Christian Testament for Sunday 8 April 2018

Acts 4:32-35        Now the whole group of those who believed were of one heart and  soul, and no one claimed private ownership of any possessions, but everything they owned was held in common. With great power the apostles gave their testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and great grace was upon them all. There was not a needy person among them, for as many as owned lands or houses sold them and brought the proceeds of what was sold. They laid it at the apostles' feet, and it was distributed to each as any had need.

Reflection       “Held in common.” What does it mean to be held in common? Perhaps it means to belong equally to someone or something, a community, a history, a way of being, much like the “common” land at the center of New England towns that ‘belonged’ to everyone in the community. But the image that captures the notion of being “held in common” for me is a massive artwork in the baggage claim area of the Oakland, CA airport.

The first time I descended the escalator into the swarming throngs of travelers waiting for their luggage I could not “read” the 10’ x 20’ piece of public art mounted across the luggage carousels from me. Vibrant colors seemed to be moving, or maybe not. Could it be my eyes? So I wound my way through the crowds to get a closer look. 

Gradually a matrix of images came into focus. Though I did not count and could not measure there looked to be about five rows of forty 8”x10” rectangular, slowly changing images of people. A portrait of a Haitian woman might become a strapping athlete, close up of an infant’s face, then heavy weight wrestler, ballerina, elder in a wheelchair… such that altogether the constantly emerging face of humanity shifted culture, color and form. The further away from the artwork one stood, the more the the images were “held in common.” The closer in one stood, the subjects became the particular foreground.

Which leads me to a different sense of being “held in common.” What if being “held in common” means both the particular distinction or singularity of an individual and  the imprecise or otherworldliness  of the transcendent occupy the same space - ‘held in common?’ What if all of those constantly emerging individual faces together reveal the abstract expression of one image, one heart, one soul? 

I believe the early Church as described in the Acts’ text points to a similar abstract expression of being “held in common.” When the great power of the particular and the great power of the transcendent come together the Church truly may be of one heart and one soul. 

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Gospel text for the Great Vigil of Easter 31 March 2018

 Mark 16.1-8        When the sabbath was over, Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought spices, so that they might go and anoint Jesus. And very early on the first day of the week, when the sun had risen, they went to the tomb. They had been saying to one another, "Who will roll away the stone for us from the entrance to the tomb?" When they looked up, they saw that the stone, which was very large, had already been rolled back. As they entered the tomb, they saw a young man, dressed in a white robe, sitting on the right side; and they were alarmed. But he said to them, "Do not be alarmed; you are looking for Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has been raised; he is not here. Look, there is the place they laid him. But go, tell his disciples and Peter that he is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see him, just as he told you." So they went out and fled from the tomb, for terror and amazement had seized them; and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.

Reflection     The stone protecting the entrance to Jesus’ tomb is rolled back. Instead of finding Jesus’ body inside the tomb there is a young man dressed in white, sitting there and saying strange things. “Do not be alarmed, you are for looking Jesus who was crucified. He is not here. He has been raised.”  And along with Mary Magdalene, Mary the Mother of James and Salome we ask, “Now what are we supposed to do?”   

Here the original gospel according to Mark ends; it ends as abruptly as it begins. Remember how is begins? This is the beginning of the good news of Jesus the Christ, the Son of God.” These few words tell us, this is a story of good news.  From the very beginning we know Jesus’ true identity, the Son of God. Nevertheless, all the way through the story, along with the disciples, we forget,  we forget the good news, we forget who Jesus is, and then we remember and begin the story again. We forget, then remember and begin the story again. 

That is the way it is (the way we are), right down to the wire. We remember who Jesus is at our Thursday evening Passover Supper and then when things get chaotic on Friday we fear for our lives, forget, run away and hide or stand at a distance watching Jesus take his last breath. Is it not ironic? The person who in the end “remembers” and announces who Jesus is, is a stranger, a Roman soldier, one of those who pounded nails through Jesus’ flesh on the cross. We hear that soldier boldly proclaim, “Truly this man was God’s Son.” And there we are, beginning again, the beginning of the good news of Jesus the Son of God, who dies on a cross. 

