As you may remember, I teach Church History in a local seminary. Church History almost always turns out to be the study of the movers and shakers—bishops, popes, emperors, kings. I’ve tried to emphasize as much as I can how, as the movers and shakers do their thing, the parish clergy and laity are living their faith. We don’t have a lot of information about this until we get to the English Reformation.
While Henry is busy dismantling the relationship between England and Rome, the average person is devoutly Catholic. One of the ways the Church ended up being so powerful and wealthy was the gifts of land, property and money that had been provided to them though out the Middle Ages by the gentry and middle class. Peasants had nothing to leave, but the record indicates they were faithful in attending to feast days and Sunday worship. Some would even run from church to church to attend mass multiple times on Sunday. Sure they tended to be pretty superstitious too, but nonetheless, their faith was incredibly important to them.
All this was on my mind during my exercise walk this morning. As I thought about this, I thought about my youth and how in the 40s and 50s when I was a kid, churches in my neighborhood were packed. I lived in a Catholic neighborhood, and on Saturday and Sunday, there was mass after mass and all seemed to have a fair share of people present.
What happened, I wondered? I wondered because all the figures today show church attendance at an all time low, especially as a percentage of population in this country. Then an “answer” popped into my head—one I want to explore more, but will share now. Vatican II happened.
For the Catholic Church in this country, the unintended consequence of Vatican II was droves of priests and religious leaving their vows. Not only that, but the number of men who sought the priesthood has fallen and continued to be so low as to border on a crisis. Convents dried up and teaching nuns disappeared. When that happened, the Catholic schools began a decline, especially in poor areas, because they could hardly afford to pay lay teachers.
What else happened? For Catholics and for Episcopalians especially, the mystery of the Eucharist was replaced by a language people understood, at least for Catholics, and by a rite they could watch face to face. Was that a bad thing? I think a little bit. This is why I need to consider this more. About the same time, clergy stopped being Father Jones and became Father Bob, or more likely, just Bob. I’m a little afraid along with the loss of the formality there was some loss of respect. Consequently, the priest up front was just another guy—or in some cases, another woman! And less likely to be able to lead or set an example.
Well, this is not a well developed argument, but it is just something I’ve been thinking about.
Peace,
Jerry+
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
Onesimus
Today is the feast day of Onesimus, the runaway slave Paul speaks of in Philemon. I know this because I led Evening Prayer today at the Seminary where I teach and had to look up the reading for the day. The Gospel for today was the story of the man blind from birth who was healed by Jesus' application of mud made from his spit.
Actually, the man, who is never named, wasn't healed until he did as Jesus told him and washed the mud away at the Pool of Siloam. It is important to note, the man didn't ask for healing--someone asked Jesus who had sinned that this poor beggar was blind. Jesus responded by saying no one sinned, but that the glory of God was about to be revealed. He then made the mud and told the man to go wash. Bottom line, as in other stories, it's the man's faith that restores his sight--the faith that had him make his way to the Pool as instructed.
I was reminded of last Sunday's OT lesson about Nahum, the great general who had leprosy. He's healed when he bathes in the Jordan seven times. He objects to this requirement. And from the context, it's clear he thinks he should have been asked to do something grand. Instead, he bathes in a dirty little river in this dirty little backwater country.
Is there a lesson for us here? Well of course there is.
You'll be healed when you figure it out for yourself.
Peace,
Jerry+
Actually, the man, who is never named, wasn't healed until he did as Jesus told him and washed the mud away at the Pool of Siloam. It is important to note, the man didn't ask for healing--someone asked Jesus who had sinned that this poor beggar was blind. Jesus responded by saying no one sinned, but that the glory of God was about to be revealed. He then made the mud and told the man to go wash. Bottom line, as in other stories, it's the man's faith that restores his sight--the faith that had him make his way to the Pool as instructed.
I was reminded of last Sunday's OT lesson about Nahum, the great general who had leprosy. He's healed when he bathes in the Jordan seven times. He objects to this requirement. And from the context, it's clear he thinks he should have been asked to do something grand. Instead, he bathes in a dirty little river in this dirty little backwater country.
Is there a lesson for us here? Well of course there is.
You'll be healed when you figure it out for yourself.
