Being Friends with Jesus

**This post is from a sermon I preached at my home parish--All Saints, Norton, VA--on Sunday, May 10, 2015 (Sixth Sunday of Easter)**

All Saints Episcopal Church, Norton, VA (where I was baptized, confirmed, and ordained a deacon)

"I do not call you servants any longer, because the servant does not know what the master is doing; but I have called you friends."

--John 15: 15

 

 

For the first 12 or so years of my life I had a best friend named Broderick, who was my dog.  Some of you may even remember Broderick; in fact, he sometimes would come to church with us, go to the nursing home service in Wise and offer pastoral care, and Dad even had him included in the media guide for the basketball team at UVA-Wise.  He was my Ole Buddy--that was what I called him--and we were inseparable.  Broderick followed me everywhere, as though Mom and Dad had given him orders to make sure I was ok.  He was literally my older brother.  And the day he died in 1995 is still vivid in my mind; his funeral--held in our front yard at Flat Gap--was the first Episcopal burial I attended.  I have never had a friend quite like him, and even now at 31 there are days when I miss him.

 

With my sister Ashley and best friend/older brother Broderick sometime in 1984 or 1985.  

 

 

 

So I wonder:  who was your childhood best friend?  Or who is your best friend now?  What are the qualities that define that relationship?  Honesty?  Support?  The ability to just be yourselves when you're around each other?

 

 

In our gospel today Jesus, continuing his Farewell Discourse to the 12 apostles, says something that he does not say in any of the synoptic gospels--only here in the Fourth.  After washing their feet and sharing a meal, with them gathered around him expecting him to open up the secrets of the Kingdom of Heaven, he calls them his friends.  His friends!  These men who have been following him for the better part of three years, who have called him 'rabbi', 'master', and 'Lord' he calls friends.  The Greek word used here is filos and also translates to 'dear ones' or 'beloved.'  So these ordinary, flawed, broken human beings are the beloved ones of the Son of God.  Matthew:  tax collector and despised one, a friend of Jesus.  Thomas:  the denier, a friend of Jesus.  Nathaniel:  who made fun of Jesus' hometown, a friend of Jesus.  Simon Peter:  the Rock, who stumbles and falls and disappoints his teacher so many times, a friend of Jesus.  And Judas:  the betrayer, a friend of Jesus.  And would dare say that this passage is for us today, as well.  We, flawed and broken individuals, are friends of Jesus.

 

 

This may seem a bit presumptuous on our part, to dare think of ourselves as friends with God.  But there is precedence for this in Holy Scripture.  Isaiah 41: 8 refers to Abraham as God's friend, and in Wisdom 7: 27 Solomon says that wisdom herself makes people the friends of God.  But doesn't this claim still seem a bit bold on our part?

 

 

Well, that's what makes Jesus so radical, and it's why we need him.  For too long in human history deities had always been far, far removed from humanity.  Think of the gods and goddesses of Greek and Roman mythology.  They sat atop their thrones on Mt. Olympus and only interacted with humanity when it suited their whims.  We were little more than tools or puppets to them.  The God that Jesus called Father, the God of Abraham, was different from these deities.  This God showed genuine compassion, promising a nation to Abraham and Sarah and later rescuing that nation from bondage.  This God seemed to actually care about humanity.  However, even this God was far away for Jesus' contemporaries, dwelling in the Holy of Holies, the innermost section of the temple in Jerusalem, where no one, save the high priest, could enter--and even then only once a year. 

 

 

But Jesus comes along and changes the narrative.  In Jesus, the living embodiment of God, we have an image of God.  In Jesus God has a face, and it smiles.  God has a mouth and taste buds, and they partake in meals.  God has hands, and they do work and pull up those who are beaten down.  God has emotions, and they run the gamete from anger to sadness and everywhere in-between.  In Jesus, God is just like us.  Suddenly, now, in Jesus, God is not so far away.  God has deemed not to be separated from humanity, and no longer need we gaze longingly to a God so far removed from us.  Jesus dwells in our presence, which makes us worthy to dwell in the presence of God.  He himself is not a distant stranger but a friend, a friend with whom we can be honest, a friend in whom we can find support, and a friend who loves us just the way we are and who invites us to just be ourselves with him.  And those of us who have been washed by the baptismal waters and have met Jesus in the sacred meal of bread and wine know these sacraments to be the marks of such friendship. 

