shrove tuesday

shrove tuesday is fascinating because it is celebrated by many activities by many people who don't necessarily know why they do the things they do except that they have always done them. in northumberland, for instance, as in many parts of britain, the day includes a football match. as carnival it is "celebrated by many people who seem mostly to be looking for an excuse to enjoy drunken excess. in the united states even, it is still celebrated with pancakes by many who will not participate in any real lenten fasting.

the name of the day, shrove tuesday, comes from the old english word "shrive" meaning to confess one's sins and have them forgiven. that was of course when we still thought there were sins, and found the burden of them intolerable. now what makes us miserable is most often not our sins, which we quite enjoy, thank you very much, but the downturns of the new leige lord of our lives, the economy. if there is anything we recognize as sin, it tends to be part of the society, for which we are not responsible.

it is against this background that i find these words of oscar romero insightful:

"how easy it is to denounce structural injustice, institutionalized violence, social sin. and it is true, this sin is everywhere, but where are the roots of this social sin? in the heart of every human being. present-day society is a sort of anonymous world in which no one is willing to admit guilt and everyone is responsible.

"because of this, salvation begins with the human person, with human dignity, with saving every person from sin. individually there are among us here no two sinners alike. each one has committed his or her own shameful deeds, and yet we want to cast our guilt on the other and hide our own sin. i must take off my mask; i, too, am one of them, and i need to beg god's pardon because i have offended god and society. this is the call of christ.

"how beautiful the expression of that woman upon finding herself pardoned and understood: 'no one, sir. no one has condemned me.' then neither do i, i who could give tht truly condemning word, neither do i condemn; but be careful, brothers and sisters, since god has forgiven us so many times, let us take advantage of that friendship with the lord which we have recovered and let us live it with gratitude."

candlemass eve: a hinge of the year

in a room filled with the smoke of incense, i leave the candles burning on the altar for a long time. there is a lot going on this night, and i want to savour it. we have celebrated the consolation of israel, the coming of the messiah, recognized by the prophet simeon and the prophetess anna, proof that there were those in israel who recognized their glory. this feast is the hinge between the completion of the old testament and the beginning of the new.

the presentation of our lord in the temple is also the hinge feast between christmas and easter. it is a bittersweet time. amidst the joy of the meeting of mary, carrying the infant lord, and joseph with simeon and anna, after simeon sings of the light to the gentiles, the glory of israel, represented in our procession around the chapel with blessed candles, comes the chilling line in the gospel, spoken by simeon to mary, "yea, a sword shall pierce through thy own soul also."

"also."

the mass of candles: the light of the world will truly be extinguished. john will mention tht darkness in his gospel, saying simply, "it was night." (13:30) we will represent that darkness again with candles, during holy week at tenebrae. what we remember in this candlemass in what we remember in all our eucharists: "as oft as ye eat this bread, and drink this cup, ye do show the lord's death till he come."

"even so, come, lord jesus."

benedict biscop

benedict biscop sought to romanize the church in britain, and therefore one might expect me to find him to be "the enemy." however, it is important to realize that the roman church in the seventh century was certainly not the roman church of novels such as the da vinci code, nor even the roman church of the nineteenth century. in the seventh century it was more orthodox than constantinople, which was nearly taken over by the current new thing, monotheletism.

what benedict seemed most taken with about roman christianity was the rule of st. benedict, which he encountered at lerins, where he was tonsured. his understanding of the rule included perhaps most importantly the chants used at rome, and books. so wonderful did the british church find the gregorian chants that when benedict's prior at wearmouth, ceofrith, was the only person at the monastery not sick with the plague except for one young boy--whom we know as bede of jarrow--he could not bring himself to leave off the chants. and of course it would be the british church's love of books and learning which would start the educational centers that would end "the dark ages" in europe.

he also, for better or for worse, brought stone building techniques to britain. the remains of st. peter's at wearmouth are still standing today, a much different sort of structure than the mud and waddle buildings that had preceeded it.