Peace,
Jerry+
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
R & B
This past weekend I devoted several hours to removing the last of the fall leaves from the flower beds. Raking and bagging is not among my favorite tasks. This stems back to my pre-retirement years when R and B ate huge chunks of my weekend free time. This fall is the first when I could rake and bag any day of the week without feeling as if I’d used all my leisure time working. I noticed this year my attitude has modified a bit.
First, I found it helped provide a bit of structure to a pretty unstructured life. I’m not used to “unstructured.” I’ve had to live all my life being very busy and very organized. It saps me. But, to suddenly wake up and know that almost every day is “my day off,” is unsettling a little. So having leaves to rake, leaves that kept relentlessly falling day after day and week after week, demanding that I get them off the deck and drive and out of the planting beds, was a nice bit of structure.
But Saturday, the second attitude adjustment popped up. As I was cleaning from under azaleas and evergreens, blowing and raking from pansy beds, wet, rich dirt was exposed. I kept thinking as I’d finished a section—“Ah, prepared for spring!” And in a few places, I unearthed the yellow green shoots of daffodils pushing up out of the cold, wet dirt. I noticed the azaleas both in front and back were budding up. Then I looked up. I’d been focused on the leaves on the ground, but now I glanced into the trees. I noticed the maple trees in the front yard had buds. My neighbor’s tulip poplar was pink and heavy with buds. Spring looked as if it were about to break out everywhere. New life, no longer just around the corner, was actually intruding into the bleak, cold winter.
So it is with the love of God. Just when winter seems to have settled into our lives for all eternity, God’s love intrudes. A friend calls, a letter arrives, an email pops up—a connection to hope and peace is made. Sometimes we need to rake a few leaves to find the signs of hope and love, other times we just need to look up.
Peace,
Jerry+
First, I found it helped provide a bit of structure to a pretty unstructured life. I’m not used to “unstructured.” I’ve had to live all my life being very busy and very organized. It saps me. But, to suddenly wake up and know that almost every day is “my day off,” is unsettling a little. So having leaves to rake, leaves that kept relentlessly falling day after day and week after week, demanding that I get them off the deck and drive and out of the planting beds, was a nice bit of structure.
But Saturday, the second attitude adjustment popped up. As I was cleaning from under azaleas and evergreens, blowing and raking from pansy beds, wet, rich dirt was exposed. I kept thinking as I’d finished a section—“Ah, prepared for spring!” And in a few places, I unearthed the yellow green shoots of daffodils pushing up out of the cold, wet dirt. I noticed the azaleas both in front and back were budding up. Then I looked up. I’d been focused on the leaves on the ground, but now I glanced into the trees. I noticed the maple trees in the front yard had buds. My neighbor’s tulip poplar was pink and heavy with buds. Spring looked as if it were about to break out everywhere. New life, no longer just around the corner, was actually intruding into the bleak, cold winter.
So it is with the love of God. Just when winter seems to have settled into our lives for all eternity, God’s love intrudes. A friend calls, a letter arrives, an email pops up—a connection to hope and peace is made. Sometimes we need to rake a few leaves to find the signs of hope and love, other times we just need to look up.
Peace,
Jerry+
Tuesday, February 3, 2009
Deliver Us From Evil (Mark 1:29-39)
[The reading from Mark is next Sunday's Gospel lesson.]
In reflecting on this Gospel just heard, it is tempting to take the easy way out and jump on a couple of sermonic tidbits. For example, we might focus on the great love Simon shows when he takes Jesus home with him to heal, of all people, his mother-in-law! Now that’s love at work in spades if you ask me! Or on a more serious note, we might look at what she did when she was healed. She immediately set about serving others, setting an example for our own ministry. Or we could look at how even Jesus needed time for solitary prayer, showing us the importance of collecting our thoughts and focusing our spirits before we begin a new day.
Without question, these are important things to consider and to integrate into our spiritual lives. Which of us couldn’t improve our service to others? Which of us wouldn’t find our lives more under control and more centered on Christ if we got up, “a great while before day” as the Gospel puts it, and prayed for direction? These would have been easy and important topics. Yet as important as they are, this is not really what this lesson seems about.
I think the core of the lesson is to be found in two cries of human longing. One is implicit in the numbers who came for physical healing or to be set free from demons—“Deliver us from evil!” The other is explicit—“Everyone is searching for you!” These two cries emphasize our profound need to be in relationship with God. And for a simple reason—only God has power to deliver us from evil, to overcome sin and death.