 

So what does it mean to be friends with Jesus?  It means to abide in joy, love, and relationship, three things that we were made for.  To be a friend of Jesus is to abide in joy, in good news.  It is something to celebrate.  Sadly, we often hear Jesus' own friends twist this and make friendship with Jesus into a burden to mourn, rather than a joy to celebrate, as though we were still servants.  To be a friend of Jesus is to abide in love, the kind he showed.  Love one another as I have loved you.  This is not the kind of love that the world knows, which is a reciprocal love that often asks something in return.  But Jesus shows us how to love unconditionally, to love those who doubt us, those that make fun of us, those that disappoint us, and even those that betray us.  To be a friend of Jesus is to abide in relationship.  We are in relationship with Jesus simply by being in relationship with each other, for we are the body of Christ.  If you look into the face of the one sitting next to you, you will see the very face of Jesus.  So we need not wonder what the Kingdom of God will look like, we have the capacity, through our love for one another and for Jesus, to bring about the Kingdom here and now.  We are not observers, but participants, beloved partners with Jesus in this redemptive work.  That's what it means to be friends with Jesus. 

 

So it really isn't such a bold claim, is it?  God's love for you made manifest in Jesus is greater than any of you can imagine, greater than friendship you have had or ever will have.  It's greater even than the love I had for Broderick or he for me.  It is an everlasting love that we cannot earn and cannot lose.  That is the power of the grace of God and the power of the friendship into which Jesus is calling you and me.  So, brothers and sisters, go into this week knowing that you are friends with Jesus, and that he calls you into lives of joy, love, and relationship with him and with one another.  And lest us join with our friend, our teacher, and our Lord, to see his face in all we meet and put our love for him into action out in the world, so that we may partner with him to bring about the Kingdom here and now. 

 



Don't Forget to Say, 'I Love You!'

*This entry is derived from my final Sunday sermon at Christ Church Cathedral, Lexington, KY (5/3/15)*

"Jesus said to his disciples, "I am the true vine, and my Father is the vinegrower. He removes every branch in me that bears no fruit. Every branch that bears fruit he prunes to make it bear more fruit. You have already been cleansed by the word that I have spoken to you. Abide in me as I abide in you. Just as the branch cannot bear fruit by itself unless it abides in the vine, neither can you unless you abide in me. I am the vine, you are the branches. Those who abide in me and I in them bear much fruit, because apart from me you can do nothing. Whoever does not abide in me is thrown away like a branch and withers; such branches are gathered, thrown into the fire, and burned. If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask for whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. My Father is glorified by this, that you bear much fruit and become my disciples.""

--John 15: 1-8

  Abide in me.  That's what he said.  Here in the 15th chapter of the Fourth Gospel, in what is often called the Jesus' Farewell Discourse, he tells those closest to him to abide in him.  It's a beautiful phrase, isn't it?  But what does it mean?  Maybe it's meant to be some form of mysticism, that Jesus' spirit literally abides in his followers and their spirits abide in him.  Surely John's community would have been familiar with Jewish mysticism.  But what about for us now?  What does it mean for us when Jesus tells us to abide in him?

Jesus says that hose who abide in him bear much fruit.  But what kind of fruit exactly?  In our modern, quantitative world, bearing fruit generally means showing signs of success.  There are the fruits of your job:  bigger check, nicer house, better pension plan.  There are the fruits of your schools:  higher grades, larger scholarship, the path that leads to the job with the bigger check, nicer house, and better pension plan.  It seems we have to prove our self-worth, and churches do this too.  It's not hard for churches to fall into the trap of thinking that we have to show how good we are at being Christians by increasing in number year after year.  If by "bear fruit," Jesus meant to make as many Epsicopalians as possible, well then we did a pretty good job on April 26 when over 40 people were confirmed, received, and reaffirmed in this cathedral.  It was a wonderful, joy-filled moment, but I suspect Jesus meant something a little deeper when he talked about abiding in him and bearing fruit.  I suspect he meant something that cannot be quantified.

