Showing posts with label Easter. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Easter. Show all posts
Saturday, April 03, 2010
Sunday, April 12, 2009
Sunday, April 20, 2008
Easter V: Show us the Father
"Show us the father and we shall be satisfied." This time it's Phillip who chimes in with Thomas.
Poor Jesus... once again confronted with the fact that his disciples, as much as they loved, respected, and trusted him, were absolutely clueless. These men lived with Jesus. They were privy to all his intimate/personal teachings. Unlike you or me who must do with a handful of stories and a smattering of sayings that are still being argued over and twisted in their original meaning... yet they still weren't quite sure of Who he was or what he was really talking about.
I've listened to people (who distinguish themselves as "Believers") speak with contempt and pity about the people who actually met Jesus in his lifetime and couldn't recognize the Son of God. Personally I bet it's easier to imagine the Divine Countenance than to be faced with someone who looks just like everyone else.
Our preacher this morning pointed out one of the Divine Mysteries that we are always faced with... division vs. unity. In the Book of Acts, Stephen announces that he sees the heavens opened and the Risen Christ "standing at the right hand of the Father". This proclamation gets him stoned to death. So in Stephen's vision Christ was standing. That's not what we proclaim in our creed. We say he's sitting. (Maybe he got tired by the time Constantine called the Bishops together in Nicaea.) Either way, we express a division. God has not received His Son back into His Eternal Glory... they are still somehow separate.
We humans understand separateness only too well. I have always thought this sense of separateness (otherness) to be a condition of the physical matter that makes up our created world. The sub-atomic levels of our existence may blip in and out of being, but we are trapped within the physical form. A chair is a chair, not a table, and I am me, not my sister or my child. Neither am I God, although a certain longing tells me I once was part of God.
"The purpose of our human pilgrimage" said our celebrant this morning, "is to bring us into the presence of God." I don't doubt that, but neither do I understand it. Just like Phillip saying: "Show us!" I also want to "see". He went on to expand on this thought by saying that the way of Christianity is not just a way of life. It's not just another way of life, but the way to life. We also hear that the way to life is through death. (Another Divine Mystery.)
If I were to preach on the story of Stephen's stoning, I would no doubt gloss over the part about him seeing the heavens opened, and focus instead on his last words before his own death: Do not hold this sin against them. That tells me more about his understanding of Jesus than any vision of heaven. This was real. His last breath closed the divisions between heaven and hell, between matter and spirit. That was when the heavens truly opened.
Poor Jesus... once again confronted with the fact that his disciples, as much as they loved, respected, and trusted him, were absolutely clueless. These men lived with Jesus. They were privy to all his intimate/personal teachings. Unlike you or me who must do with a handful of stories and a smattering of sayings that are still being argued over and twisted in their original meaning... yet they still weren't quite sure of Who he was or what he was really talking about.
I've listened to people (who distinguish themselves as "Believers") speak with contempt and pity about the people who actually met Jesus in his lifetime and couldn't recognize the Son of God. Personally I bet it's easier to imagine the Divine Countenance than to be faced with someone who looks just like everyone else.
Our preacher this morning pointed out one of the Divine Mysteries that we are always faced with... division vs. unity. In the Book of Acts, Stephen announces that he sees the heavens opened and the Risen Christ "standing at the right hand of the Father". This proclamation gets him stoned to death. So in Stephen's vision Christ was standing. That's not what we proclaim in our creed. We say he's sitting. (Maybe he got tired by the time Constantine called the Bishops together in Nicaea.) Either way, we express a division. God has not received His Son back into His Eternal Glory... they are still somehow separate.
We humans understand separateness only too well. I have always thought this sense of separateness (otherness) to be a condition of the physical matter that makes up our created world. The sub-atomic levels of our existence may blip in and out of being, but we are trapped within the physical form. A chair is a chair, not a table, and I am me, not my sister or my child. Neither am I God, although a certain longing tells me I once was part of God.
"The purpose of our human pilgrimage" said our celebrant this morning, "is to bring us into the presence of God." I don't doubt that, but neither do I understand it. Just like Phillip saying: "Show us!" I also want to "see". He went on to expand on this thought by saying that the way of Christianity is not just a way of life. It's not just another way of life, but the way to life. We also hear that the way to life is through death. (Another Divine Mystery.)
If I were to preach on the story of Stephen's stoning, I would no doubt gloss over the part about him seeing the heavens opened, and focus instead on his last words before his own death: Do not hold this sin against them. That tells me more about his understanding of Jesus than any vision of heaven. This was real. His last breath closed the divisions between heaven and hell, between matter and spirit. That was when the heavens truly opened.