The plea “deliver us from evil,” needs to be seen as a heart-felt plea from those who saw evil everyday, everywhere. We can understand this better if we remember in biblical days physical ailments were seen as proof that the sick one was somehow out of favor with God. He or she had sinned and was being punished. Remember Job? His comforters encouraged him to confess his sin and the sores would heal, the pain would end. This was a common understanding of the time. And to tell the truth, I’m not so sure we modern day folk don’t still think that at some level. But, that’s another sermon.
At the same time, the emotionally or mentally disturbed were understood as possessed by demons, the Greek view, or unclean spirits, the Jewish view, who controlled their behavior. Asking to be healed was clearly asking to be delivered from evil. And in the case of demon possession, it was asking to be delivered from more than the personal torture of not being in control of yourself. A demon possessed person was a threat to the community, so great a threat, they were often kicked out of the community to wander aimlessly outside the city. To have a demon cast out not only restored your personal spirit, but it restored your place in the nurturing community. Wholeness returned on two critical levels—the personal and the interpersonal.
In our enlightened scientific time, we are not very likely to blame mental illness or weird behavior on demon possession. We’ve gotten too sophisticated for that. Maybe in the process, just maybe we have gotten too sophisticated to believe in the evil the demons represented as well. Too bad, because there are certainly powers that can possess us and ruin our lives individually and collectively. Call them demons, call them social ills, call them what you will, but they are real whatever they are called. Greed, immorality, self-serving ambition, revenge, racism, selfishness, materialism, hatred, arrogance, to name a few—haven’t we seen these take over otherwise normal people and control their behavior? I think a case can be made that at some level these behaviors are evil embodied? What other explanation is there for corporate greed? Crummy government? Poor parenting? Poor schooling? Too much TV? Sick video games? You really think that explains it all?
I’m not trying to eliminate a sense of personal responsibility for our actions. Yet, what do we make of those situations when these or behaviors like these seize you and me, normal folk. We know should break free, we even want to break free, but we can’t. We want to stop the destructive behavior, but still, it grips us. I can’t really explain why. I think believing it is evil living in us is one way to understand it. Is there a day that goes by that the effects of evil don’t affect me? Is there a day that goes by that I am not at war with the presence of evil in my mind and heart? Is it my inherent weakness, is it a demon—I don’t know and I don’t care—I just want to be freed from the effects in my life. As I believe you do. We’re vulnerable, we’re mortal and we rightly pray, “deliver us from evil.” We want it. We’re even eager for the deliverance aren’t we? Aren't we?
Peace,
Jerry+
In reflecting on this Gospel just heard, it is tempting to take the easy way out and jump on a couple of sermonic tidbits. For example, we might focus on the great love Simon shows when he takes Jesus home with him to heal, of all people, his mother-in-law! Now that’s love at work in spades if you ask me! Or on a more serious note, we might look at what she did when she was healed. She immediately set about serving others, setting an example for our own ministry. Or we could look at how even Jesus needed time for solitary prayer, showing us the importance of collecting our thoughts and focusing our spirits before we begin a new day.
Without question, these are important things to consider and to integrate into our spiritual lives. Which of us couldn’t improve our service to others? Which of us wouldn’t find our lives more under control and more centered on Christ if we got up, “a great while before day” as the Gospel puts it, and prayed for direction? These would have been easy and important topics. Yet as important as they are, this is not really what this lesson seems about.
I think the core of the lesson is to be found in two cries of human longing. One is implicit in the numbers who came for physical healing or to be set free from demons—“Deliver us from evil!” The other is explicit—“Everyone is searching for you!” These two cries emphasize our profound need to be in relationship with God. And for a simple reason—only God has power to deliver us from evil, to overcome sin and death.
The plea “deliver us from evil,” needs to be seen as a heart-felt plea from those who saw evil everyday, everywhere. We can understand this better if we remember in biblical days physical ailments were seen as proof that the sick one was somehow out of favor with God. He or she had sinned and was being punished. Remember Job? His comforters encouraged him to confess his sin and the sores would heal, the pain would end. This was a common understanding of the time. And to tell the truth, I’m not so sure we modern day folk don’t still think that at some level. But, that’s another sermon.