Being a Christian does mean a life of activity.  We show our love for Jesus and our commitment to him as our Lord by our actions in and out of this place.  We are enabled by the power of Christ in us to do amazing things and bear much fruit.  For three years I have had the pleasure of serving alongside you, walking with you through your faith journey, and I can tell you that you have borne much fruit.  But I'm not thinking of the quantifiable kind.  I'm thinking of a trip to England, where a new, young chaplain joined up with the choir on their tour.  Not only had he only been on the job for four days, he hadn't even been ordained yet!  Still, the choir gave him the nickname Joe Clergy, and they welcomed him as one of their own in a time when he was nervous and worried about starting a new job.  I'm thinking of a little black dog who, upon arriving here, ran around like she owned the place.  And yet you welcomed her and loved her, even when she had a few accidents in certain rooms of the cathedral, and you allowed her to offer pastoral care to you in ways that I and the other clergy could never do.  I'm thinking of a group of young adults, who have gathered over food and fellowship these last three years.  And while their numbers have increased, that's really just an afterthought.  What they have really increased in has been their love of God and their love for one another, deepening their faith, asking questions, and growing together.  I'm thinking of a small but dedicated group of college students at a little chapel down the street at UK, who have met each week and with whom you have shared their journey through meals and your presence.  I'm thinking of Holy Conversations around the sensitive issue of marriage equality and the decision this community made to affirm the love between two of its most cherished members.  And I'm thinking of so many more examples, but if I listed them all here, we'd never get out done!

Do you know why you have been able to bear so much fruit?  It's because of love.  You see, love can't be quantified.  It can't be explained empirically.  You can't measure it.  There's no end-of-the-quarter report that you put together about it.  And yet love is the most powerful force in the entire universe, because it is the only force capable of transcending time and space.  The epistler tells us why this is so:  because love is of God.  And it is by this--by love--that we know we abide in God.  And when we know we abide in God, we can take bold steps forward, no matter how fearful they may be, because perfect love--the love God has shown to us in Jesus, the kind of love that you have for one another--that kind of love casts our all fear.  I've seen you overcome great fears through the power of the love of Christ that abides in you, and I know that whatever fearful moments may lie ahead of you, you will overcome them also through the power of Christ's love.

It sounds pretty simple.  But we Christians have a habit of turning the simple into the difficult.  We shout that we are filled with God's love as we throw a bible at someone.  We preach our own brand of love but reject someone who doesn't meet our standards--kind of like what the religious authorities did to Jesus.  Or we speak of how much we love our meek and mild Lord, while we flaunt our extravagance at those who have nothing.  Maybe it's because of our own fear that we forget that to love God is to love one another and vice versa.  How often we forget.  I know I forget.  Way more than I should. 

But there is a way that we can avoid forgetting.  There is a solution for us, one that will draw us back to Christ's love and case aside our own fears.  Say, 'I love you.'  Say it a lot.  Say it like it's going out of style.  Say it to someone as you pass the Peace.  Say it to someone who might be sitting in YOUR pew.  Say it to your family, your friends, your co-workers (yes, even the one that you can't stand).  Say it to the stranger on the street.  Who knows, they might be Jesus!  Say it like you mean it.  Say it like you believe the words from the First Letter of John, that those who abide in love abide in God.  Say those words as often as possible, and you will bear some pretty amazing fruit.  And it won't be the kind you can quantify.

Christ Church Cathedral, I love you.  From the bottom of my very soul, I love you!  I've told you more than once that you made me a priest.  But more than that, you made me a better Christian, and a better person.  You showed me extraordinary ways to love one another, and you have carried that love with you out into the world.  You are the branches that have stretched far beyond these walls, sowing seeds of love in this city, this diocese, and beyond.  Keep it up!  And don't forget to say, 'I love you.'

It wouldn't be a Father Joe sermon without some obscure comic book or 1980s toy reference.  And so I say to you what He-Man said at the end of the 1980s live action Masters of the Universe movie:  good journey.  Good journey, brothers and sisters.  I am blessed beyond words to have been a part of your journey thus far.  But the future will be even brighter, as you continue to abide in the love of Christ. 

Together met, together bound, we'll go our different ways.  And as God's people in the world, we'll live and speak God's praise. 

Holy Week: A Lived Experience

Yesterday marked the start of the holiest time of year for us Christians.  Yes, it's holier than Christmas!!  The period we call Holy Week is the holiest of times because it is not just a moment frozen in time; rather, it is a lived experience.