and, benedict brought icons. we hardly think of british christianity as being iconographic today, because of the thoroughness of the roundheads' destructiveness. but at one time, following the lead of benedict biscop, monasteries and parish churches and cathedrals were all as frescoed and full of icons as the churches of the east. whenever benedict started a new building project, he undertook another trip to rome to bring back books and icons and vestments, bringing the british church into the cultural world of the one holy catholic and apostolic church. when the light of christianity culture was nearly extinguished by the invasions that would follow, that culture would be taken back to europe by misssionaries from britain. but that is the story of later saints.

christmas in the old testament

i suspect many of us think of christmas as a "new testament" event, and of course it is insofar as it inaugurates the new testament. but much if not most of our understanding of the event comes from the old testament. the ox and the ass are from isaiah; the answer to the question of the wise men to herod's advisors comes from micah. but i think my favourite prophecy that has shaped our understanding of the nativity is the passage from wisdom that is the introit for the second sunday of christmas (wisdom 18:14-15):

"while all things were in quiet silence
and that night was in the midst of her swift course,
thine almighty word leaped down from heaven out of thy royal throne."

it is the image that informs my favourite german, perhaps favourite of all, christmas carol, "lo, how a rose e'er blooming."

advent ember days: our king and saviour draweth nigh

christianity is not a democratic religion. recent liberal protestantism seems determined that it should be, and if one's understanding of christianity comes from the history of religion school that dominates many seminaries, the popular press, and the popular media, one would think that the divinity of christ and his messiahship were the results of a vote held at nicea in 325.

the traditional propers for the advent ember days present a different view.* in the older western lectionary it is on the third sunday in advent that our attention is turned from the last things, the coming of christ at the end of the world, to the coming of christ as jesus of nazareth with a gospel from matthew, and "our ministry" is put into that context with an epistle from 1 corinthians. in contrast, there are no seasonal ember days propers in the newer lectionaries, and the emphasis has, not surprisingly, moved almost solely to the inclusive nature of the people of god and away from the exclusive sovereignty of god. (see, for example, the collects "for the ministry" and "for the mission of the church," pp. 205-206, 256-257, book of common prayer 1979.)

but still we have the advent antiphon on venite, "our king and saviour draweth nigh: o come let us adore him." and this is the true context in which we live our lives and die our deaths.

i have included this rather lengthy historico-polemical introduction because it is easy to forget that the one whose coming we celebrate this season is not an elected official, but the absolute sovereign of the universe. true, we may elect to serve him or to oppose him. but either way, "he cometh, he cometh to judge the earth; and with righteousness to judge the world, and the peoples with his truth."

jesus insistently reminded us that no on can serve two masters. it is remarkable but not coincidental that at no other time of the year than advent does mammon make such inticing claims on us. so, these advent ember days are a sober opportunity for each of us to consider whom one recognizes as king.

*these include isaiah 2:2-5, psalm 24, isaiah 7:10-15, luke 1:26-38, psalm 119:151-152, isaiah 9:1-5, psalm 85, luke 1:39-47, psalm 53, isiah 19:20-22, psalm 19, isaiah 35:1-7, isaiah 40:9-11, isaiah 45:1-8, the song of the three holy children 26-30, benedictus es, 2 thessalonians 2:1-8, and luke 5:1-6. one might notice that there is no lack of mention of the inclusion of all peoples in the kingdom of the holy one.

advent: for he cometh, for he cometh to judge the world

one of the problems of starting blogging is that one feels one should continue blogging, especially during the big times of the year. so, i have been thinking i should say something about advent, but have been hesitant to jump to it. advent is a multi-layered season, because the coming of christ is a multi-layered event, and our celebration of it brings together many parts of that coming at one time.