At the same time, the emotionally or mentally disturbed were understood as possessed by demons, the Greek view, or unclean spirits, the Jewish view, who controlled their behavior. Asking to be healed was clearly asking to be delivered from evil. And in the case of demon possession, it was asking to be delivered from more than the personal torture of not being in control of yourself. A demon possessed person was a threat to the community, so great a threat, they were often kicked out of the community to wander aimlessly outside the city. To have a demon cast out not only restored your personal spirit, but it restored your place in the nurturing community. Wholeness returned on two critical levels—the personal and the interpersonal.
In our enlightened scientific time, we are not very likely to blame mental illness or weird behavior on demon possession. We’ve gotten too sophisticated for that. Maybe in the process, just maybe we have gotten too sophisticated to believe in the evil the demons represented as well. Too bad, because there are certainly powers that can possess us and ruin our lives individually and collectively. Call them demons, call them social ills, call them what you will, but they are real whatever they are called. Greed, immorality, self-serving ambition, revenge, racism, selfishness, materialism, hatred, arrogance, to name a few—haven’t we seen these take over otherwise normal people and control their behavior? I think a case can be made that at some level these behaviors are evil embodied? What other explanation is there for corporate greed? Crummy government? Poor parenting? Poor schooling? Too much TV? Sick video games? You really think that explains it all?
I’m not trying to eliminate a sense of personal responsibility for our actions. Yet, what do we make of those situations when these or behaviors like these seize you and me, normal folk. We know should break free, we even want to break free, but we can’t. We want to stop the destructive behavior, but still, it grips us. I can’t really explain why. I think believing it is evil living in us is one way to understand it. Is there a day that goes by that the effects of evil don’t affect me? Is there a day that goes by that I am not at war with the presence of evil in my mind and heart? Is it my inherent weakness, is it a demon—I don’t know and I don’t care—I just want to be freed from the effects in my life. As I believe you do. We’re vulnerable, we’re mortal and we rightly pray, “deliver us from evil.” We want it. We’re even eager for the deliverance aren’t we? Aren't we?
Peace,
Jerry+
Wednesday, January 28, 2009
Like A New Creation
When I awoke this morning it was snowing. Just enough had fallen to cover everything with a nice soft layer of white.
I’m always excited to see the snow. Though I dislike driving in it--largely due to my fellow drivers who don’t seem to think slick streets suggest caution--I love looking at it. Its brilliant sparkle seems to give the drab, grey winter landscape luminescence. Bare trees glisten. Dead grass disappears. The leaves that have fallen since the last raking have their summoning voices silenced. At the early hour when I first looked out, not even tire tracks marred the black of the roadway. It was as if all of creation had been rendered a beautiful new creation.
Those who witnessed Jesus driving out the demon of the man in the synagogue (Mark 1: 21-28) were seeing a new creation too. “They were all amazed, and they kept on asking one another, ‘What is this? A new teaching-- with authority! He commands even the unclean spirits, and they obey him.’" With authority! They weren’t used to that. This Jesus was something new and different—a force with which to be reckoned.
Two thousand years later, we aren’t much impressed. Jesus’ work and teaching, they’re old hat to us. No amazement. Too bad for us.
It’s not a terminal condition. We could, you know, listen to his words when they are read to us or when we read them and pretend we’d never heard them before. We could let our imagination go and see how we’d act if it really were a new teaching. When we head in the Eucharistic prayer the mighty works of God on our behalf, we could really listen for a change. When the recital of Jesus’ saving work is intoned, we could imagine we’d never heard such a thing before.
And if we did these things, what might happen? I’ll let you consider that for yourself.
Peace,
Jerry+
I’m always excited to see the snow. Though I dislike driving in it--largely due to my fellow drivers who don’t seem to think slick streets suggest caution--I love looking at it. Its brilliant sparkle seems to give the drab, grey winter landscape luminescence. Bare trees glisten. Dead grass disappears. The leaves that have fallen since the last raking have their summoning voices silenced. At the early hour when I first looked out, not even tire tracks marred the black of the roadway. It was as if all of creation had been rendered a beautiful new creation.
