really know if it's true or not. Now let's try the second filter, the filter of Goodness. Is what you are about to tell me about my student something good?”
“No, on the contrary...”
“So,” Socrates continued, “you want to tell me something bad about him, even though you're not certain it's true?”
The man shrugged, a little embarrassed.
Socrates continued. “You may still pass the test though, because there is a third filter—the filter of Usefulness. Is what you want to tell me about my student going to be useful to me?”
“No, not really...”
“Well,” concluded Socrates, “if what you want to tell me is neither True, nor Good nor even Useful, why tell it to me at all?”
The man was defeated and ashamed.
This is the reason Socrates was a great philosopher and held in such high esteem.
James, in his own way, is also a great philosopher, though he speaks in a more colorful and theological style. His reference is always the love of Christ and our task as followers of his which is to imitate him as best we can with self-awareness and intention. As highly verbal creatures he calls us to confront that most basic of actions that we often engage in without thinking—talking.
Talking is rich in metaphorical meaning. It goes all the way back to the start of things. In Genesis we hear that God speaks the world into being. Speaking is a creative act. It is a powerful act. It is an act of relationship. And it is an act of forming identity.
In the story of creation the word that is spoken, the wind that blows over the face of the waters is the Spirit of God. The Gospel of John opens with the story of the Word becoming flesh, a renewing of the creation that God made and holds in being. That word is named as Jesus the Christ and a light that the darkness could not overcome. That word is what caused all to be and is life.
In some Native American traditions the power of word and speech is revered and accordingly used sparingly. There is the practice in some places to speak to the corn as it is sown, a ministry of the women. They speak to the corn as it is planted, as it sprouts and grows, calling it into becoming and growing as a force of life for their people. Such an act is not superstitious or unfounded. Science has proven the intuitive wisdom of this. Plants spoken to with love and gentleness thrive; plants that are spoken to harshly or treated brutally shrivel and die.
James is reminding us of the power of words, of speech. Speech has the ability to effect events, to shape realities, to steer a course of action. But our speech unlike that of the divine is tainted. Our tongues deal out not only life, but death; blessings and curses. Our speech is more powerful than we know. The evil of the tongue is not that we can speak, but that we use it so carelessly! We are victims to pride and ego, flinging words around carelessly and enjoying their power yet avoiding an awareness of how easily they are a force for destruction and harm.
Gossip, prejudices, distortion of facts, spin...all these are the consequences of a tongue not tamed to Goodness, Truth and Usefulness. All these are small things that can result in massive destruction and impact. Just think of the outright lies and distortions being spoken to undermine a rational, reasoned and thorough conversation about substantive reform, or public health care option. One senator yelling “you lie” has sparked a firestorm, and a distraction. If the stakes weren't so high it would almost by comical. As it is, tens of millions of people's lives and health are hanging in the balance.
Or at a more personal level we know the power of words in shaping our perceptions. When we are teased or made fun of we are marked by those words. They create a bit of the fabric that is our self-identity. Children who are called stupid or ugly believe it. It is their reality. And for some it turns into a destructive fire that consumes them and those around them.
James calls those of us who are Christians to remember how powerful our tongues can be. And while I suspect he would affirm all that Socrates said, he takes it further. It is a creative act. It is an act that binds us to God and to each other. It has real impact on who we become and what happens around us. It is theological in that it is revealing of who we are and what we are meant to be. Does our speech reflect the grace and love and forgiveness of God? Or does it play to our own purposes? Or even worse, does it play into our sin, which seeks to hurt and dominate and control others? Does our speech violate a fundamental truth: doing unto another that which we wouldn’t want done to us.
What do our words create? That is the question. It is a spiritual question and a spiritual reality. To tame our tongues to the law of love, to tie our words to only the good things that come forth in our hearts, is to make manifest the love and grace of God. As long as our speech pollutes the world with the things from within that contaminate us, we are still spiritual infants. We are harming our own souls at the same time we inflict pain on another. It is creating something, but not for good. But there is Good News in this. I think that the more we come to know our own souls as vessels of the creative light and life of God, residing within and around us, the more we grow out of the need to hurt or judge or control. If we can touch that light, we let God work in us and we see ourselves in a new way. We heal and let go and grow into an ever-increasing realization that to love another is the same as loving self is the same as loving God. We can grow in understanding without having to diminish another. We find new ways of accountability without vengeance and how to live with each other without dominance. But it all starts within and with the energy, the creative life of our words that pour forth from our tongues.
