Being Christian

            When I was a kid and sang in the choir, I used to hate Palm Sunday.  The gospel lesson seemed to me to be just about the entire bible.  We would sit there and listen to the priest read the Gospel until we were ready to fall asleep.  I don’t think that I ever really listened to it, I was so preoccupied with how long it was.

            Thankfully, these days, we do something else with it.  When I was the rector of Christ Church, we used to dress up and dramatize it.  I loved watching Judas come down the center aisle and throw the money at the feet of the Pharisees at the end of the Gospel.  The person who was selected to portray Jesus always managed to make Eli Eli Lema Sabachthani  sound like a cry from the depths.  I, in my vestments always seemed to be chosen to depict Pilate.  I loved it.

            It is easy to miss the point of Palm Sunday and the story that it tells.  Here is Jesus coming into Jerusalem on a donkey and feted by the crowd, hailed as the Messiah with palms laid at his feet.  How quickly it all turned.  At the end of the day, Jesus is arrested and delivered to Pilate to be crucified.  I used to teach the congregation how to take those large palm fronds and make crosses out of them to take home with them as a reminder of how quickly our cheers can be turned to taunts. 

            Maybe the Gospel is a bit long, but it needs to be to tell the story that we need to hear.  We certainly, like the people in Jerusalem, want a messiah.  But we want one who will do things the way that we want them done. 

            The Roman Catholic church has just elected a new pope.  Francis, named for the great Saint Francis of Assisi, has a mandate to clean up a battered church with scandal after scandal having wracked it.  The Romans are no different from the rest of us.  All of the churches, all of us, Catholic, Orthodox and Protestant are hungry for Christian leadership that will reflect the power of the Gospel of Christ.  In his first days, Francis has mingled with crowds in the Vatican and has seemed to be the humble servant that we are all called to be when we assume the title Christian.  My prayers are that Francis will be the leader that we all need to show us a new way.

           But we are all in this together.  The wonderful assortment of people who attended to the election and the installation of the Pope testify to how wide the Christian message has been spread and how integrated all of us are in making sure that Christian values permeate this turbulent world.  How can each of us be a part of showing the world that the message of Christ is peace and unity?  That is what I want to pray and think about on this Palm Sunday.

Love and Resurrection

            About three years ago, I was one of the clergy who presided at the wedding of my nephew who married his partner of a number of years in Washington, DC because it was legally possible to do that.  I was honored to be a part of that wonderful ceremony that brought these two people into a long term relationship that they both wanted very much. 

            This coming April, I will preside at the wedding of his brother, my other nephew in New Bern, NC to his dear betrothed love.  Again, I am honored to be a part of this joining together of two people who want to be in a life-long loving relationship with each other.

            Relationships are essential to our lives.  This was made apparent to us by Jesus who made it a point to touch as many lives as possible during his time with us.  I am particularly taken by the story of his friend Lazarus, who was the brother of Mary and Martha of Bethany.  When Jesus found out that Lazarus was sick, he waited a few days and then went to Bethany to do what he could for his friend.  Lazarus had died and he asked where they had buried him.  Jesus went to the tomb, stood there and wept.  He honored his friend with his tears, and then he did something that amazed everyone around.  He brought Lazarus out of the tomb and restored him to his sisters.  We only have the word of the Gospel of John for this, but Jesus emphasized this wonderful miracle by dining with Lazarus later on.  This was when Mary anointed Jesus feet with costly perfume in thanksgiving for what he had done for them, and as a prefiguring of Jesus own death that was surely coming at the hands of a hostile church.  That Judas reproved Mary for this is seen by the author of the Gospel as additional proof of his malicious mindset that resulted in the betrayal of Jesus to those who wanted to kill him.

            I love this story because it tells us something about the length of our relationships with each other.  They last not only during this life, but we can expect them to continue in eternity.  That, I think, is what Jesus is trying to demonstrate by his continued relationship with Lazarus after his raising from the dead.  So, like Jesus at Lazarus’ tomb, we need to weep when we encounter death, certainly we have all done that; but we also need to remember that these relationships are not over at that moment, but that we will certainly see each other again when we come to our eternal life. 