So what do I mean by that?  For many of my brothers and sisters the Christian experience is one in which we remember the actions of Jesus regularly, however, they are little more than just that:  remembrances.  True, Jesus said to do many things to remember him and show others that we are his disciples(e.g. the sharing of a holy meal, loving one another as Jesus has loved us, baptizing, etc.).  But what makes Holy Week different is that it is not done just to remember Jesus.  Christians--even many Episcopalians--may argue that the celebration of Holy Communion is done simply as a memorial to Jesus.  Still, there can be no argument on Holy Week.  It's NOT just a memorial!

Holy Week is a lived experience.  The late-4th century pilgrim Egeria wrote extensively about her own trip to the Holy Land during the season of Lent, and what she found was not simply services done to remember Jesus' final days but daily prayers and services in which regular folks walked with Jesus through the days of his agony and glory.  For example, Egeria notes that the Bishop of Jerusalem sat atop a donkey and rode down the Mount of Olives on Palm Sunday, embodying the actions of Jesus.  The same was true on Maundy Thursday, when the Bishop washed the feet of the city's poor.  And on Good Friday the people walked the Via Dolorosa, the path through Jerusalem that leads to Golgotha, taking each agonizing step along the way with their Lord.  This was no mere commemoration of a past event.  This was a very real experience, and Christians in the orthodox and catholic traditions continue to walk with Jesus through the Washing of Feet on Maundy Thursday to the Stations of the Cross on Good Friday.

And that brings me to the point of the Pashcal Triduum.  The what?!  (Don't feel bad.  I've been an Episcopalian my whole life and only learned this term the year before I went to seminary!)  The Paschal Triduum--also known as the Three Sacred Days--is one service spread over the course of three days.  The service begins with the Maundy Thursday liturgy, continues with the walk with Jesus on Good Friday, and concludes with the celebration of Christ's resurrection at the Great Vigil of Easter on Saturday night.  It is thanks to Egeria that we have this celebration, and it is a glorious one!  And while it may be exhausting for some--especially clergy--it is spectacular.  There are churches out there who choose, for whatever reason, to only do one or two pieces of the Triduum.  Perhaps they are small in number and don't want to overload their people, or perhaps they, like me, have never heard of or seen an Easter Vigil before.  Be that as it may, this does a disservice, in my opinion, to the Church and to her people.  By not doing all three pieces of the Triduum, we severely miss the point. It is another example of us making the celebration of God's liturgy about ourselves, rather than about the lived-out experiences of Christ in His body.  We make the walk with Jesus because we are Jesus' body.  Thus, by eliminating one or two pieces of that walk, we are cutting ourselves off from Jesus' own walk through betrayal, agony, and, ultimately, glory.  We cannot get to Easter without Good Friday and Maundy Thursday!!

So this week I pray that you will take the time to put yourself right there with Christ.  You are there.  You are walking with our Lord.  You are in the upper room, in the garden, at the foot of the cross, and at the empty tomb.  Do not cut yourself off from it!  Sit with the discomfort of having your feet washed.  Let the tears flow as you kiss the tree on which the King of Glory hung.  And let your voice resound with the Alleluias of Easter's dawn.  Our Christian walk is not just one done in remembrance.  It is one we make with Christ every single day, and this week brings that to the forefront of our lives like no other.  May you know and feel Christ's presence as you walk with Him through this Holy Week.

Let It Be With Me

The angel of the Lord announced unto Mary, and she conceived by the Holy Ghost

Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee.

Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus.

Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death.  Amen.

Today we take a break from Lent.  We take a break from our fast, from our solemnity, and from everything that this penitential season entails.  Why?  Because today is the Feast of the Annunciation! And while the season of Lent calls us into preparation through prayer and fasting, today is a day for feasting,  for taking the ‘Alleluias’ out and celebrating.