the earliest observation of advent by the church seems to have been in the fast preceeding not christmas but the ephiphany, which from very early times in the eastern and celtic church has been a time of baptism. that is where the penitential layer, which is much less popular in the west particularly today, comes from. we are not in our "culture" very comfortable with penitence; we tend to focus more on the coming of the new-born king. more and more we use blue advent candles. and the birth of christ, at christmas, is of course also part of the season. but the earlier emphasis in the west was on the second coming, on the last things as we used to say. this is made very clear in the propers in the pre-vatican ii lectinary and missal.

i have been thinking about whether i might write a little something about each of these emphasises, but i think what is suggested by folklorists as an even earlier understanding of this time of the year is something most of us need most, and which would allow us time to explore some of the other gifts of this season, the gift of a new king who would give us a new heart, so that all would be well.

that earliest understanding is reflected, some think, in the advent wreath. the story is that at this time of the year, the dark time with long and cold nights, people would actually take the wheels off their wagons to turn them into chandeliers to light their times together as they waited and encouraged the return of light, telling stories in the glow of the candles.

few of us would not benefit from something similar. rather than make advent a time of making a list and checking it twice, we could sit down and tell each other stories, read to one another, or curl up with candle light and a novel. (i just finished hermann hesse's wonderfully provocative and ironic the glass bead game, a wonderful meditation on, among other things, both penitance and the last things, although i did not expect that when i picked it up.)

there is a beautiful collect in the family prayers section of the book of common prayer we might find helpful:

"o god of peace, who hast taught us that in returning and rest we shall be saved, in quietness and in confidence shall be our strength; by the might of thy spirit lift us, we pray thee, to thy presence, where we may be still and know that thou art god; through jesus christ our lord. amen."

i confess i was even more pagan after reading hesse: i had a little campfire last night to celebrate the beautiful advent vesper light, and the encourage the return of light and warmth.

st. john of damascus

john of damascus would probably have a much harder time these days than he did in the seventh and eighth centuries. in the seventh and eighth centuries the struggle between christians and muslims was hardly off the ground. he is famous for his hymns, but even more famous for his defense of icons.

what i find so fascinating about his defense of icons is that he was able to write his treatises, usually called on the holy images, because he had the protection of his muslim friends. he had been born in damascus, his father had worked for the caliph, and he had as well before he retired to the desert of palestine. he, as did many of his contemporaries, thought of the muslims as another christian heresy.

ironically, it is usually thought that the orthodox aversion to icons at this time was because the muslims looked upon the holy images as a violation of the second commandment.

had he remained closer to the centers of power and orthodoxy during the iconoclastic controversy, john would probably been severely punished; almost certainly his treatises would not have been published. but working at the fringes of imperial power, he was protected by the caliph and produced the work that led to his often being called "the last of the fathers."

a great week of saints

st. cedd, st. alfred the great, st. frumentius, st. neot and sts. simon and thaddeus all have come up this week. oddly enough, there are quite a lot of connexions between them.

cedd of course is the brother of my patron, chad, but he was also one of the most southern-traveling of the northumbrians, and worked in the territory of which alfred was king. (if alfred had not won at edington, you might be reading this in a language which, even if after 1066 and all that sounded much the same, would be called danish.) alfred was the patron of neot of glastonbury, a scholar and monk who was very influential on alfred. at a time when most kings were pretty bloody even if they were christian (think of my patronymic ancester, cadwaladr, who was a "christian" but who allied himself again and again with the pagan penda in wars against the christian kings of northumbria), alfred truly was a kinder and gentler sort of ruler.

neot shares his feast day with ss. simon and jude, who amongst other things were missionaries to persia. jude is also known as thaddeus, and in persia is called addai, the composer of the liturgy of sts. addai and mari, also used by the church in abbysinia, whose founder was st. frumentius.

the old testament reading for today's feast of simon and jude from isaiah (28:9-16) seems appropriate to all of these saints: "precept upon precept, precept upon precept; line upon line, line upon line; . . . i lay in zion for a foundation a stone, a tried stone, a precious cornerstone, a sure foundation; he that believeth shall not make haste."