Sunday, April 13, 2008
serendipity
"Some of us have been reading your blog... to get to know you better."
(Oh dear)
"Well, I haven't been writing much lately because I've been focusing on the retreat."
Those words were said in the context of a conversation I was having with one of the Oregon conveners. Since I'll be leading an Associates' retreat there in just under two weeks, there were aspects of the schedule (and my responsibilities) that needed to be discussed. That's the easy part. What do I do? When do I do it? Where do I stand?
My own internal response to the fact that this is a huge responsibility and that time is ticking away, has been less manageable. I vacillate between humility and arrogance, fear and excitement, trusting completely that the Holy Spirit will give me the right words at the right time, and thinking that if I don't plan every single talk in specific detail I'll fall flat on my face and fail them. I have reason to be concerned. The Oregon associates are used to Sr. Lucia (one of their own) and more recently, Sr. Leslie, the Sister-in-charge of associates. They don't know me. I'm new. And not just new to them, new to the life. Is there anything I could say of any importance or interest to them?
My friend and mentor Barbara Crafton sits down, looks around at her audience, and starts talking. Or so it seems. She makes such things as meditations and homilies and retreat addresses look like child's play. She's done it a long time and can draw on a vast store of wisdom that I never feel I have.
Our celebrant this morning is another one who speaks without notes and just rattles it off, always astounding me with her deep understanding of the Gospel stories, always able to relate her message to something in my life, to this 21st century world. Amazing.
She spoke today about "another Shepherding Sunday, another comforting Sunday" and she asked the rhetorical question "Why do we need to be comforted? It's Easter!" I always rise to the bait and start answering the question for myself, when her words stop me midstream as she gives yet a deeper, more profound answer to her own question.
She also gave an interpretation of this specific Gospel lesson (John 10:1-10) that I can own and run with. These particular words of scripture have been used so many times to exclude people... those of other faiths, those who, though they profess Jesus Christ, aren't the right kind of Christian... words that can turn me off and leave me wondering which historical agenda was being hammered with them? Yet historical agendas aside, one of the profound beauties of the Word of God is that it lives.
So today's living and life-giving message was essentially this: Jesus says in today's Gospel: "I am the gate." Not the barrier gate that we immediately imagine, but the open gate, the pathway gate, the all-inclusive gate that makes crystal clear that the power of resurrection lies in the fact that everything is restored. And... the shepherd also had a shepherd. He was not alone.
Many, if not most of us, recite the 23rd Psalm in the old King James language. It's the way we learned it as children, and even though the actual words themselves may have made little or no sense at the time, it's still the most comforting version when we are in distress. It's said at funerals, and in our prayer book the burial rite uses the old language. The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want. David, the shepherd-king is attributed with these words. He had been a shepherd as a boy, but then he was anointed King. Not the kind of king who was set up to rule, but the kind who was enthroned to protect and defend his people. Huge difference. And yet we say... the Lord is our shepherd. It is He who defends us, protects us, looks after our best interests, whether we can know it or appreciate it or not. Serendipity? One of my retreat themes deals with this very thing... We have nothing to fear.
(Oh dear)
"Well, I haven't been writing much lately because I've been focusing on the retreat."
Those words were said in the context of a conversation I was having with one of the Oregon conveners. Since I'll be leading an Associates' retreat there in just under two weeks, there were aspects of the schedule (and my responsibilities) that needed to be discussed. That's the easy part. What do I do? When do I do it? Where do I stand?
My own internal response to the fact that this is a huge responsibility and that time is ticking away, has been less manageable. I vacillate between humility and arrogance, fear and excitement, trusting completely that the Holy Spirit will give me the right words at the right time, and thinking that if I don't plan every single talk in specific detail I'll fall flat on my face and fail them. I have reason to be concerned. The Oregon associates are used to Sr. Lucia (one of their own) and more recently, Sr. Leslie, the Sister-in-charge of associates. They don't know me. I'm new. And not just new to them, new to the life. Is there anything I could say of any importance or interest to them?
My friend and mentor Barbara Crafton sits down, looks around at her audience, and starts talking. Or so it seems. She makes such things as meditations and homilies and retreat addresses look like child's play. She's done it a long time and can draw on a vast store of wisdom that I never feel I have.
Our celebrant this morning is another one who speaks without notes and just rattles it off, always astounding me with her deep understanding of the Gospel stories, always able to relate her message to something in my life, to this 21st century world. Amazing.
She spoke today about "another Shepherding Sunday, another comforting Sunday" and she asked the rhetorical question "Why do we need to be comforted? It's Easter!" I always rise to the bait and start answering the question for myself, when her words stop me midstream as she gives yet a deeper, more profound answer to her own question.