                Sometimes, death comes as a relief from the problems that we create for one another, but remember that our sins are forgiven and our souls purified by our God when we come into His presence, and it is this purified soul that we will meet when we all come together before God’s throne.  That is why I know that God wants only goodness and peace for us all, even if we won’t necessarily see it in this life.  May we all honor each other in this life with the love that lies deeply in our hearts, so that when we meet later, that love will continue to grow and become a firm part of our being.  That is certainly what I want for my nephews in their marriages, and for all of us in this life.

Redeeming the Prodigal Son

           When I first went to college back in the early fifties, I was certainly not mature enough to understand what I or it was all about.  I easily got caught up in the fraternity party ethos on the campus with their weekend beer parties, and hardly paid any attention at all to the courses that I was supposed to be taking. 

            The college put up with that for a while, but eventually one of the advisors called me in and suggested to me that because of my terrible grades, college was obviously not for me and wondered if I shouldn’t consider a “trade school” or something.  In other words, the college wasn’t interested in me anymore since I obviously wasn’t interested in learning any of the things that they were offering.

            I remember my father coming to the campus to try to reason with the people in charge, but in the end, what they wanted prevailed and I was sent home.  I lazed around for a while, unsure of what to do next.  I had no schedule, no job, nothing to occupy my time.

            There was a profound moment that I’ll never forget.  My father was cooking breakfast one Saturday morning and he called me into the kitchen.  “Well, what are you going to do?” he asked.  I said that I would try to find a job and see what happened.  “Good, good,” he said.  “But where are you going to live?”  The bottom fell out of my world with those words.  All of a sudden I understood that I was going to have to take care of myself.  In my immaturity, this was a new thought for me.  What was I going to do, indeed!

             My dad arranged for me to take a course in radio broadcasting that had been started by an old friend of his.  I took the course, and found a job working in a men’s shop part time while I was learning about broadcasting.  I enjoyed the course, did well in it and eventually I found a job at a radio station in Indiana, PA.  This began a career in broadcasting for me which lasted about twenty years.  But that defining moment with my father never left me.  It was the moment that I grew up. 

            When I read the story of the prodigal son, I always think of myself and that Saturday moment with my father.  He really knew what I needed, even if I didn’t.  I have thanked God for that defining time over and over again.  It was really a gift that I needed more than anything else. 

            My dad never lived to see what happened to me; how well I did in my radio and television career and then was led to go back to college and then to seminary and into the priesthood.  I can’t imagine a better life than the one that I have had, but it certainly began on that Saturday morning when I came to understand my responsibility for my own life.  My father gave me that wonderful gift, just as the father of the prodigal son gave him back the life that he had squandered

God and Problem Solving

          There is a statement made often to people who are in trouble.  “God won’t give you any more than you can handle.”  That certainly sounds good, and I know that it is meant to be comforting, but I have known lots of people who have had to deal with much more than they could handle.  Bills that can’t be paid, relationships that crumble, the news is full of episodes where people who are overwhelmed sometimes turn to crime to solve their problems.   Suicides and murders seem to multiply in our culture.  There are many people who are overwhelmed by the problems that they face.  Anyone who has listened in counseling to people with difficulties knows that being overwhelmed is one of the principle problems that we have in this world.  Think about your own life and the lives of those around you and it doesn’t take long before you see how overwhelming life can sometimes be. 

I think that this idea that we won’t be given more than we can handle comes from Paul’s words in the tenth chapter of first Corinthians:  God is faithful, and he will not let you be tested beyond your strength, but with the testing he will also provide the way out so that you may be able to endure it.         