and of course with all of them the collect for today is appropriate:

"O ALMIGHTY God, who hast built thy Church upon the foundation of the Apostles and Prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the head corner-stone; Grant us so to be joined together in unity of spirit by their doctrine, that we may be made an holy temple acceptable unto thee; through the same Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen."

commemoration of st. frideswide

with the feast of luke the evangelist and iconographer and the new martyrs of russia available for consideration, why should i choose to mention the somewhat obscure 8th century mercian abbess frideswide? i chose to write about her because the history of the modern western church seems to be described by the history of her foundation. i can probably do no better than to quote her story from fr. beverly c. hughson o.h.c.'s athletes of god, pp. 335-336:

"this saint was a mercian abbess, the daughter of a prince who lived at oxford early in the eighth century. the old story is that algar, a neighboring prince, sought her hand in marriage. fearing lest her father would compel her to accept his addresses, she fled from oxford with two nuns in a boat, rowed by an angel in the likeness of a young man clothed in white, and took refuge in a wood near abingdon. many stories similar to this are told of this holy virgin. there is no question, however that she founded a convent at oxford and for many years devoted herself to the service of the poor and outcast. her convent was in later times given to the augustinian canons, and it was acquired by cardinal wolsey for his cardinal college, which afterwards became christ church. the chapel of this college, which was built in the twelfth century, is now the cathedral church of the oxford diocese. the bones of the saint were cast out of their tomb [see photo above] in the chapel in the reign of edward vi, and those of the wife of peter martyr, the reformer, enshrined in their stead. under queen mary the bones of the intruding lady were removed, and the relics of st. frideswide restored. when elizabeth came to the throne, she ordered the former to be returned to the shrine without disturbing those of the saint. so now it is said that they both rest in the same shrine, and those who go to venerate the relics of the saint have opportunity of contemplating the remains of her strange bedfellow."

monasticism in its early days was often an attempt to escape from the growing worldly politics in which the church was becoming engaged. frideswide's refusal of a political marriage and the privileges it would provide were well understood and appreciated in the early british church. consider the legend of the seven desert fathers who brought monastic christianity to wales and cornwall, and the popularity of the visit of st. anthony to st. paul as the bottom image on standing crosses.

but monasticism, too, came to be a source of power, rather than of seeking one thing: to know god. st. frideswide's abbey became an augustinian house. then the royally established episcopacy took over, and cardinal woolsey made it into a "college." at first colleges were legitimate institutions for christian learning, one may hope. but the despotic rule of henry, which the reformers thought they could turn to their advantage, made cardinal college a royal establishment instead, although cleverly named not king's (that would happen at the even more protestant cambridge) but christ college.

now even the bones of the monastic foundress were removed, and those of a foreign-born scholar replaced them. with the elizabethan settlement, all the bones were thrown in together, a somewhat macabre pre-curser of the claims of the history channel, for example, which claims that truth is to be found simply by considering everyone's "opinions." it is sad to consider that the pharisees have prevailed in so much of the modern church.

st. thais

i admit right up front that one of the reasons i decided to post on the commemoration of st. thais is to have a link to joshua bell's playing of the interlude in massenet's opera. but the real life of the penitent saint and the story as told by the romantic massenet are slightly different. paphnutius was not so distracted by her physical beauty as to be driven mad. rather he was given a vision of a throne awaiting some saint in heaven. he assumed it would be for s. anthony, but he was told instead that it awaited s. thais, the penitent, who reposed only fifteen days after entering the desert monastery.

praying the scriptures

a letter from a friend arrived yesterday with a very useful problem. ryan knight is a campus minister at a large state school. he is thinking of introducing praying the scripture to his students, but they are already having trouble understanding praying the psalms. so i thought about this as i walked out to the county's highest ridge, with a view of the kings river.