It is also a move towards humility. For when we speak of faith in God or our own religious path or the nature of the divine our words so quickly become weapons. My version is right and yours is wrong. I am saved and you are not. But to do so is to curse another is it not? And is it not the heights of arrogance to claim that one person or one group of people has the whole story on God? Even Jesus never claims that! Do we have a revelation? Yes. Is it true? Yes. Is it the totality of the nature of God? No, for it is imparted to and through we frail, limited creatures, which are really quite small. However, when we connect with the creative light within we touch the holy and find that it is more than we can ever put in to words. This is common of all mystical and spiritual events. And therein is our clue. Our faith has allowed us into the holy of holies and it is a place beyond words. We can only share it in part and listen when others share their way into that same space. How much more than we when teach or share our faith are we to do so in a way that blesses! How much more must our words be a spring of fresh water that invite without force! We can share our faith with a firm conviction, but always in a way that finds room for the other’s experience without condemnation or judgment. For it is from those we least expect that we often run smack into God’s ongoing revelation. See the Bible for multiple examples. And we can only fully experience God’s ongoing revelation when our tongues are harnessed for good, usefulness, truth…and life.
Friday, September 11, 2009
September 6, 2009, Fourteenth Sunday after Pentecost
September 6, 2009
Fourteenth Sunday after Pentecost, Proper 18
The Rev. Tasha Brubaker Garrison
A story I picked up while living back East…
Our house was directly across the street from the clinic entrance of Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore. We lived downstairs and rented the upstairs rooms to out patients at the clinic.
One summer evening as I was fixing supper, there was a knock at the door. I opened it to see a truly awful looking man. “Why, he’s hardly taller than my eight-year-old,” I thought as I stared at the stooped, shriveled body. But the appalling thing was his face, lopsided from swelling, red and raw. Yet his voice was pleasant as he said, “Good evening. I’ve come to see if you’ve a room for just one night. I came for a treatment this morning from the eastern shore, and there’s no bus ‘til morning.”
He told me he’d been hunting for a room since noon but with no success, no one seemed to have one. “I guess it’s my face…I know it looks terrible, but my doctor says with a few more treatments…” For a moment I hesitated, but his next words convinced me: “I could sleep in this rocking chair on the porch. My bus leaves early in the morning.”
I told him we would find him a bed, but to rest on the porch. I went inside and finished getting supper. When we were ready, I asked the old man if he would join us. “No, thank you. I have plenty.” And he held up a brown paper bag.
When I had finished the dishes, I went out on the porch to talk with him a few minutes. It didn’t take a long time to see that this old man had an oversized heart crowded into that tiny body. He told me he fished for a living to support his daughter, her five children, and her husband, who was hopelessly crippled from a back injury.
He didn’t tell it by way of complaint; in fact, every other sentence was prefaced with a thanks to God for a blessing. He was grateful that no pain accompanied his disease, which was apparently a form of skin cancer. He thanked God for giving him the strength to keep going.
At bedtime, we put a camp cot in the children’s room for him. When I got up in the morning, the bed linens were neatly folded and the little man was out on the porch. He refused breakfast, but just before he left for his bus, haltingly, as if asking a great favor, he said, “Could I please come back and stay next time I have a treatment? I won’t put you out a bit. I can sleep fine in a chair.” He paused a moment and then added, “Your children made me feel at home. Grownups are bothered by my face, but children don’t seem to mind.” I told him he was welcome to come again.
And on his next trip he arrived a little after seven in the morning. As a gift, he brought a big fish and a quart of the largest oysters I had ever seen. He said he had shucked them that morning before he left so that they’d be nice and fresh. I knew his bus left at 4:00 a.m. and I wondered what time he had to get up in order to do this for us.
In the years he came to stay overnight with us there was never a time that he did not bring us fish or oysters or vegetables from his garden. Other times we received packages in the mail, always by special deliver; fish and oysters packed in a box of fresh young spinach or kale, every leaf carefully washed. Knowing that he must walk three miles to mail these, and knowing how little money he had made the gifts doubly precious.
