36 and counting: the sixth sunday of easter

the gospel for this sunday is john 14:15-21. the church knows that forty days after the resurrection jesus ascended to the father, a fact that is celebrated thursday of this week. but she remembers that jesus promised he would not leave us orphans, that he would send, "another comforter, that he may abide with you forever."

for a number of years my favourite read for pentecost (after of course the daily office readings for this season) has been annie dillard's holy the firm. this year i have a new favourite: cormac mcarthy's the road. it profoundly recognizes that we are living in the last days, but it is also a profoundly hopeful book, a pentecostal book in all meanings of that word. in it a loving father takes his son through the wilderness, telling him all along the terror-filled way that they are "some of the good guys," that they "carry the fire," even though the existence of other "good guys" is an act of faith, and the fire is constantly challenged. at last the father dies just as the son meets some of the other good guys: one man, one woman, two children, one boy, one girl.

"the woman when she saw him put her arms around him and held him. oh, she said, i am so glad to see you. she would talk to him sometimes about god. he tried to talk to god but the best thing was to talk to his father and he did talk to him and he didnt forget. the woman said that was all right. she said that the breath of god was his breath yet though it pass from man to man through all time.

"once there were brook trout in the streams in the mountains. you could see them standing in the amber current where the white edges of their fins wimpled softly in the flow. they smelled of moss in your hand. polished and muscular and torsional. on their backs were vermiculate patterns that were maps of the world in its becoming. maps and mazes. of a thing which could not be put back. not be made right again. in the deep glens where they lived all things were older than man and they hummed of mystery." (p. 241)

koan on the creekside

i sat on the banks of a creek wednesday as it flowed into the impounded waters of the white river, it's enlarged surface reflecting early springs green leaves and the still-white trunks of the sycamores.

i was reading nikolai gogol's the divine liturgy of the russian orthodox church, and i interspersed bits and pieces of psalms which occur in the liturgy as i read, especially psalm 103. i found myself humming them to melodies from the orthodox liturgy, and i was saddened that there is no community here to sing with.

and i understood perhaps some of how brother andre of taize felt. he stopped celebrating eucharist because the whole church would not celebrate together.

today i am reading s. l. greenslade's schism in the early church (london: scm,1964), which includes these words:

"[the early church] was not undivided, but it was much less divided than we are to-day, and it hated division and worked hard, if sometimes by unhappy means, to heal it. it did so, not because it was uneconomical in manpower or money to have a novatianist chapel and a catholic church on opposite street corners, nor even because disunion was mocked at by the pagan. it was because disunion is in itself sin, and therefore to be fought against." (p. 33)

lord have mercy upon us, and incline our hearts to keep thy law.

fifth sunday of easter: way, truth, life

this post is another one of those times i feel like i have a good answer to an excellent question quite a while after the question has been asked. knightr4 said in response to the previous post, "folks still want revealed truth but are not sure where to find it because they are not finding it in the books that they used to." i rose to the bait of books and said, " i have noticed that many of the books "'they are used to' use orthodoxy as the big-bad-word." but it's not about books, but about our search for, amongst modern-thinking folk, infallibility, and among post-modern-thinking folk, what ryan calls "revealed truth." neither are really found in books, except, i would suggest, in the very specific way which the bible reveals the word of god.

yesterday's gospel, john 14:1-14, takes place in the room where jesus and the disciples met on the thursday before the crucifixion. philip, who a bit before had been asked by some greeks to show them jesus, now asks, “lord, show us the father, and we will be satisfied.” jesus responds, "whoever has seen me has seen the father."

this is leading up to one of the conclusions as it were of john's gospel. we so often read the gospels in little bits and bobs, which we sometimes fancy up with the term "pericopes," that it is easy to lose sight of the fact that they are excellent works of writing. everyone knows john 3:16, more or less. i was confronted saturday with a flock of youngsters in red t-shirts that said in big black letters "3:16" only saturday. but seldom do i find t-shirts that say "17:3": "and this is eternal life, that they may know you, the only true god, and jesus christ whom you have sent."

in a rather famous interview, theresa of calcultta was asked what she and her sisters did that was so successful, since people were flocking to them, and not only the dying to whom they particularly ministered. she replied, "we give them jesus." the interviewer thought she was being coy, so insisted, "but you must do something special." theresa replied, "we give them jesus."

it is the person of jesus who reveals the way, the truth, the life, indeed the very nature of god. anything else, books or sermons or even this blog, can only point to him or away from him.

jody's question: orthodoxy?

i am leading a reflection on the old testament readings of the easter vigil at the local united methodist church on wednesdays during the great 50 days. usually it is only on thursday that i am able to think of good answers to the very good questions people have asked.