i had recently sent him one very practical book on the subject, which i did not yet know he had not read. oh well. but i thought, another book is probably not going to be much help anyway.

and it dawned on me that praying scripture is really very simple:
think about someone you love very much.
imagine that person in serious trouble.
think of yourself praying for that person.
think how you would want the holy one to listen to your prayer.
read scripture listening that way.

we are the ones whom god loves very much.
we are in serious trouble, and not for our sins only, but for the sin of the world.
the holy one speaks to us in scripture.
our listening is praying the scripture.

the next problem ryan came up with is that many of his students are still in denial that they are in serious trouble. but that is why so much of the scripture is stories. they catch us up in ways we aren't expecting. but that's perhaps the subject of another post.

eucharist & christology

the past few days i am thinking about the eucharist (ian t. ramsey, ed. london: s.c.m. press, 1972), particularly about the anglican eucharist in ecumenical perspective (edward p. echlin, s.j. new york: the seabury press, 1968), because i am starting a mission and the eucharistic rite we use is an ecumenical version of an anglican usage.

my thinking has led to several observations.

in times of great change in our understanding of epistemology and ontology, such as occured at the time of the reformation and is occuring now, in what we often call the post-modern era, the church is forced to rethink its understanding of the euchrarist in a very fundamental way if she is going to be able to make that understanding "understanded of the people." this seems obvious, but what may not be so obvious is how comprehensive eucharistic theology is. our understanding of the eucharist is interwoven with our understanding of the world.

as those understandings change, we look for authorities to support our new understandings. archbishop cramner looked to the continental reformers, especially martin bucer and peter martyr. the archbishops of york and canterbury in these days look to a "commission" drawn from the various academic "disciplines." the editors of "the liturgy of st. tikhon" looked to the russian church, which is seen, perhaps wrongly, as having preserved the tradition without the controversies of the reformation.

but seldom is eucharistic theology discussed in clearly christological terms. (welcome exceptions are the essays by j.l. houlder and h.e.w. turner in thinking about the euchraist.) it seems that much of the argument that accompanied the reformation and counter-reformation, as both the "catholic" and "protestant" parties of the western church tried to adjust their understanding of the eucharistic events to the new science, might have been helped by thinking of the bread and wine in terms of the definition chalcedon: the statements that are made about jesus christ as both man and god apply also to the bread and wine.

the "moment" of consecreation is not much discussed in the archbishops' book, but it has remained a point of contention for many who have written about the eucharistic event. father echlin, with fine jesuitical understanding, insists that oblation, anamnasis, and epiclesis are all necessary for the consecration. if we extrapolate from this to the acts of our lord, on maundy thursday, good friday, and either, in the johannine tradition, easter evening, or, in the lucan tradition, pentecost, then we have a parallel suggestion of events, actions, that are necessary for our salvation. then, of course, it may well be suggested that our salvation is the prelude and requirement for our sanctification.

so, i am led to another observation. one of the matters of contention during the reformation, brought up again in england during the oxford movement days, but now not getting much ink, was how the eucharist is a sacrifice, and if it is, is there an immolation. one of the reasons i am partial to the english rite is that it includes a self-oblation. it makes very clear that not only the bread and wine which are the body and blood of christ are made holy (which is the basic meaning of sacrifice), but the body of christ as the church gathered is made holy. our old selves are immolated, as we are sent out in the power of the spirit to be christ's body in the world.

the feast of the exaltation of the holy cross

today is one of my favourite holidays. when i first read the collect last night during the first vespers, i was at first a little disappointed. the old western collect is patterned after traditional jewish blessings: we thank god for giving us this celebration, and pray we may receive the benefits of it. but as i thought more about it, it seemed a wise way to approach such a complicated feast, with its look back to a wide range of old testament prophecies, and forward to a wide range of their fulfillments. in a way this feast is a recapitulation of all the old testament, not only a reminder that we're halfway to pasch, but also that we're halfway to the readings of the paschal vigil.