Those who witnessed Jesus driving out the demon of the man in the synagogue (Mark 1: 21-28) were seeing a new creation too. “They were all amazed, and they kept on asking one another, ‘What is this? A new teaching-- with authority! He commands even the unclean spirits, and they obey him.’" With authority! They weren’t used to that. This Jesus was something new and different—a force with which to be reckoned.
Two thousand years later, we aren’t much impressed. Jesus’ work and teaching, they’re old hat to us. No amazement. Too bad for us.
It’s not a terminal condition. We could, you know, listen to his words when they are read to us or when we read them and pretend we’d never heard them before. We could let our imagination go and see how we’d act if it really were a new teaching. When we head in the Eucharistic prayer the mighty works of God on our behalf, we could really listen for a change. When the recital of Jesus’ saving work is intoned, we could imagine we’d never heard such a thing before.
And if we did these things, what might happen? I’ll let you consider that for yourself.
Peace,
Jerry+
Thursday, January 22, 2009
Being Called
As Jesus passed along the Sea of Galilee, he saw Simon and his brother Andrew casting a net into the sea-- for they were fishermen. And Jesus said to them, "Follow me and I will make you fish for people." And immediately they left their nets and followed him. As he went a little farther, he saw James son of Zebedee and his brother John, who were in their boat mending the nets. Immediately he called them; and they left their father Zebedee in the boat with the hired men, and followed him.
This is a kind of surreal story. Four fishermen are called to leave their livelihood and take up a new vocation—bring people to believe in Jesus and the new Kingdom he preached. Just out of the blue, he asks them to stop what they have been doing and join in this rump movement. Forgive me if I stretch this story to be a metaphor for what Obama is doing—to be a kind of parallel between the first century and now.
As I pointed out earlier, the President is asking us to stop business as usual and find ways to bring justice to the poor and disadvantaged; to put swords away in favor of hammers and brick; to look beyond ourselves to the common good. Obama sees a vision of what America can be instead of what it has become and he calls each of us to join in making it a reality.
The thing is, I didn’t vote for him. I didn’t think he had the experience or the political savvy to do a tenth of what he said he’d do during the campaign. And I really believed, as was said in the final days of the campaign, he’d be tested by foreign powers—severely tested and tested early. I wasn’t sure he’d pass.
I suspect many people who heard Jesus promise something new and better had the same thoughts about him as I had about Obama. But four men and later eight men and later many men and women believed.
His vision hasn’t become a reality, but still you and I are called to make it so, to believe he can deliver. He calls us today as surely as Obama is calling us. As Christians, we can respond both as believers and as good citizens. There are many overlaps between what the President seeks and what Jesus seeks. But neither of them can pull it off without our involvement. Today is not New Year’s Day, but perhaps it is still a good time to resolve to restore what is broken down and renew what is fallen. How about it?
Peace,
Jerry+
This is a kind of surreal story. Four fishermen are called to leave their livelihood and take up a new vocation—bring people to believe in Jesus and the new Kingdom he preached. Just out of the blue, he asks them to stop what they have been doing and join in this rump movement. Forgive me if I stretch this story to be a metaphor for what Obama is doing—to be a kind of parallel between the first century and now.
As I pointed out earlier, the President is asking us to stop business as usual and find ways to bring justice to the poor and disadvantaged; to put swords away in favor of hammers and brick; to look beyond ourselves to the common good. Obama sees a vision of what America can be instead of what it has become and he calls each of us to join in making it a reality.
The thing is, I didn’t vote for him. I didn’t think he had the experience or the political savvy to do a tenth of what he said he’d do during the campaign. And I really believed, as was said in the final days of the campaign, he’d be tested by foreign powers—severely tested and tested early. I wasn’t sure he’d pass.
I suspect many people who heard Jesus promise something new and better had the same thoughts about him as I had about Obama. But four men and later eight men and later many men and women believed.
His vision hasn’t become a reality, but still you and I are called to make it so, to believe he can deliver. He calls us today as surely as Obama is calling us. As Christians, we can respond both as believers and as good citizens. There are many overlaps between what the President seeks and what Jesus seeks. But neither of them can pull it off without our involvement. Today is not New Year’s Day, but perhaps it is still a good time to resolve to restore what is broken down and renew what is fallen. How about it?