            I don’t want to be seen as arguing with the bible, but this is another example of how scripture can be used to justify almost anything.  One of the largest quandaries that we have with the bible is how random verses are picked out of it to tell us what the speaker wants us to believe.  I am reminded of the current turmoil over sexuality, how people quote verses from Leviticus or Paul’s epistles to provide what they believe is the final word of God on this subject.  I have seen how that kind of absolute bible quoting can hurt people and hurt them badly.  I know that it is possible to find great comfort and hope in the bible, but single verses completely out of context isn’t usually very helpful.

            When we take the bible as a whole, as the story of God’s creative spirit working to redeem creation, it is possible to understand what God can do for all of us in the more troubling moments of our lives.  Jesus tells us the greatest commandment: Love the Lord your God with all of your heart, your soul and your mind.  This is the first and greatest commandment, and the second is like unto it; love your neighbor as a person like yourself.  If you want to pick out a random verse of scripture to tie to your life, this is the one that I would recommend.  The reason that I think that this works in the most difficult moments of our lives is because it moves us toward community.  Community is what ties us together as a whole and gives us access to each other and what we need.  Community is what the church is all about.  We come together not only to worship our God, but to know each other.  There is nothing more important on Sunday morning than the gathering of the people in unity before the altar of God. 

            I have always believed that coffee hour, which has been described as the “eighth sacrament” is one of the most important times to gather that is offered by the church.  This is where we can informally share our lives with each other.  Pastoral care is the primary offering that clergy provide.  Counseling and caring is primary in the life of the church.  All of us have to participate in this.  Caring for each other becomes a function of the work of not only the clergy, but of all of us who belong to the community of God.  When we have each other, we have the greatest gift that God can bestow. 

            It has always been a miracle to me how problems can be solved when we tell each other what they are.  People who have no transportation discover that there are those who are willing to help; people who finally can tell someone that they have overwhelming financial or family problems can discover that there are ways that these things can be helped.  This happens only in community, when we know each other and trust each other so that we can share our deepest problems. 

             This is at the last, what loving means.  It is how we share our lives with each other and find common solutions to our various problems, and the struggles that we have in our community.   This is what I believe that we are about as Christians, and how God moves in this turbulent world.

Guns and Courage

          On December 8, 1941, the United States Congress declared war on Germany and Japan after the disastrous Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.  The European war had been festering for a long time and the US had provided aid to Britain in the form of Lend-Lease and other programs.  The President had hoped to keep us out of a shooting war, but after Pearl Harbor, that was no longer an option and this country headed into a four year shooting war with a seemingly endless cold war to follow with the Soviet Union. 

           

            I am impressed with the solidarity of the war declaration, a country united in purpose and resolve.  I remember the posters that went up all over the country uniting us and proclaiming our clear intent to not let the disaster of Pearl Harbor, or the sinking of the Lusitania go unpunished.  We were certainly a nation unified in purpose.

            I remember all of this because of the incredible difficulty that we seem to have in this nation after the Newtown shootings to provide any kind of effective legislation regarding guns.  There is, to be sure, organized opposition to anything that would restrict gun ownership or providing background checks of purchasers of guns, but the country seems to me to be united in its resolve to do something about the proliferation of assault weapons in this country and the problem of mentally unstable people able to get their hands on them.  We keep hearing about the Second Amendment to the Constitution, and its granting of permission to own guns, with the part about a well-regulated militia being necessary for our common defense de-emphasized so that it always sounds as though our founding fathers were endorsing the possession of any kind of weapon at all by the common people.  

            Where is the resolve that the people of this country are demanding?  Where is the courage of this congress to provide relief even in the face of the concerted opposition of the American Rifle Association and all of the others who are opposed to any kind of regulation?  

            In the face of certain opposition by many people who had power, Jesus continued to heal and instruct, knowing full well that those in power were trying to kill him.  His healing and their killing were not to be avoided, and we have the Cross of Calvary, and the Resurrection of Jesus as our prize and our hope out of all that he did in his powerful ministry.  

            All that we need to do is to cling to that hope with the same courage that our Lord provided to us and without fear do something about not only guns, but all of the crises that face humankind.  God will bless us when we do this.