It is in this very moment that we discover the answer to the question, the question that mystified us and the Mary’s just moments ago at Jesus’ vacated tomb, “Now what are we supposed to do?” The answer is this, when the Sabbath (the time of waiting) is over and  “the sun has risen on the first day of the week,” it is time to begin again, to see the new light that has pierced the darkness. It is time for us to go and tell the good news of Jesus the Son of God, the message that has reverberated throughout Mark’s gospel because always, always, always, no matter how dark the darkness, always we begin again.

This is the good news of Easter…. ALWAYS we begin again. Alleluia! Alleluia!

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Gospel text for Sunday of the Passion 25 March 2018

Mark 15.1-39         As soon as it was morning, the chief priests held a consultation with the elders and scribes and the whole council. They bound Jesus, led him away, and handed him over to Pilate. Pilate asked him, “Are you the King of the Jews?” He answered him, “You say so.” Then the chief priests accused him of many things. Pilate asked him again, “Have you no answer? See how many charges they bring against you.” But Jesus made no further reply, so that Pilate was amazed.

Now at the festival he used to release a prisoner for them, anyone for whom they asked. Now a man called Barabbas was in prison with the rebels who had committed murder during the insurrection. So the crowd came and began to ask Pilate to do for them according to his custom. Then he answered them, “Do you want me to release for you the King of the Jews?” For he realized that it was out of jealousy that the chief priests had handed him over. But the chief priests stirred up the crowd to have him release Barabbas for them instead. Pilate spoke to them again, “Then what do you wish me to do with the man you call the King of the Jews?” They shouted back, “Crucify him!” Pilate asked them, “Why, what evil has he done?” But they shouted all the more, “Crucify him!” So Pilate, wishing to satisfy the crowd, released Barabbas for them; and after flogging Jesus, he handed him over to be crucified.

Then the soldiers led him into the courtyard of the palace (that is, the governor’s headquarters); and they called together the whole cohort. And they clothed him in a purple cloak; and after twisting some thorns into a crown, they put it on him. And they began saluting him, “Hail, King of the Jews!” They struck his head with a reed, spat upon him, and knelt down in homage to him. After mocking him, they stripped him of the purple cloak and put his own clothes on him. Then they led him out to crucify him.

They compelled a passer-by, who was coming in from the country, to carry his cross; it was Simon of Cyrene, the father of Alexander and Rufus. Then they brought Jesus to the place called Golgotha (which means the place of a skull). And they offered him wine mixed with myrrh; but he did not take it. And they crucified him, and divided his clothes among them, casting lots to decide what each should take.

It was nine o’clock in the morning when they crucified him. The inscription of the charge against him read, “The King of the Jews.” And with him they crucified two bandits, one on his right and one on his left. Those who passed by derided him, shaking their heads and saying, “Aha! You who would destroy the temple and build it in three days, save yourself, and come down from the cross!” In the same way the chief priests, along with the scribes, were also mocking him among themselves and saying, “He saved others; he cannot save himself. Let the Messiah, the King of Israel, come down from the cross now, so that we may see and believe.” Those who were crucified with him also taunted him.

When it was noon, darkness came over the whole land until three in the afternoon. At three o’clock Jesus cried out with a loud voice, “Eloi, Eloi, lema sabachthani?” which means, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” When some of the bystanders heard it, they said, “Listen, he is calling for Elijah.” And someone ran, filled a sponge with sour wine, put it on a stick, and gave it to him to drink, saying, “Wait, let us see whether Elijah will come to take him down.” Then Jesus gave a loud cry and breathed his last. And the curtain of the temple was torn in two, from top to bottom. Now when the centurion, who stood facing him, saw that in this way he breathed his last, he said, “Truly this man was God’s Son!”

Reflection       Each one of our stories is a variation on the theme of Jesus’ story. Some of us were planned from birth, others, not so much. Some were welcomed to the world with gifts, (if not frankincense and myrrh, perhaps a silver spoon) others driven into hiding. All of us encounter “other” people; the sick, wealthy, poor, wise, powerful, weak, fearful, bold. A few of us have friends who really know who we are but most people only think they do. We have families who love us and misjudge us; civil and religious officials who try to tell us who and how we ought to be. And, if we dare to pick up our cross and live our lives by faith rather than fear, if we dare to strive for love and compassion rather than power and privilege, there is every chance we will be misunderstood, hated, persecuted and likely hear ourselves cry out, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” 

Here is the thing. As we progress on our journeys of faith with God, sometimes God seems to be absent especially if we have experienced moments of joy, comfort or great consolation with God. Experiencing the presence of God with us is like fueling our deepest desire, and of course, all we want is more, more of the amazing God feeling. So God, in God’s wisdom steps back, inviting us into deeper, more faithful relationship with God, a relationship that does not depend on signs,  miracles, good feelings or even rescue from suffering or death.