When I received these little remembrances, I often thought of a comment our next-door neighbor made after he left that first morning. “Did you keep that awful looking man last night? I turned him away! You can lose roomers by putting up such people!” Maybe we did lose roomers once or twice. But oh! If only they could have know him, perhaps their illnesses would have been easier to bear. I know our family always will be grateful to have known him.
The ways in which we humans are in the habit of judging and showing partiality! The way our partiality shows what we value most! It is clear what the neighbor values and fears. Sadly, her reaction is all too typical. And we know too deep down that we are not intended to be this way with one another. We know something is amiss, yet we struggle to get ourselves right.
James’ words today help us to get out of the tangle. He cuts to the chase and chastises the early Christians who within decades of the earthly ministry of Jesus for creating ranks and distinctions among themselves and trying to encourage the “right kind of people” to attend their church. But who is the wrong kind of person, James asks? For if we are all neighbors the outer trappings only reveal how the world has placed us but not our hearts and not our God. The church is that absolutely open table of all that Jesus practiced—replicated and shared and disseminated for it has the power to change the world. Yet all to easily it begins to mimic it.
James in his direct way reminds the early church of two facts: one the Church is love in doing not in name only and two, the highest law is to love neighbor as self. Now one can argue that the love of neighbor is clearly referring only to fellow Christians, and certainly James is pointing out where the community is falling short internally. But does that really hold up? Jesus again and again included those who were not insiders. He challenged his fellow Jews with the story of the Good Samaritan thereby extending the concept of neighbor to be greater than common ethnic identification. And in the Gospel today his healing goes beyond the national bounds to a Syrophoenician woman and her child. It is the orientation of our heart and spirits that make us able to receive the Good News of Jesus, not our pedigree. The family of God is always bigger than we want to make it. The neighbor is all we encounter, probably most especially the one we want to disregard.
The other truth he reminds us of is that love is not a spiritual concept for private contemplation that is disconnected from the world. Love is not a reverencing of God “out there”. Love is caring concretely and tangibly for those around us. God’s love is made known or not in how we treat each other. James is reminding us that God’s love is very much about social concern and justice, and we had better not fool ourselves into thinking otherwise. Partiality undermines love. It reveals where we have split the human family all made in God’s image into categories of lesser and more. And to do so is to begin to unravel the revelation of the common meal and the common table that Jesus spread for us—the all-encompassing vision of the kingdom of God.
In looking into our hearts we will be able to see where partiality is at work. When we examine our partiality, both private and corporate we can ask some important questions. What is underneath it? What are the assumptions we haven’t questioned? What is it we are avoiding and why? Our partiality often reveals what we are avoiding or ignoring. We will also discover our own poverty, our own lack. It’s an illuminating place. For me I notice that I am very partial towards conversations with others who are highly educated, quick on their intellectual feet, ready to engage in some good verbal dialogue. The poverty it reveals in me all too often is my own need to be recognized for my brains, my insecurity and need for accolades, my own pride and vanity. It can lead me to not pay equal attention to the wisdom and knowledge of those who are perhaps not outward intellectuals, but certainly have much to teach me and much to enrich my life. It’s not a one-way street with me being the only one with something of value to offer. And academically smart people aren’t superior human beings.
In that paradoxical way of faith when we respond to the poverty of another we find that our own poverty is responded to as well. The old man was poor in things, but rich in spirit and faith. He gave of that to this family that welcomed him and gave to him of their material wealth. They gave and received from each other through the act of putting aside partiality in favor of seeing a common humanity. Imagine how much less fear and anger and abuse and violence there might be in this world if we could treat each other this way!
Perhaps the challenge of James we can take home this week is to spend some time looking into our soul at our own partiality. Where? Towards whom? About what? And when we find that it is leading us into a place of disregard and contempt we can look there to find our own poverty. We can also then begin again to let it go in favor of the amazing vision of Jesus where all are important and equally needed at the table. We can be healed of our poverties by allowing ourselves to be there for one another, giving of our wealth, whatever its form, to meet the lack in others and vice versa. We can grow more alive because we see our life being fed by all others and not by having to prove we are more important than others. We can embody a faith that has works and is therefore alive.