jody asked last wednesday, "what do you mean by orthodoxy?" i had said rather off-handedly that if one has not experienced orthodox worship, one has no idea of what real worship is like. by that i mean, at the least, that orthodox worship happens in heaven. we ascend with christ as christ's body to the heavenly realm. most western worship, especially in the reformed tradition, is definitely worship here on earth.

but there is the bigger meaning of "orthodox," and as i thought about that, i came to the conclusion that i mean the church as described in the second chapter of acts: "and they continued stedfastly in the apostles' doctrine and fellowship, and in breaking of bread, and in prayers." (v. 42) certainly many folks who consider themselves christians have consciously departed from the apostles' doctrine. indeed another person in the group was rejoicing that modern united methodists have a wide variety of teachings and practices from which to choose.

that this is a source of rejoicing rather than repentance comes, i think, from our adoption of the a modern (in the sctrict hobbesian/lockian sense)worldview, in which god perhaps cannot but certain does not actually reveal his self to us. the scriptures, the liturgy, the church, are all human inventions, not gracious gifts from the holy one. the thanks that we give in the liturgy of sts. addai and mari, which i have received in my apostolic tradition, for the "form of worship which we have received from you [the father] does not make sense to many modern christians.

therefore for many modern christians it does not seem possible that what orthodox christians consider stedfast continuity is even possible. yet it also seems that many modern christians have accepted some sort of infallibility that comes not from god but from our own imaginations.

we reject the possibility of there being real access to truth in the orthodox traditions of the holy catholic church, but we put our faith in the "institutes" of calvin or luther's single-minded rejection of a millenium and a half of tradition, even accepting his shortened canon of scripture. or we consider the bible infallible, confusing a book about the word of god for the incarnate, eternal word of god himself. how odd that some who hold that position find the infallibility of the pope incomprehensible.

so i find myself often seeming to be the fogey, the silly old man who thinks god loves us enough to self-reveal to us. i find not only great comfort but great truth in the oft-repeated address in the orthodox liturgy, "thou art a man-befriending god." i find continuity between the holy one's desire to be friends with moses and his desire to be friends with us. this i think is a completely orthodox understanding of the beloved one. thanks be to god for his unspeakable gift!

the fourth sunday of easter: all we like sheep

it is not popular to be sheep these days. we seldom use the old confession,

"almight and most merciful father; we have erred, and strayed from thy ways like lost sheep. we have followed too much the devices and desires of our own hearts. we have offended against thy holy laws. we have left undone those things which we ought to have done; and we have done those things which we ought not to have done; and there is no health in us. . . ."

the in the gospel for this week (john 10:1-10) jesus suggests we are indeed his sheep, because he is our shepherd. when we so proudly think of ourselves otherwise, we are listening to the voices of those who are thieves and robbers. i was reminded of a hymn from my childhood:

"savior, like a shepherd lead us, much we need thy tender care;
in thy pleasant pastures feed us, for our use thy folds prepare.
. . .
early let us seek thy favor, early let us do thy will;
blessèd lord and only savior, with thy love our bosoms fill." (dorothy a. thrupp)

but there are times when we, too, are called to act as shepherds. that is when the other image of jesus in this gospel becomes important. he is the door. whenever we would bring anyone into the fold any other way, we fail.

as usual, william temple sums it all up quite well, saying,

"the pastoral office, like all other offices in the church, is a localisation, so to speak, of a function of the whole church and its members. . . . we are called to be christ's witnesses. but by what right do we date to attempt the direction of a neighbour's life, or even of a child's? and . . . the answer is that we approach him through the door.
"i have no right to call men to adopt my traditions or to follow my manner of life. but i may call them to accept the truth and to follow the way which is life." (readings in st. john's gospel (new york: st. martin's press, 1968), p. 159)

tribute to a friend

i received a letter yesterday from one of my several friends who are exploring ordination--not any of the ones who have commented on this blog, and this post is in tribute to him.

it has been an odd week, in that a greater than usual number of my friends who are in the business, as it were, ordained ministers in various brands of the church, have talked to me about their discomfort with the church, questioning whether they can continue to work within it as they have been. none of them is questioning his or her own calling to priesthood, merely whether the church allows them to exercise it.

my immediately, if not spoken, reaction, is that the calling and imposition of episcopal hands is itself the empowerment and indeed necessitating--is that a word--to exercise it. but that's easy for me to say. i'm ordained in a branch of the church that follows without ever noticing it roland allen's idea of priesthood without remuneration. i can be as prophetic as i wish, and there is no loss of what we call "livelihood" to me or my family.

so, into this week comes my friend's letter, saying "that i do genuinely feel called to out of the idea of the joy of service. . . . but is the job ready for me?" the problem, you see, is that my friend is "a queer."