We share this story that we call life with Jesus. Woven throughout our stories there are paragraphs called suffering and others called death because our lives are punctuated  with all kinds of suffering and who knows how many deaths; deaths of our self image, ego, ideals, youth, dreams, deaths of our pets and loved ones, death of the way things used to be, until our physical death. 

There is no superhero God who is going to break into space and save us from suffering and death. But the good news is,  Jesus shows us the way to navigate these paragraphs with grace and equanimity. Rather than praying for divine rescue or miraculous cure we look to the presence of God who is faithfully with us, no matter what because God is faithful. 

The curtain that separated the divine from the human has been torn for ever. As the apostle Paul wrote to the Christians in Rome, “For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God…” (Ro 8.38-39) God is faithful, no matter what.

May your walk to Jerusalem be blessed this Holy Week and always.

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Gospel text for Sunday 18 March 2018

                                       

John 12:20-33         Now among those who went up to worship at the festival were some Greeks. They came to Philip, who was from Bethsaida in Galilee, and said to him, “Sir, we wish to see Jesus.” Philip went and told Andrew; then Andrew and Philip went and told Jesus. Jesus answered them, “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. Very truly, I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. Those who love their life lose it, and those who hate their life in this world will keep it for eternal life. Whoever serves me must follow me, and where I am, there will my servant be also. Whoever serves me, the Father will honor.

“Now my soul is troubled. And what should I say—‘Father, save me from this hour’? No, it is for this reason that I have come to this hour. Father, glorify your name.” Then a voice came from heaven, “I have glorified it, and I will glorify it again.” The crowd standing there heard it and said that it was thunder. Others said, “An angel has spoken to him.” Jesus answered, “This voice has come for your sake, not for mine. Now is the judgment of this world; now the ruler of this world will be driven out. And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself.” He said this to indicate the kind of death he was to die.

Reflection       Every summer while living along a craggy canyon in Northern New Mexico I was amazed when I looked down into my neighbors property and saw an explosion of salmon, flamingo and bubblegum roses dressing up their dusty driveway, never watered, pruned or fertilized. How is this possible? My courtyard garden is well mulched and regularly drenched. Still, my surpassing TLC comes to nothing. When I visited a local garden nursery and issued my complaint I was shocked by what I learned. 

“The key to a prolific rose bush is stress. If you take inordinately good care of it, it has no reason to bloom. You may have to let your rose bush die back before it comes to full life again.”   Jesus’ words echo in my mind, “… but if it dies, it bears much fruit.” 

The Episcopal priest, The Very Rev. Alan Jones writes of his contemplative prayer practice, “In my tradition we try to practice dying every day so that we can be fully alive. What I understand of my prayer life is to place myself on the threshold of death, to participate in my dying, so that I may live each day and each moment as a gift… each moment becomes a new thing.”* I  have no idea if Jones tried to grow roses, but I believe Jones has taken Jesus’ exquisitely crafted word painting to heart, “unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.”

The rhetorical effect of Jesus’ words is profound. Assuming Jesus does not mean we must literally die, what does he mean? I believe the death to which Jesus points is death of our over identification with our individual selves, death of our striving to water and fertilize and mulch ourselves excessively. To the extent that we only experience ourselves as physical beings in need of constant provision, we will surely die. But when we recognize we are spiritual beings intimately connected with God and with all people, we die to the notion of our separate selves and discover new and eternal life in divine and human relationship.  

Being fully human, when facing physical death Jesus’ “soul is troubled,” nevertheless, rather than cling to his separate self he remembers his spiritual relationships with God and humanity…. calling out to God for the benefit of others and he lives on.  

• Excerpt from Graceful Passages: A companion for Living and Dying, (Novato, CA, New World Library), 2001, p31. 

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Gospel text for Sunday 11 March 2018

John 3:14-21            Jesus said to Nicodemus, "Just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life."For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.

"Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. Those who believe in him are not condemned; but those who do not believe are condemned already, because they have not believed in the name of the only Son of God. And this is the judgment, that the light has come into the world, and people loved darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil. For all who do evil hate the light and do not come to the light, so that their deeds may not be exposed. But those who do what is true come to the light, so that it may be clearly seen that their deeds have been done in God.”

Reflection          If God is God, in and of, with and for all things, that means God is not other than us. Though we are not God, we are not, not God either. Nothing separates us from God. Nothing separates God from us which means our image of ourself is not other than our image of God. Conversely, our image of God is not other than our image of ourself. Humanity and God are intimately interwoven. We cannot be torn apart.

Which brings us to face the questions, “What is my image of myself? What is my image of God?” It really does not matter which question we begin with because we cannot tease the two apart. Let’s begin with our image of our selves. When we see ourselves as a disappointment, not measuring up or fundamentally not good enough by implication we are seeing God as displeased,  demanding and disengaged; God the judge. By contrast, when we see ourselves as dependable, devoted and desiring God by implication we see God as trustworthy, loving and true, God the benevolent. The thing is, just like our image of our selves, our image of God is not etched in stone. It is up to us to choose the image with which we want to live. 

When we choose to believe in a harsh and judgmental God we have every reason to remain in the shadows, hoping against hope that miraculously we will be transformed into something acceptable, unless of course we reject God entirely. But if we chose in favor of a sympathetic, life-giving God then we can dare to reveal ourselves, step out of the shadows into the light. The moment we do this we are set free, free from the shackles of a shameful self image, free to claim the truth of our identity with God. 

At the same time every one of us has some skeleton in the closet, some secret or foible we fear to expose about ourselves. For as long as we keep this hidden we remain prisoners of the darkness. But when we choose to bring our deepest truth into the light we are seen in the light of God’s love, love that does not condemn us but counsels us to choose life in the light of God.

Who we are is defined by our choices. In John’s gospel text Jesus counsels Nicodemus and us to choose, choose to believe. The thing is, belief is not a commodity that we mine like copper or grow like corn. Belief is not something we can find or buy or bargain for. Belief is a state of mind in which we choose to accept something as being true or existing without any empirical evidence to prove it with factual certainty.*

What we believe really matters because what we believe guides our action and determines whether we live in the darkness or in the light. For as long as we believe that we are fundamentally flawed,  not good enough or cannot measure up, we will hate the light and avoid the light because we do not want our shameful self to be exposed. But when we choose to believe that we are essentially good, we will seek and love the light and let our selves be exposed in the light “so that it may be clearly seen that (our) deeds have been done in God.”

The light and life and love of God is in and of, with and for all of us. Do you choose to believe? 

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* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belief/accessed March 9, 2018.

Gospel text for Sunday 4 March 2018

John 2:13-22        The Passover of the Jews was near, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. In the temple he found people selling cattle, sheep, and doves, and the money changers seated at their tables. Making a whip of cords, he drove all of them out of the temple, both the sheep and the cattle. He also poured out the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables. He told those who were selling the doves, “Take these things out of here! Stop making my Father’s house a marketplace!” His disciples remembered that it was written, “Zeal for your house will consume me.” The Jews then said to him, “What sign can you show us for doing this?” Jesus answered them, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.” The Jews then said, “This temple has been under construction for forty-six years, and will you raise it up in three days?” But he was speaking of the temple of his body. After he was raised from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this; and they believed the scripture and the word that Jesus had spoken.

Reflection     What a great example of market economy in action. The elite Judean religious and political officials are selling access to God and it is very profitable. The way this works is simple. The political and religious authorities conspire to keep something that is very desirable to the people (access to God)  scarce, and as a result the price the people are willing to pay for it goes up. The rich get richer. The powerful gain power. The masses of people sacrifice and fall behind as long as they agree to participate in the exchange. 

For as long as the masses believe the only way to experience the presence of God is to make a pilgrimage to the temple in Jerusalem, the only way to escape the torment of being separate from God is paying a temple tax, the only way to insure access to a happily ever after life is to sacrifice a pair of doves and an unblemished lamb, they will continue to turn their wallets over to the money changers in exchange for their heavenly insurance policies. Until someone like Jesus comes along and shouts, “Stop!” 