Fourteenth Sunday after Pentecost, Proper 18
The Rev. Tasha Brubaker Garrison
A story I picked up while living back East…
Our house was directly across the street from the clinic entrance of Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore. We lived downstairs and rented the upstairs rooms to out patients at the clinic.
One summer evening as I was fixing supper, there was a knock at the door. I opened it to see a truly awful looking man. “Why, he’s hardly taller than my eight-year-old,” I thought as I stared at the stooped, shriveled body. But the appalling thing was his face, lopsided from swelling, red and raw. Yet his voice was pleasant as he said, “Good evening. I’ve come to see if you’ve a room for just one night. I came for a treatment this morning from the eastern shore, and there’s no bus ‘til morning.”
He told me he’d been hunting for a room since noon but with no success, no one seemed to have one. “I guess it’s my face…I know it looks terrible, but my doctor says with a few more treatments…” For a moment I hesitated, but his next words convinced me: “I could sleep in this rocking chair on the porch. My bus leaves early in the morning.”
I told him we would find him a bed, but to rest on the porch. I went inside and finished getting supper. When we were ready, I asked the old man if he would join us. “No, thank you. I have plenty.” And he held up a brown paper bag.
When I had finished the dishes, I went out on the porch to talk with him a few minutes. It didn’t take a long time to see that this old man had an oversized heart crowded into that tiny body. He told me he fished for a living to support his daughter, her five children, and her husband, who was hopelessly crippled from a back injury.
He didn’t tell it by way of complaint; in fact, every other sentence was prefaced with a thanks to God for a blessing. He was grateful that no pain accompanied his disease, which was apparently a form of skin cancer. He thanked God for giving him the strength to keep going.
At bedtime, we put a camp cot in the children’s room for him. When I got up in the morning, the bed linens were neatly folded and the little man was out on the porch. He refused breakfast, but just before he left for his bus, haltingly, as if asking a great favor, he said, “Could I please come back and stay next time I have a treatment? I won’t put you out a bit. I can sleep fine in a chair.” He paused a moment and then added, “Your children made me feel at home. Grownups are bothered by my face, but children don’t seem to mind.” I told him he was welcome to come again.
And on his next trip he arrived a little after seven in the morning. As a gift, he brought a big fish and a quart of the largest oysters I had ever seen. He said he had shucked them that morning before he left so that they’d be nice and fresh. I knew his bus left at 4:00 a.m. and I wondered what time he had to get up in order to do this for us.
In the years he came to stay overnight with us there was never a time that he did not bring us fish or oysters or vegetables from his garden. Other times we received packages in the mail, always by special deliver; fish and oysters packed in a box of fresh young spinach or kale, every leaf carefully washed. Knowing that he must walk three miles to mail these, and knowing how little money he had made the gifts doubly precious.
When I received these little remembrances, I often thought of a comment our next-door neighbor made after he left that first morning. “Did you keep that awful looking man last night? I turned him away! You can lose roomers by putting up such people!” Maybe we did lose roomers once or twice. But oh! If only they could have know him, perhaps their illnesses would have been easier to bear. I know our family always will be grateful to have known him.
The ways in which we humans are in the habit of judging and showing partiality! The way our partiality shows what we value most! It is clear what the neighbor values and fears. Sadly, her reaction is all too typical. And we know too deep down that we are not intended to be this way with one another. We know something is amiss, yet we struggle to get ourselves right.
James’ words today help us to get out of the tangle. He cuts to the chase and chastises the early Christians who within decades of the earthly ministry of Jesus for creating ranks and distinctions among themselves and trying to encourage the “right kind of people” to attend their church. But who is the wrong kind of person, James asks? For if we are all neighbors the outer trappings only reveal how the world has placed us but not our hearts and not our God. The church is that absolutely open table of all that Jesus practiced—replicated and shared and disseminated for it has the power to change the world. Yet all to easily it begins to mimic it.
James in his direct way reminds the early church of two facts: one the Church is love in doing not in name only and two, the highest law is to love neighbor as self. Now one can argue that the love of neighbor is clearly referring only to fellow Christians, and certainly James is pointing out where the community is falling short internally. But does that really hold up? Jesus again and again included those who were not insiders. He challenged his fellow Jews with the story of the Good Samaritan thereby extending the concept of neighbor to be greater than common ethnic identification. And in the Gospel today his healing goes beyond the national bounds to a Syrophoenician woman and her child. It is the orientation of our heart and spirits that make us able to receive the Good News of Jesus, not our pedigree. The family of God is always bigger than we want to make it. The neighbor is all we encounter, probably most especially the one we want to disregard.