So what are we celebrating today, exactly?  The Annunciation marks the occasion on which the angel Gabriel came to a poor, young Palestinian woman and told her that she would become the theotokos, the “God-bearer.”  With this action the whole of human history was turned on its head.  It was not in majesty, riches, or pomp & circumstances that God chose to be born into this world.  Rather, God decided to enter the world in loneliness, poverty, and great humility.  By entering this world like all of us, God took on all of our struggles, fears, and joys.  And whereas every other deity had always dwelt far away from humanity, this God—our God—chose to be in relationship with humanity; God’s story became our story and vice versa.  And it all began with the message of an angel to a young girl named Mary.  THAT is what we celebrate today!

This new thing that God was working in Mary’s life must have certainly been frightening; in fact, in every other occasion that an angel meets a human in Scripture, the angel has to remind the human not to be afraid.  However, Mary’s fears are put at ease with her incredible faith.  “Let it be with me,” she says.  Let it be with me.

I wonder what new thing God is doing in you right this moment.  I wonder what heavenly work is being nurtured within you.  Maybe it is frightening.  Still, I pray that you will have Mary’s courage to say yes to it.  Let it be with you.  Let it be with me.  Let whatever new thing God is creating be with us.

So today, as we step away from Lent, I pray that you will celebrate whatever new thing God is stirring up inside of you.  I pray that you will use this day to look around you and see the glory of God’s creation and shout in joy and thanks for the abundance of God’s goodness that lies all around you.  And yes, dust off those ‘Alleluias’ today!

God’s blessings be upon you as you continue your Lenten journey and as we turn the corner toward Jerusalem, the cross, and glory.  But for today, celebrate God’s goodness in you and around you!  Alleluia!!

The Annunciation (Henry Ossawa Tanner, 1898)

A New Transformation

Because this blog’s title is ‘Father Prime’ I would be remiss if I did not make a post here and there about the Transformers.  Every child of the 1980s knows who they are:  heroic Autobots battling evil Deceptions with the fate of their homeworld of Cybertron and our own planet Earth hanging in the balance!  At its core, Transformers is about a civil war raged between two warring factions of the same race of sentient robots, and since 1984 they have taken on a number of new forms—pun intended. 

The original Autobots and Decepticons from the 1984 Transformers series.

As a fan of the franchise I am always excited for a new series.  Perhaps it is because each new series takes me back to being five years old.  Perhaps the millennia-spanning conflict of the Autobots and Deceptions makes for some really great storytelling.  Or perhaps it’s simply that each new series brings the hope that it will be even better than the preceding one.  

This past weekend saw the premiere of Transformers:  Robots in Disguise on Cartoon Network.  It is the 10th cartoon series to debut in the U.S. since the original—what we call Generation One—ended in 1987, and with each new show comes the promise of fun, exciting, and captivating storylines with a cast of characters that we can truly get behind and care about.  Some series have succeeded in this regard—such as the mid-90s Beast Wars—and some have failed miserably—such as 2004’s Transformers: Energon.  From what I’ve seen thus far of Robots in Disguise, I have really high hopes!

What makes Transformers such a successful franchise, however, is not just characters like Optimus Prime and Megatron.  What makes Transformers so successful is the ability to adapt, which has nothing to do with the characters and their abilities to change their shapes into nearly any object imaginable.  Unlike other series of my childhood, like M.A.S.K. or Voltron, Transformers has managed to adapt with the times and let go of some of its 1980s charm and find new ways to connect with viewers.  Shows like M.A.S.K. and Voltron have attempted to reboot themselves for new audiences, but they’ve lacked the staying power.  When Beast Wars premiered in 1996 fans were in an uproar that Autobots and Deceptions had been replaced by Maximals and Predacons and new animal forms had taken over for slick vehicle modes.  But after a few episodes, Beast Wars proved to be a rousing success.  Change, despite what fans originally thought, was a good thing.  The same has, more or less, held true for every series since.  Most folks—including myself—are angry at first with the change, but soon enough we find something to love.  And quite honestly, I can find something to love with every single Transformers series, even ones that I know are sub-par.  

Megatron and Dinobot from Beast Wars.

And so now we find ourselves with the promise of a new show, the promise of a new transformation.  The animation is different, so are the characters and the overall tone of the series.  And with Robots in Disguise comes a renewed interest in my childhood hobby.  Each new episode makes me feel like a kid again, which I certainly don’t think is a bad thing.  