God is not in-prisoned in the temple of Jerusalem. God does not require you pay tax. The religious and political elites are not the only ones with access to God. God is with you, each and every one of you, in spirit and in truth. Quit your deal making. You do not have to sacrifice a pair of javelina, fresh fish or pay a temple tax. You do not have to make a pilgrimage to the Holy Land. All you have to do is stop, be still and know that God is with you right here, right now, in spirit and in truth. The true temple of God is not made of stones and mortar. As it is with Jesus so it is with us. The true temple of God is our bodies.

The question is, how do we inhabit our bodies as the true temples of God? I believe we must dismantle the bricks and mortar of our market economy lives that depend on differentiating those who have from those who have not. We must divest our greed and narcissistic striving. We must dismember the chains of our market driven guardianship. All of this ideology we must allow to crumble like Jesus’ proverbial temple walls so that we too will rise up into new, reasonable, holy lives, being humane, restrained and sane; humble, faithful and moral; awake, alert and alive, so that we embody in spirit and in truth the ubiquitous Presence of God. 

To delve into the way of embodying the presence of God in ordinary life, please listen to the audio book "Practicing the Presence of God" with Brother Lawrence by clicking on image above and to the right.  

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Gospel text for Sunday 25 February 2018

Mark 8:31-38        Jesus began to teach his disciples that the Son of Man must undergo great suffering, and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again. He said all this quite openly. And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. But turning and looking at his disciples, he rebuked Peter and said, “Get behind me, Satan! For you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things.”

He called the crowd with his disciples, and said to them, “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it. For what will it profit them to gain the whole world and forfeit their life? Indeed, what can they give in return for their life? Those who are ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of them the Son of Man will also be ashamed when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels.”

Reflection       From the time I was twelve or thirteen years old I was certain there was a single capital “T” Truth and my mission in life was to find it. While babysitting I discovered Hermann Hesse’s book describing the spiritual journey of a young man named Siddhartha. It is the story of Gautama Buddha and I grabbed onto it as Truth, until, it was hard to find a Bodi tree in New Jersey, and of course there were the intrusions of school and parents. This is not working for me. So I set down Siddhartha and decide I will find and master Truth in the breathing and bodily postures of Yoga until I realize twisting my body into pretzel forms is not it, so I stop doing yoga and become certain that capital T Truth is hidden in consciousness. This launches my exploration of altered states, which are quite exotic, but at the end of the day they fade away along with the big T Truths I thought I grasped. So I turn to the writing of Lao Tzo, a mythic sixth century Chinese philosopher, poet and writer and nail my hat to that peg for a decade, certain that Truth arises from living in harmony with the Tao, until that too emerges empty. My litany of failed certainty continues today.

Do you see the pattern? First I am certain that I know the way to Truth. I stumble along, life happens and I realize, not so much. And the litany of certainty continues, each chapter whittling itself away, making room for more questions until ever so slowly I have come to realize that in all things I am mostly uncertain. 

The Wisdom of Uncertainty aligns with recent theories of the cosmos that suggest only four percent of the universe is made up of matter and energy that can be measured (this includes all the billions of stars in each of the billions of galaxies.) The remaining ninety-six percent  of all that is is made up of dark matter and dark energy that cannot be seen. ** In other words, the cosmos is rather like God or consciousness, somehow we infer it is there even though we cannot see it. 

Much as religion relies on faith, so too does science when it admits, we cannot base our understanding of the material world on our five senses. Every time we discover something it raises more questions than answers. And there we have it ,  the Wisdom of Uncertainty. When we are certain that we are right, it is like living in a box from which we cannot escape. But when we are liberated from the confines of our certainty box, we are free to move on, to live and grow and ask new questions.

In Mark’s text Peter is certain he is right. His friend, the Messiah, with whom God is please, cannot not possibly“undergo great suffering,  be rejected by the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again.” Peter is certain and Peter is wrong. 

This is especially important to consider as we navigate the Lenten season of self examination, the season that prepares us to receive the ultimate foolishness, “we must lose our lives to gain our lives.” The Wisdom of Uncertainty presents us with questions we all must ask ourselves. About what am I certain that I am right? With whom do I argue to prove I am right? How does my certainty that I am right close my ears and eyes and heart to another person’s perspective? to a more expansive point of view?   What if I am not right? What if I am setting my mind not on divine things but on human things? What if I am wrong? 

 ** https://www.space.com/20930-dark-matter.html accessed 23 Feb 2018.

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