The other truth he reminds us of is that love is not a spiritual concept for private contemplation that is disconnected from the world. Love is not a reverencing of God “out there”. Love is caring concretely and tangibly for those around us. God’s love is made known or not in how we treat each other. James is reminding us that God’s love is very much about social concern and justice, and we had better not fool ourselves into thinking otherwise. Partiality undermines love. It reveals where we have split the human family all made in God’s image into categories of lesser and more. And to do so is to begin to unravel the revelation of the common meal and the common table that Jesus spread for us—the all-encompassing vision of the kingdom of God.
In looking into our hearts we will be able to see where partiality is at work. When we examine our partiality, both private and corporate we can ask some important questions. What is underneath it? What are the assumptions we haven’t questioned? What is it we are avoiding and why? Our partiality often reveals what we are avoiding or ignoring. We will also discover our own poverty, our own lack. It’s an illuminating place. For me I notice that I am very partial towards conversations with others who are highly educated, quick on their intellectual feet, ready to engage in some good verbal dialogue. The poverty it reveals in me all too often is my own need to be recognized for my brains, my insecurity and need for accolades, my own pride and vanity. It can lead me to not pay equal attention to the wisdom and knowledge of those who are perhaps not outward intellectuals, but certainly have much to teach me and much to enrich my life. It’s not a one-way street with me being the only one with something of value to offer. And academically smart people aren’t superior human beings.
In that paradoxical way of faith when we respond to the poverty of another we find that our own poverty is responded to as well. The old man was poor in things, but rich in spirit and faith. He gave of that to this family that welcomed him and gave to him of their material wealth. They gave and received from each other through the act of putting aside partiality in favor of seeing a common humanity. Imagine how much less fear and anger and abuse and violence there might be in this world if we could treat each other this way!
Perhaps the challenge of James we can take home this week is to spend some time looking into our soul at our own partiality. Where? Towards whom? About what? And when we find that it is leading us into a place of disregard and contempt we can look there to find our own poverty. We can also then begin again to let it go in favor of the amazing vision of Jesus where all are important and equally needed at the table. We can be healed of our poverties by allowing ourselves to be there for one another, giving of our wealth, whatever its form, to meet the lack in others and vice versa. We can grow more alive because we see our life being fed by all others and not by having to prove we are more important than others. We can embody a faith that has works and is therefore alive.
Monday, August 31, 2009
August 30, 2009, 13th Sunday after Pentecost
August 30, 2009
The Rev. Natasha Brubaker Garrison
Year B, Proper 17
The letter of the law and the spirit of the law. In part, this is a way we can look at the point of the sparring between Jesus and the Pharisees in today’s story from Mark. Law reflects the context of time and place. It reflects the values and priorities, both good and bad, of a given society. We know that our own Constitution is an imperfect document that contains stances we find morally repugnant today, such as the wording, and the realities it spoke to, that one slave equals three fifths of one white or free person. And law codes change. Deuteronomy was a rewriting and a reinterpretation of the Law of Moses, of Leviticus, to reflect the experience of history and the reality that the Israelites were no longer semi-nomadic, but settled in towns and cities. The law followed in Jesus’ day was still, as is the way of things, evolving. And this was not seen as contrary to following God.
Of course, trouble happens when the law is seen as the end and as the ultimate reference point—immutable, absolute, and unchangeable. In religion things get distorted when the law is seen as divine dictation that is somehow free of human interference and shaping. A legalistic rigor sets in that makes The Law, with all the ways customs, traditions and social patterns have gotten tangled up in it, into an idol. The law then can easily become a weapon of oppression and a tyrant, manipulated by others in ways that cling to the letter and subvert the spirit. Think of how often people can get off the hook for a crime they did commit due to a technicality, sometimes the most trivial of things that has no impact on the evidence or content of the case. It’s a game, see, and we can use the law against itself to beat the system. It is this that Jesus is railing against I think—the loss of the spirit of the law, the way in which the intent of the law has gotten lost or buried under practices and prejudices that pervert its aim.