I wonder, as spring creeps its way into our lives, what new thing is God working to premiere in your life?  What new transformation is at work inside you?  That might sound pretty corny, and I suppose it is, but our ability to change, to adapt, to find something new at work in our lives is the only way that we will avoid the hazards of burn-out, depression, and anxiety.  Transformers has managed to stay fresh by changing itself in more ways than one, and so I think the same holds true for our own lives.  

Life itself is a transformation.  And just as the old Transformers comic book used to refer to “a world where things are not as they seem,” our lives are not what they seem, either.  The lives that we live often revolve around our possessions, jobs, and other frustrations.  But the true focus is the life Jesus calls us to, the life that looks out for the Other and points us to the Kingdom.  God is constantly doing new things to point us in this direction, to transform our way of thinking and being, especially during this season of Lent.  And in a weird way, the Autobots and Deceptions do the same thing.

The Autobot cast of the new Robots In Disguise.

So, brothers and sisters, how is your life being transformed??

Until That Day...

While scrolling through the Facebooks and other social media today I was surprised to find out that it's International Women's Day.  I hadn't heard anything about the day, no fanfare, no big announcement, nothing.  To top all off, the day selected for this commemoration was the only day of the year that's 23 hours!  That's right, the day selected for celebrating women is only 23 hours long.  Odds are that was not intentional, but the impact should not be lost on us.

A National Women's Day should not have to exist.  Nor should Women's History Month, which is going on right now.  Nor should Black History Month, which we honored in February.  Any commemoration that singles out a particular group should not HAVE to exist.  All men and women, of every shape, size, color, creed, and lifestyle should be honored and celebrated every single day of the year.  That's how it SHOULD be.  But sadly, that's not our current reality.

The fact is that the white, heteronormative, Christian narrative has dominated the history of western civilization.  This narrative has subjugated anyone and everyone that does not fit nicely into these categories.  As a result, women have been treated as little more than personal property, people of different skin tones have been enslaved and systematically eradicated, non-Christian peoples have been killed in the name of righteousness, and gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender peoples have had basic human rights denied to them.  All of this because the people in power fit a certain profile:  white, Anglo-Saxon, Protestant, heterosexual, men.  Blessedly, this trend is (very slowly) changing, and the tide of history is beginning to turn.  But it is not so simple to turn centuries-old thinking.

This is why a National Women's Day is important.  It's why Black History Month still matters and why social media trends such as #TransLivesMatter are needed.  I've heard the argument: 'There's not White History Month, so we shouldn't make special concessions for minority groups!'  I've heard the phrase 'Tyranny of the Minority' more than once.  Here's the thing:  the people in power don't get to dictate how the Other should feel.  As a white, heterosexual, cisgender male, I do not have the right to tell a black man that he shouldn't be outraged over police violence or a transwoman that her experiences of being outcast are not valid.  I simply do not have that right, nor does anyone!

I am a follower of Jesus of Nazareth, who I believe is the living embodiment of God Almighty and whose life I try to model, so that this world might look a little more like this Kingdom of Heaven that he spoke of so often.  When I hear so-called Christians say that racism no longer exists, or that women are treated as equals, or that gay and trans people are somehow infringing on Christian values, it makes me ill. Either they're stupid or they're not paying attention! It's a complacency and a willingness to just accept the centuries-old ways we have always done things.  But the Jesus that I serve is a much more radical person, someone who looked at the standards of his own time and said, 'It doesn't have to be this way!'  The Jesus that I know is the one who said that God has "lifted up the lowly," (Luke 1: 52) and again that "those who are not against us are for us," (Mark 9: 40) and again "love one another as I have loved you" (John 13: 34).  The Jesus I know shows no partiality and sees none of the petty barriers that we have erected for one another.  Those Christians who use their faith to continue holding women and other minorities back in the name of righteousness are simply bigots.  Simple as that.  And they do not represent me or the faith upon which I stand.