Peace,
Jerry+
Tuesday, January 20, 2009
An Open Letter
Mr President, I listened to your speech today. I found it moving, hopeful, and realistic in its appraisal of our situation at home and abroad. Yes, and it was filled with idealism as well. A part of me is always attracted to idealism. Ideals such as mutual respect, care for others, concern for the common good, inspire me and draw me in. At the same time, I’ve had my idealism crushed too many times to not recognize that a powerful speech by a new president will likely change nothing.
I say that with a lump in my throat and moisture in my eyes. You have called us to such a higher good that it is almost unimaginable that not everyone will want to join in making it real. Yet, I’m pretty confident, that as you try to bring about the changes you outlined, intra and inter party politics will result in every initiative being delayed, watered down, or completely defeated. The same selfishness that helped create our economic crisis will not go away because you have called us to pull together. The lust for power and control is at least as powerful as the greed that drove us to the brink. I wish I did not believe this to be so, but I do.
I am old enough to remember the many personal sacrifices of the people of our country during WWII. We had our butter and our sugar rationed. Gasoline and rubber for tires were in short supply. Rag pickers regularly moved up and down the street I lived on to gather worn out wash clothes and towels to be recycled. Pleas for iron skillets and aluminum pans to be turned into war materiel were answered with enthusiasm. I remember collecting aluminum foil to help our efforts. There was no sense of entitlement or wish to be excused from the sacrifices; no sense that “none of this applies to me.”
But my life as shown me that those who taste power and wealth are unlikely to want to sacrifice any of it for the common good. And these are those who actually run our country in public office and behind the scenes, on Wall Street and in board rooms. Power is just heady stuff. It’s an addiction that’s hard to break. And wealth? The mortgage payment on the gated community or the McMansion are too high to move the speculators and brokers to thinking about the retired or less affluent people in the community who are struggling to make it. If there is a buck to be made, it will be made—damn the consequences for the “little people.” Real change just seems so unlikely.
I’m sorry I’m so pessimistic about all this. I don’t want to feel this way. But I remember being excited about other presidents and other administrations only to be disappointed in what they were able to accomplish. Good men, such as Jimmy Carter, who was simply over his head. Sincere men, such as George Bush, who took bad advice and held to his idealism with damning consequences.
Perhaps this time it will be different. I hope so, Mr President. I’ll do what I can. You are my president and you’ll have my support, my encouragement, and my prayers.
Peace,
Jerry+
I say that with a lump in my throat and moisture in my eyes. You have called us to such a higher good that it is almost unimaginable that not everyone will want to join in making it real. Yet, I’m pretty confident, that as you try to bring about the changes you outlined, intra and inter party politics will result in every initiative being delayed, watered down, or completely defeated. The same selfishness that helped create our economic crisis will not go away because you have called us to pull together. The lust for power and control is at least as powerful as the greed that drove us to the brink. I wish I did not believe this to be so, but I do.
I am old enough to remember the many personal sacrifices of the people of our country during WWII. We had our butter and our sugar rationed. Gasoline and rubber for tires were in short supply. Rag pickers regularly moved up and down the street I lived on to gather worn out wash clothes and towels to be recycled. Pleas for iron skillets and aluminum pans to be turned into war materiel were answered with enthusiasm. I remember collecting aluminum foil to help our efforts. There was no sense of entitlement or wish to be excused from the sacrifices; no sense that “none of this applies to me.”
But my life as shown me that those who taste power and wealth are unlikely to want to sacrifice any of it for the common good. And these are those who actually run our country in public office and behind the scenes, on Wall Street and in board rooms. Power is just heady stuff. It’s an addiction that’s hard to break. And wealth? The mortgage payment on the gated community or the McMansion are too high to move the speculators and brokers to thinking about the retired or less affluent people in the community who are struggling to make it. If there is a buck to be made, it will be made—damn the consequences for the “little people.” Real change just seems so unlikely.
I’m sorry I’m so pessimistic about all this. I don’t want to feel this way. But I remember being excited about other presidents and other administrations only to be disappointed in what they were able to accomplish. Good men, such as Jimmy Carter, who was simply over his head. Sincere men, such as George Bush, who took bad advice and held to his idealism with damning consequences.
Perhaps this time it will be different. I hope so, Mr President. I’ll do what I can. You are my president and you’ll have my support, my encouragement, and my prayers.
Peace,
Jerry+
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