Which made me wonder what a modern day version of this exchange might look like. And almost immediately I had an image of Jesus sparring with Justice Scalia on the steps of the U.S. Supreme Court. The case in point would be that of Troy Anthony Davis. Mr. Davis has been on Georgia’s death row for many years. He was convicted of murdering an off-duty police officer. Officer McPhail’s death occurred during a fight that broke out a gas station. Though there was no physical evidence linking Troy to the crime other than his presence there, along with that of many other people, he was convicted and sentenced to death. Now, seven of the nine witnesses that said he was the shooter have recanted completely and revealed that they were coerced and pressured by the police to point the finger—all done quite legally. Troy’s family has fought unceasingly to get his conviction overturned. With no credible evidence and others now naming a different man as the shooter, we see how the law railroaded a man all while following the legal process, a process that we know is riddled with problems, biases and prejudices. The Supreme Court has ruled that he can challenge his conviction. A rare move indeed. Two justices, however, voted against that ruling. Scalia wrote in his dissent: “This court has never held that the Constitution forbids the execution of a convicted defendant who has had a full and fair trial but is later able to convince a habeas corpus court that he is “actually” innocent.” In other words, even if convicted of a crime you did not do it is perfectly legal for you to be executed anyway. The letter of the law here is not only trumping the law, but also making the notion of justice a farce. I imagine Jesus firing back with a reminder that it was precisely to escape nations where the law was honored or not as took the fancy of those in charge that informed the founding fathers. He would likely ask if the final source of morality is the Consitution or is it God and seeking to do good? And it gets us to his probing assertion that it is what comes out of us that defiles not what goes in. Is not an interpretation such as Scalia’s a defilement of what we believe the spirit of the law is in this nation?
Which gets us to the place I want us to go for the next few weeks or so. The idea I want to play with is that of looking inside our hearts. And I think I will spend quite a bit of time taking us through the book of James, which speaks so wisely about the life, the character, and workings of the heart and its connection to the life we live in the world.
The law is a starting point, a frame, and a structure. But it is only as good as the hearts of those who hear and apply it. For many, the law gives the foundation for life. It defines the bounds of our behavior and the consequences, and that is the end of the matter. Yet we are called as children of God to go further. The law is an important piece, but is not only an exterior constraint. The law must penetrate the heart. We are to hear it and then take it in, absorb it into our being. As Jesus says, the foundation of the law is to love the Lord our God and to love our neighbors as ourselves. Study of the law, doing of the law in line with its intent takes us to this deeper place. It is now not about legalism, but about spiritual understanding. As we look into our hearts we find the things that defile us, that impede our ability to love—theft, murder, adultery, avarice, envy, pride and so forth. When these things are alive in our hearts, the law may call us to account when they emerge publicly, but the law is not able to take root and grow in us as a spiritual sense.
Jesus for us is the embodiment of the law fully alive in a human being. He was not a legalist, going around citing codes and rules. He lived the deepest essence of the law: love. The love of God was so alive in him, so thoroughly forming his heart, that he could see the light of God in everyone. For instance, when we see with this love we can no more think of stealing from another then flying to the moon. Conversely, we can also no longer accept or be at ease in a society that allows people to go hungry or without life’s essentials which is also a form of theft—theft of life and health and respect. When we see with this light inside we know we are utterly loved by God in our essence, in our particular self. We have nothing to envy in any one else and we discover that our hearts burn to honor the dignity and serve the presence of Christ in all other persons. But most of us are a long way off from loving like Jesus, of having the law become transformed and honed into its center—divine love—within us.
James, with his great wisdom, speaks eloquently about the spiritual work we are about. We have seen perfect love and therefore perfect law made alive in Jesus. He is the perfect gift, from above, coming down from the Father of light. He gave us birth by the word of truth, so that we could become a kind of first fruits of his creatures. James reminds us that in Jesus we have received, through our belief in him and as members of his Body, the word of truth, of light. We have been shown the life we are to cultivate within ourselves. Our first work is to look into our hearts and see what is blocking the light. This is not something we do once, but constantly. As we grow in Jesus’ truth we see more and more into ourselves. As we see more and more and as life happens there is always more space for Jesus’ truth to take root in us.