I pray that the day does come when things like International Women's Day are no longer needed, when women are celebrated with the same fervor as men, when they make the same living wage as men, and when the images of the "fairer sex" that we have erected over the years are torn down.  I pray for the day when African Americans can walk down a white neighborhood without fear of being questioned simply for who they are.  And I pray for a day when the right to love unconditionally is granted to all God's children.  But we are not there yet, and that is why days like this are still necessary.  So until that day, it falls to us to continue to raise up the rights of those who have, for so long, had those rights denied.  It is up to us to make this world look a little bit more like the Kingdom of which Jesus spoke.
 #nationalwomensday #blacklivesmatter #lgbt #translivesmatter #equality

Never the Answer

Yesterday in church we heard Jesus say one of those things that we aren't particularly fond of:  he calls Peter, the rock upon which the Church is built, Satan.  He calls him Satan!  Think of the worst possible thing you could call another person, and THAT'S the equivalent here.  It's a disturbing moment, and more than once I've heard clergy say how uncomfortable they are with talking about it, almost to the point of either ignoring it or--God help us--changing the reading altogether.  This is never the answer.

The Gospel from yesterday speaks to a bigger issue:  what do we do with passages of Scripture with which we do not agree?  I experienced this once in seminary when I set up for a service of Morning Prayer and listed Psalm 137 as the prescribed Psalm for the day on our song board.  Two minutes before the service began an older seminarian walked into the sacristy and exclaimed, "We can't say that psalm because it's the one about bashing babies' heads against rocks!"  Fortunately, the Prayer Book allowed us to omit the final three verses of that psalm, but that moment stuck with me.  Is that really what we're supposed to do with difficult Scriptures?

I was once in a planning session for a service, and both readings prescribed were not particularly "nice."  One of the other clergy asked, "Don't we want something more edifying?  We don't want people to be in a bad mood when they hear these."  But statements like these, and like the one the older seminarian said to me, are dangerous.  Here's why.

Firstly, it's picking and choosing Scripture.  If it's not ok for fundamental evangelicals to pick and choose what Scriptures they pay attention to, how is it ok for us to do the same?  True, we may not be trying to push a particular theology the way that folks  do who constantly raise up one passage of Leviticus while ignoring the passages around it, but in deciding what we should or should not read on a Sunday morning, we are making the Scriptures about us.  We are arrogantly proclaiming that we know better than the lectionary authors what we should and should not be hearing in a given service.  We don't get to do that!  That's not what catholic worship is about!  Catholic worship is about setting aside the emotions of the one and accepting the practices of the whole.  And the whole has decreed that we use a lectionary and not pick and choose our readings.

Secondly, it does a disservice to our congregations.  How can folks in the pews be expected to wrestle with difficult Scriptures if we are not doing it ourselves?  The Bible is full of moments that make me go, "WHAT?!" or moments that make me angry at its writers and question their motives.  But I cannot just put those passages down and pretend they are not there.  If we ignore the fact that the Gospel of John uses the phrase, "for fear of the Jews," then we are not fully communicating to the folks in the pews what John actually means by that phrase and we are failing them as teachers.

Finally, it's making worship about us.  Let's get one thing straight:  worship is NOT about us!  It is about God!  This is how those of us in the catholic tradition can come together and worship, even if the particular liturgical/worship style of the congregation doesn't fit with our own.  Those of us who identify as "high church" would never walk out of a service just because that community was not using incense or chanting the Gospel.  That's insane!  But that is what we do when we choose to change words of Scripture or leave out passages entirely.  We are projecting our own anxieties onto the Scriptures, using excuses like, "We'll catch flack from the congregation if we use this passage."  How about instead of worrying about catching flack we use it as a teaching moment?  How about we worry less about what the folks in the pews think and focus more on the agreed-upon customs of our tradition so that all of the focus and attention can be on God, not ourselves?

Changing Scripture to fit our own emotions is no better than saying that Scripture never changes and means the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow.  Scripture is meant to be examined, studied, and wrestled with.  Methods such as textual and historical criticism help us put Scripture into its context and truly get at the heart of what is being said.  This is what we are meant to do with the Scriptures.  They are not there for us to use as our personal weapon, nor are they there for us to do with as we damn-well please.  They are there to tell us the story of God and God's people.  And it is our duty to care for that story and to respect it.  That means studying and critiquing it, but it also means letting it exist in its own time and not changing pieces just to suit ourselves.

Have you been faced with a piece of Scripture that you're not comfortable with?  The next time that happens, don't ignore it.  Don't just pick another one that will make you feel warm and fuzzy.  Sit with it.  Analyze it.  Ask questions about it.  And maybe you'll get to the heart of what is really being said.  And maybe your own spiritual journey will be enriched.