She also gave an interpretation of this specific Gospel lesson (John 10:1-10) that I can own and run with. These particular words of scripture have been used so many times to exclude people... those of other faiths, those who, though they profess Jesus Christ, aren't the right kind of Christian... words that can turn me off and leave me wondering which historical agenda was being hammered with them? Yet historical agendas aside, one of the profound beauties of the Word of God is that it lives.
So today's living and life-giving message was essentially this: Jesus says in today's Gospel: "I am the gate." Not the barrier gate that we immediately imagine, but the open gate, the pathway gate, the all-inclusive gate that makes crystal clear that the power of resurrection lies in the fact that everything is restored. And... the shepherd also had a shepherd. He was not alone.
Many, if not most of us, recite the 23rd Psalm in the old King James language. It's the way we learned it as children, and even though the actual words themselves may have made little or no sense at the time, it's still the most comforting version when we are in distress. It's said at funerals, and in our prayer book the burial rite uses the old language. The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want. David, the shepherd-king is attributed with these words. He had been a shepherd as a boy, but then he was anointed King. Not the kind of king who was set up to rule, but the kind who was enthroned to protect and defend his people. Huge difference. And yet we say... the Lord is our shepherd. It is He who defends us, protects us, looks after our best interests, whether we can know it or appreciate it or not. Serendipity? One of my retreat themes deals with this very thing... We have nothing to fear.
Monday, April 07, 2008
six weeks and more
Yesterday's Gospel reading was the story of the road to Emmaus, one more of the miraculous accounts of disciples seeing Jesus after his death. I heard a lecture a few years ago (I'm thinking it was James Robinson). He mentioned that there's no clear evidence that Emmaus was an actual place... that in fact it was a word that may have derived from the expression "no place left to go." That would probably have described those disciples pretty well. It doesn't matter. People saw Jesus. Not exactly (nor necessarily) with their eyes, but with the eyes of faith. I think that's important for us today.
Our celebrant said that she was so glad that Eastertide was six weeks long. She explained that clergy often are so wiped out by the end of Holy Week, that they move through Easter in a daze. She appreciated the time to catch up. I echo those sentiments in my own heart. I'm just beginning to feel "Eastery". It is in hearing these resurrection stories again and again that Easter becomes more real for me. It also helps to sing the Easter hymns for six weeks. One of yesterday's was #182 from the Hymnal: Christ is Alive! Often with hymns, some of the verses are optional, either because they fit a certain liturgical calendar or because the theology might be controversial. Verse 3 was one of the optional ones. I loved it:
Christ is alive! Not throned above,
Remotely high, untouched, unmoved by human pains,
But daily in the midst of life our Savior reigns.
The collect for the Third Sunday in Easter asks God to "open the eyes of our faith" to Christ's redeeming work in the world. Why? Because we aren't going to recognize him. We'll be like Mary in the garden, like the Cleopas on his way to Emmaus, we'll see somebody else... a gardener, a stranger with no grasp of current events. We'll miss the risen Christ in our midst because of our own blind expectations.
Eastertide is six weeks long. But for Resurrection Christians, it has to extend into the rest of the year. Only through the eyes of faith can we see Jesus in the stranger and in ourselves.
Our celebrant said that she was so glad that Eastertide was six weeks long. She explained that clergy often are so wiped out by the end of Holy Week, that they move through Easter in a daze. She appreciated the time to catch up. I echo those sentiments in my own heart. I'm just beginning to feel "Eastery". It is in hearing these resurrection stories again and again that Easter becomes more real for me. It also helps to sing the Easter hymns for six weeks. One of yesterday's was #182 from the Hymnal: Christ is Alive! Often with hymns, some of the verses are optional, either because they fit a certain liturgical calendar or because the theology might be controversial. Verse 3 was one of the optional ones. I loved it:
Christ is alive! Not throned above,
Remotely high, untouched, unmoved by human pains,
But daily in the midst of life our Savior reigns.
The collect for the Third Sunday in Easter asks God to "open the eyes of our faith" to Christ's redeeming work in the world. Why? Because we aren't going to recognize him. We'll be like Mary in the garden, like the Cleopas on his way to Emmaus, we'll see somebody else... a gardener, a stranger with no grasp of current events. We'll miss the risen Christ in our midst because of our own blind expectations.
Eastertide is six weeks long. But for Resurrection Christians, it has to extend into the rest of the year. Only through the eyes of faith can we see Jesus in the stranger and in ourselves.
Sunday, March 23, 2008
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