i found two of the posts at the blog, full of grace and truth to be particularly rich for this day. the first is for the day itself, and the second recognizes moses in the feast.

the first feast of the new year

on the eighth day of the first month of the year we celebrate the nativity of the blessed virgin mary, the theotokos.

the collect for this day is rich:

"we beseech thee, o lord, to bestow on us thy servants the gift of thy heavenly grace: that as the child-bearing of the blessed virgin was to us the beginning of salvation; so the devout observance of her nativity may avail for the increasing of our peace. through jesus christ thy son, our lord: who liveth and reigneth with thee, in the unity of the holy ghost, ever one god, world without end. amen.

of course it makes sense to pray for the gift of grace on a feast of the one who is full of grace. and the collect recognizes that the beginning of our salvation is the incarnation of our lord. but the next part has more references than we might immediately recognize. in part the petition for peace is an allusion the prophet ezekiel's description of the temple with the closed gate, which is a source of much of our imagery regarding the theotokos. but it is also a reminder of the role the blessed virgin plays in the whole church. she is, as the one who both hears and does the word, as the one who bears the christ, the model for the whole church. (think of her central place in the icon of pentecost.)

and so it is for the peace of the church that we pray in this final petition of the collect. what we do not have, we cannot share.

a footnote to this feast and the peace of the church is provided by the association for the promotion of the reunion of christendom, a short-lived organization which urged the church to pray for peace during the octave of the feast.

a new year begins

the orthodox church, following the calendar presented to moses, starts the new year this month. it is the month of the anniversary of creation (which actually comes at the 14th, on the lunar calendar, but it's the spirit that counts, or something--i personally start my year on holy cross day, the 14th, which is close to the lunar date.)

in honor of the new year, i thought this link to patriarch bartholomew's encyclical might be appropriate.

st. bartholomew's day: a wonder for nathaniel bar tholomew

"may the words of mouth always find favor,
and the whisperings of my heart,
in your presence, YHWH,
my rock, my redeemer." psalm 19:14, (jerusalem bible)

what, i wonder, were the words
whispering in nathaniel's hearts as
he sat under his fig tree.

i wonder if they could have been
jacob's dream of the ladder, well
before he became israel without guile.

(i wonder if even in john's gospel
jesus knew such things
as this. yes?)

i wonder how long nathaniel
would keep his ironic humor:
"rabbi, you are the son of god."

i wonder if it were jesus'
ironic humor,
"there is an israelite who deserves
the name, in capable of deceit,"
that drew nathaniel bartholomew
to follow.

i wonder, was it the search for the ladder
that would take this israelite to india,
carrying the gospel book in his native tongue.

i wonder, that spring day by the gallilean sea,
if nathaniel's heart murmered to wander
so far, even with the king of israel.

and, i wonder if it were only in albana,
by the caspian sea,
that he saw the ladder,
as his guileless skin
was pulled from his
faithful body.

call me historian, not christian

i read too much, and seldom do i listen.

lately i have been reading fredrick denison maurice's work. he is a rather unusual historian in that he is not so interested in learning the past that we might avoid the mistakes, but that we might enjoy the wisdom. and he is especially interested in christian unity, as i am, too. (see my posts from february, 2008.) but he still speaks in terms of the wisdom of quakers, and lutherans, and unitarians.

there is a little group that meets on friday nights for soup and bread, sometimes pie, and the gospel of mark. i am usually the historical arse, finishing people's statements with historical insights. history often is just the academic word for gossip. (think of footnotes: the most pedantic way of saying "he said 'she said'".)

last night, in that modest little group, i heard the word of the lord. it came, not surprisingly, gently, with no elaboration. the denominational backgrounds of the little group are varied, and therefore actually a help to each other. but, i the historian, have difficulty letting go of the past. so as we were casually ending the discussion, i referred to two very dear friends as "the lutherans."