This is the doing of the word after the hearing. We hear that things inside us give life to evil, to things that defile us and soil the world. But doers of the word take up the call and invite that light into their hearts. Doers are not afraid to examine their hearts and see what is in there that is poisonous, sordid and rank. In this gazing we don’t forget what we look like, but take that knowledge to Christ for his light, his word. We allow our hearts to touch it and see that it is a spiritual reality, not just a way we think. As we become doers of the word we are purified by that light of Christ. As that light penetrates and illuminates our darkness and our lost-ness we see ourselves anew. This is not, let me be clear, an invitation to self-indulgent naval gazing, but a spiritual practice of self-examination that consciously invites the love and light of Christ in. In time we see the path through is also spiritual—forgiveness, mercy, hope, atonement, repentance, compassion and so on. In short, it is being and doing in imitation of the perfect Doer of the Word: Jesus the Christ.
It is the grafting of Christ to our own hearts. In time, we become to resemble the one grafted there. For most of us we don’t usually mean it in complimentary terms when we say I’ve become just like my mother. Nor do we usually take it as a compliment when someone says you’ve become just like your dad as you’ve gotten older. But imagine someone coming up to us and saying: you’ve become more like the Christ! When I see you doing things I think of Jesus, perfect law and therefore perfect love in action. It is real; it is solid. It isn’t a trapping or a practice or regulation; it’s shining straight from your heart.
The Rev. Natasha Brubaker Garrison
Year B, Proper 17
The letter of the law and the spirit of the law. In part, this is a way we can look at the point of the sparring between Jesus and the Pharisees in today’s story from Mark. Law reflects the context of time and place. It reflects the values and priorities, both good and bad, of a given society. We know that our own Constitution is an imperfect document that contains stances we find morally repugnant today, such as the wording, and the realities it spoke to, that one slave equals three fifths of one white or free person. And law codes change. Deuteronomy was a rewriting and a reinterpretation of the Law of Moses, of Leviticus, to reflect the experience of history and the reality that the Israelites were no longer semi-nomadic, but settled in towns and cities. The law followed in Jesus’ day was still, as is the way of things, evolving. And this was not seen as contrary to following God.
Of course, trouble happens when the law is seen as the end and as the ultimate reference point—immutable, absolute, and unchangeable. In religion things get distorted when the law is seen as divine dictation that is somehow free of human interference and shaping. A legalistic rigor sets in that makes The Law, with all the ways customs, traditions and social patterns have gotten tangled up in it, into an idol. The law then can easily become a weapon of oppression and a tyrant, manipulated by others in ways that cling to the letter and subvert the spirit. Think of how often people can get off the hook for a crime they did commit due to a technicality, sometimes the most trivial of things that has no impact on the evidence or content of the case. It’s a game, see, and we can use the law against itself to beat the system. It is this that Jesus is railing against I think—the loss of the spirit of the law, the way in which the intent of the law has gotten lost or buried under practices and prejudices that pervert its aim.
Which made me wonder what a modern day version of this exchange might look like. And almost immediately I had an image of Jesus sparring with Justice Scalia on the steps of the U.S. Supreme Court. The case in point would be that of Troy Anthony Davis. Mr. Davis has been on Georgia’s death row for many years. He was convicted of murdering an off-duty police officer. Officer McPhail’s death occurred during a fight that broke out a gas station. Though there was no physical evidence linking Troy to the crime other than his presence there, along with that of many other people, he was convicted and sentenced to death. Now, seven of the nine witnesses that said he was the shooter have recanted completely and revealed that they were coerced and pressured by the police to point the finger—all done quite legally. Troy’s family has fought unceasingly to get his conviction overturned. With no credible evidence and others now naming a different man as the shooter, we see how the law railroaded a man all while following the legal process, a process that we know is riddled with problems, biases and prejudices. The Supreme Court has ruled that he can challenge his conviction. A rare move indeed. Two justices, however, voted against that ruling. Scalia wrote in his dissent: “This court has never held that the Constitution forbids the execution of a convicted defendant who has had a full and fair trial but is later able to convince a habeas corpus court that he is “actually” innocent.” In other words, even if convicted of a crime you did not do it is perfectly legal for you to be executed anyway. The letter of the law here is not only trumping the law, but also making the notion of justice a farce. I imagine Jesus firing back with a reminder that it was precisely to escape nations where the law was honored or not as took the fancy of those in charge that informed the founding fathers. He would likely ask if the final source of morality is the Consitution or is it God and seeking to do good? And it gets us to his probing assertion that it is what comes out of us that defiles not what goes in. Is not an interpretation such as Scalia’s a defilement of what we believe the spirit of the law is in this nation?