hence my post. i wrote to him of my experience when i resigned my charge in the united methodist church, which had decided not to ordained "practicing self-professing homosexuals." i knew i should be truthful, so although i had had no practice, i self-professed. the response was one of those bureaucratic horrors that eviscerates the power of the gospel to save this horrible broken world in which we live. i don't remember whether it was the district superintendent or the elder who was in charge of keeping everyone on the next page in the notebook with the checkmarks to fill out for full membership in the conference who answered, but the answer was, "gosh, dale, we don't care what you do, so long as no one knows."

i assumed that my ordained life was over. it was therefore an amazing surprise when i discovered a weird branch of the church whose discernment process was not based on either fear or current politics, but on what the spirit is speaking to the church (and what he had spoke to the church in the earliest days, before it got all entangled with the empire). as i began to go through enquiring about possible ordination, i was delighted and surprised that my phone would ring and it would be a bishop from somewhere or another who did not have a notebook with check mark blanks but with questions about my spiritual experiences and practices and understanding of the holy.

so, i told my friend, "the bigger question is not if the church is ready for you, but how it necessarily requires you. think of how the big shots in the temple thought they weren't ready for jesus. and of course they weren't."

and i am delighted to find someone who recognizes that the call to ordination is the call to the joy of service, and delighted that he has found that in a parish which serves.

and i want to make sure that i am not dishonest online. as i wrote to my friend, i am celebate, but it is to simplify my life, not because i think there is something worse about what i prefer to call homophilia than homosexuality. anyone who goes through the checkout lane of any grocery store in this country can see on the covers of the weeklies that heterosexuality is not necessarily a good thing, either. despite what television and people magazine say, there is more to life than sex.

third sunday of easter: heartburn

usually on monday mornings i try to post something about the previous sunday's gospel. this post is no exception, but it is a little more personal than some.

the gospel is the story of the first supper: unrecognized jesus and two disciples meet on the road. they hear him tell of all the scriptures that testify of him, and then recognize him in the breaking of the bread. "did not our hearts burn within us while he talked to us along the way, while he opened the scriptures to us?"

i was delighted that an old friend was in town, a priest with whom i had worked twenty-five years ago. bob was at the parish breakfast. then at the bible study after breakfast, another friend said, "i like this guy," in reference to something bob had said. "i like him, too," i said, "but when i was a substitute teacher, i found that anyone can be brilliant for three days." in my mind was, "but i worked with bob for years, and his brilliance lasts." but those words were not said.

afterwards, after i had probably been too anxious to agree with bob--not that i disagreed with him--i had a bit of heartburn. i realized that i was jealous. bob has had a very easily-defined career: rector, canon-to-the-ordinary, rector, head of a dioscesan taskforce. at breakfast i had been called once again a prophet. what has my career been? semi-pelagian semi-prophetic semi-ornamental semi-hermit. how does that look on a resume? indeed i had started to call this post "the loneliness of the long-distance prophet." in my better moments i am happy to recognize my calling; blessed even (macarius has both meanings, after all.) i know that

"the measuring line marks out delightful places for me,
for me the heritage is superb, indeed." (psalm 16:6)

before the day was over, it had become one of my better times. edie reminded us in her sermon that "every good and every perfect gift comes down from the father of lights" (james 1:17), and as we broke the bread, we sang:

"one bread, one body, one lord of all,
one cup of blessing which we bless.
and we, though many throughout the world,
we are one body in this one lord." (john b. foley, after paul of tarsus)

of course! bob's gifts are mine, and my gifts are his; or rather, bob's gifts are ours and mine are ours. apart from the vine, the one lord, whose branches and members we are, we are nothing.

"so my heart exults, my very soul rejoices,
my body, too, will rest securely,
for you will not abandon my son to sheol,
nor allow the one you love to see the pit;
you will reveal the path of life to me,
give me unbounded joy in your presence,
and at your right hand everlasting pleasures." (psalm 16:9-11)

the koan: a (perhaps) last remark

i have discovered in my old age roland allen, whose insistant idea of what constituted "church" was based on pauls' missionary methods, not ours. when a local group of believers have received the bible, the creeds, the sacraments, and the ministry, they are as much church as rome or canterbury or constantinople or antioch, or even jerusalem. of course his continuing problem with "the church" as it already existed was that there was no willingness for bishops to share "their" ministry--or at least the ministry which is often seen seen as "theirs" rather than the church's.

there are two things that strike me full-in-the-middle-of-the-forehead about his writings.

the first is that what he sees as constituant of the church is exactly the contents of the chicago-lambeth quadrilateral.

the second is his insistance, in which i find he is painfully correct, that we fail to trust the holy spirit.