marilyn quietly said, "we are not lutherans, dale, but christians." wow! the meaning in the depths of simple words has been been echoing in my hollow head all the hours since. i thought i needed to look for the unity of the church, and here it was, gathered around my little table, as we broke bread together.

there are none so deaf as i, who will not hear.

the dormition of the blessed virgin mary

there have of course been many thousands of pages written about the theotokos, and some of the earliest are accounts of her dormition, starting with evodius, the second bishop of antioch. i don't need to add much to the pages; a good review of many of the topics are clearly posted at a byzantine christian. i would direct you to the reading for celebrations of the blessed virgin on saturdays after trinity in the traditional benedictine missal:

"and it came to pass, as he spake these things, a certain woman of the company lifted up her voice, and said unto him, blessed is the womb that bare thee, and the paps which thou hast sucked. but he said, yea rather, blessed are they that hear the word of god, and keep it." (luke 11:27-28)

the first part of this gospel is the part picked up in discussions about mary that center, as most of them do and as lance discussed in his post, on the nature and person of her son. but the second part, the words spoken by jesus, point us to the nature and person of jesus herself. it is her hearing the word of god, and keeping it, which is at the heart of her singular role in our salvation. a few years ago there was a book by marina warner, alone of all her sex, which traced mary as, among other things, a model of feminism in western culture. it could however as easily been titled "alone of any sex," so singular is she.

i can't end without posting a link to my favourite hymn of this fest, "ave stella maris", here in a setting by monteverdi. it is the hymn in the benedictine second vespers for the feast.

musings on evangelism, 2

now for the good news: the spread of the kingdom doesn't require that my life is remarkable. it wouldn't hurt, but the good news is not that some of my friends are worried about their real estate investments, or not, nor that i, who live on social security, am worried about how many books my stipend will buy this month, or not.

rather, of first importance, the good news is that god was in christ, reconciling the world to himself. we are more accustomed to hearing that as god so loved the world that he gave his only son. indeed, that's on quite a few of the t-shirts walking round eureka springs on any given saturday.

god so loved the world: me, with all my books; my friends who find their real estate investments more enslaving than liberating; the earnest young man on the plaza clinging to his bible as he spoke; the lesbian couple who came to stand by me because, they said, i was peaceful.

what people need, what "saves us" (i.e., heals us, makes us whole), is to know the love of god, and to love in return. some of us remember when each sunday the anglican rite started with the words, "hear what our lord jesus christ saith. thou shalt love the lord thy god with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. this is the first and great commandment. and the second is like unto it; thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. on these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets."

i said that if i were to preach at the park on a saturday morning, i would start with the eighth chapter of the gospel according to john. that's the story of the woman caught in the actual act of adultery. what jesus says to her, after all her accusers have gone, is remarkable: "neither do i condemn thee. now go and sin no more." as all gospel stories do, this one seems rather hard. likewise hard is the reading from the eighteenth chapter of st. luke in this morning's daily office. a certain ruler comes to jesus to find out what he needs to "do to inherit eternal life?" jesus tells him that he must "sell all tht thou hast, and distribute unto the poor, and thou shall have treasure in heaven, and come, follow me. and when [certain ruler] heard this, he was very sorrowful: for he was very rich."

we do not really know the responses of the woman caught in adultry or of the ruler. perhaps they followed jesus' command, even if the ruler were sorrowful at first. if indeed they did, their lives would probably have been as remarkable as anthony of the desert's. but we do know that jesus said about that the difficulty for those of us with richest to enter the kingdom of god, that "the things which are impossible with men are possible with god." and we do know that not all of us achieve sanctity immediately. remember that st. mark, whose gospel we have been reading on friday nights, was sent away by paul. but he went on to accompany peter in jerusalem, to write the gospel, and to become the first bishop of alexandria.