Which gets us to the place I want us to go for the next few weeks or so. The idea I want to play with is that of looking inside our hearts. And I think I will spend quite a bit of time taking us through the book of James, which speaks so wisely about the life, the character, and workings of the heart and its connection to the life we live in the world.
The law is a starting point, a frame, and a structure. But it is only as good as the hearts of those who hear and apply it. For many, the law gives the foundation for life. It defines the bounds of our behavior and the consequences, and that is the end of the matter. Yet we are called as children of God to go further. The law is an important piece, but is not only an exterior constraint. The law must penetrate the heart. We are to hear it and then take it in, absorb it into our being. As Jesus says, the foundation of the law is to love the Lord our God and to love our neighbors as ourselves. Study of the law, doing of the law in line with its intent takes us to this deeper place. It is now not about legalism, but about spiritual understanding. As we look into our hearts we find the things that defile us, that impede our ability to love—theft, murder, adultery, avarice, envy, pride and so forth. When these things are alive in our hearts, the law may call us to account when they emerge publicly, but the law is not able to take root and grow in us as a spiritual sense.
Jesus for us is the embodiment of the law fully alive in a human being. He was not a legalist, going around citing codes and rules. He lived the deepest essence of the law: love. The love of God was so alive in him, so thoroughly forming his heart, that he could see the light of God in everyone. For instance, when we see with this love we can no more think of stealing from another then flying to the moon. Conversely, we can also no longer accept or be at ease in a society that allows people to go hungry or without life’s essentials which is also a form of theft—theft of life and health and respect. When we see with this light inside we know we are utterly loved by God in our essence, in our particular self. We have nothing to envy in any one else and we discover that our hearts burn to honor the dignity and serve the presence of Christ in all other persons. But most of us are a long way off from loving like Jesus, of having the law become transformed and honed into its center—divine love—within us.
James, with his great wisdom, speaks eloquently about the spiritual work we are about. We have seen perfect love and therefore perfect law made alive in Jesus. He is the perfect gift, from above, coming down from the Father of light. He gave us birth by the word of truth, so that we could become a kind of first fruits of his creatures. James reminds us that in Jesus we have received, through our belief in him and as members of his Body, the word of truth, of light. We have been shown the life we are to cultivate within ourselves. Our first work is to look into our hearts and see what is blocking the light. This is not something we do once, but constantly. As we grow in Jesus’ truth we see more and more into ourselves. As we see more and more and as life happens there is always more space for Jesus’ truth to take root in us.
This is the doing of the word after the hearing. We hear that things inside us give life to evil, to things that defile us and soil the world. But doers of the word take up the call and invite that light into their hearts. Doers are not afraid to examine their hearts and see what is in there that is poisonous, sordid and rank. In this gazing we don’t forget what we look like, but take that knowledge to Christ for his light, his word. We allow our hearts to touch it and see that it is a spiritual reality, not just a way we think. As we become doers of the word we are purified by that light of Christ. As that light penetrates and illuminates our darkness and our lost-ness we see ourselves anew. This is not, let me be clear, an invitation to self-indulgent naval gazing, but a spiritual practice of self-examination that consciously invites the love and light of Christ in. In time we see the path through is also spiritual—forgiveness, mercy, hope, atonement, repentance, compassion and so on. In short, it is being and doing in imitation of the perfect Doer of the Word: Jesus the Christ.
It is the grafting of Christ to our own hearts. In time, we become to resemble the one grafted there. For most of us we don’t usually mean it in complimentary terms when we say I’ve become just like my mother. Nor do we usually take it as a compliment when someone says you’ve become just like your dad as you’ve gotten older. But imagine someone coming up to us and saying: you’ve become more like the Christ! When I see you doing things I think of Jesus, perfect law and therefore perfect love in action. It is real; it is solid. It isn’t a trapping or a practice or regulation; it’s shining straight from your heart.
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