even if the life of christians are not always so remarkable as we might wish, the total life of the church neverless is. we are part of that great cloud of witness which includes the blessed virgin mary, apostles, martyrs, confessors, and those of us who worry about our mortgages and retirement funds. the holy one may have finished the work of creation, perhaps even the work of salvation (in the sense that if i were to tell someone the time and date of my salvation, i would probably say 3:00 p.m. 4 april a. d. 31, judean local time), but the work of sanctification continues, and the inclusion of more and more of the people the holy one loves into the body of those being sanctified continues.

there is, your see, nothing intrinsically wrong about t-shirts or houses or books, or love of another human being. but as we come to know and love the holy one, our love for all of these other things falls into perspective and is rightly ordered. that is good news indeed.

musings on evangelism

the topic of the past week has been evangelism. i had not invited it, at least not consciously, but i suppose my pretensions to starting a congregation has its own invitations. anyway, the topic first presented itself when i was the luncheon guest of the new episcopal vicar. we were talking about the attraction of eureka springs. i suggested that it has always been a place of healing, and that is still it's attraction, even for those who come on harley-davidson's, even though we have overlaid it with great numbers of greedy t-shirt stores and motels.

it was usual for desert monks to have a few books. st. athanasius' cell was remarkably free of books. when he was asked about that, he said that creation is an open book to those who have eyes to see. eureka springs seems like one of those places, and the opposition to its role as a revelation of the creator seems much like the same sort of opposition that occurs to other forms of the holy one's revelation, especially in scripture and in the incarnation of god the son.

friday night, as the little group that meets at my house for soup and the gospel of mark were discussing the fourth chapter of that gospel, one of the participants said, in real surprise, "why are we talking about evangelism?" for most of us evangelism has become a discomforting word, and we wondered why. it was, i suggested, because the word has been coopted by those whose take on evangelism is the question, "if you died tonight, where would you spend eternity?" the gospel of mark, the good news of our lord jesus christ according to mark, starts with jesus saying, "repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand." there is no suggestion that the kingdom needs to wait until we die.

the little group also recognized, however, that the church often falls far short of actually living in the kingdom. we wondered whether there were any noticeable difference common to those of us who considered ourselves christians and those of our neighbors who do not consider themselves christians. it was certainly difficult to see much difference in morality.

one of the participants suggested that she had been taught as a young lutheran in catechism class that a christian is one who knows whom to thank. i added that for orthodox christians, it is also how to thank. we have again and again noticed in reading mark's gospel that people gathered in great numbers around jesus, who often was trying to escape for a while.

there was a fairly large gathering saturday morning in downtown eureka springs' basin park. it was one of the four annual "diversity weekends," and although i usually avoid downtown on weekends (for reasons alluded to above under the heading of greedy t-shirt shops), i thought it wouldn't hurt me to see more of the town in which i have come to live, and i was particularly curious about a group called "jericho riders" who have noticeably appeared on diversity weekends to perform "street preaching"--in other words, something that probably would be described by its practitioners as "evangelism." i listened to one of the earnest young men for a little while, went off to write a rather depressed letter to a friend, and came back to talk with the "preacher." i confess i find what he and the jericho riders were doing to be about as far from evangelism as i could imagine. to start with, they were "proclaiming" certain passages from paul's writings, mostly from his letters to the corinthian church, with no concern for how the passages they quoted worked within the structure of paul's letters and thought, nor with any appreciation that the audience in the park were mostly not church members. paul's letters were pointedly to church members. i thought that if i were going to preach to that crowd, i would probably start with the eighth chapter of john's gospel.

but evangelism i expect seldom occurs when some one decides that some group of "others" needs a good preaching. evangelism happened in the new testament, and it could happen still, when people who call themselves christians live lives that are remarkable enough to make people curious. jesus pointedly reminded us that where our treasure is, there we will find our hearts. for those of us whose main concern is the value of our real estate or retirement investments, or whose christianity consists of motor-cycle jackets with crosses decorating them, there's nothing to make anyone curious.