Lent and Resurrection

           We are into Lent, that wonderful season of repentance and meditation; those forty days that precede Easter every year.  This can be a very useful time for all of us.  The intent is to imitate the journey of Jesus into the wilderness where he was tempted by the devil for all of his time there.  We are offered an opportunity to examine our lives, think about how we live them and think about how we might live them differently.  The process can bring us to a much better place than when we began. 

            Lent begins for me with Shrove Tuesday, when we eat sometimes terrible pancakes usually provided by our youth groups, with some kind of charity in mind.  But the main event at the beginning of Lent is Ash Wednesday, the day that we present ourselves at the altar of God and receive ashes on our foreheads, and listen to the solemn words:  Remember that you are dust, and to dust you will return.  This follows a liturgy of confession and repentance that brings us all together as a people who are dedicated to the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  I know that we all mean it when we offer our confession and receive the absolution, but it doesn’t take us very long before we begin again to deviate from what we have so solemnly promised.  That is not to suggest that it is impossible, but merely to offer the observation that we are all human and that we continue in our sin daily. 

            I’ve always been impressed with Jesus’ trip into the desert and the way that he responded to the devil when he tempted him.  All of the temptations were things that Jesus needed very much.  First, was his hunger and the temptation to turn the stones into bread.  Jesus said to the devil, that one doesn’t live by bread alone.  That almost seems curious when you reflect on the hunger that life in the desert can create; but Jesus resisted this because of his dedication to the word of God, and his need to keep his focus on his mission.  Secondly, the devil offered to Jesus all of the cities of the world, if only he would worship the devil.  Jesus resisted this by telling the devil that It is written worship the Lord your God, and serve only Him, again, being in charge of all of the cities of the world is something that was deeply a part of Jesus’ hope, indeed, it has been the goal of the church since it was created.  But having this given to him with the price of devil worship wasn’t in the mix.  It involved Jesus renouncing the worship of God that was the very essence of his being.  Thirdly, the devil took Jesus to Jerusalem, put him on the pinnacle of the temple and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down so that angels will rescue you so that you will not dash your foot against a stone.”  Jesus resisted this by simply saying do not put the Lord your God to the test. At the end of all of this, the scripture says that the devil ended his temptations and departed from Jesus until an opportune time.

           

            This last temptation is certainly a preview of the crucifixion.  Nicholas Kazantzakis echoes this in his magnificent book The Last Temptation of Christ when he has Jesus come down from the cross in the middle of his crucifixion, being tempted by a small girl, who is really the devil who has returned at what he believes to be “an opportune time”. In this fantasy, Jesus goes on to live in Bethany with Mary, whom he marries and has several children.

  After a long time, the dream is over; Jesus wakes up, is back on the cross and the crucifixion continues.  One can almost applaud Kazantzakis’ beautiful fantasy ending of a story that we know so very well; that Jesus dies on the cross and is buried in a tomb.  What this book tells us is that Jesus’ resurrection is not possible without his death, and that Jesus’ death is there for all of us to understand that with his death and resurrection, we will also rise from our graves into the loving arms of our Lord God.  That is what this Lenten journey is all about; to give us some perspective on this incredible story.

            Do we really believe in the Resurrection?  We’ve never seen one.  I can tell you that I have stood beside caskets many times at funerals when I wished that I could wave my hands and do a resurrection.  The grief that we all suffer at those times is palpable.  I would have loved to be able to mitigate that horrible grief with a happy ending right there.  What we all need to remember is that we all have a happy ending.  Our resurrections are secure, no matter what else we might think, we will be safe in the arms of our God after our deaths, whether we believe that or not.   I know, I’m asking you to grasp the most incredible mystery that this world offers.  What about life after death?  What happens to us when we die?  No matter what it is that we wish for our enemies, our God is full of grace and merciful.  That is the end of the story.  We are loved with an intensity that we can’t even begin to imagine.  It is the kind of Love that God wishes for all of us to have for each other.  If we were somehow able to do that, all of the wars would cease and we would return this world to the paradise of Eden.  Isn’t that what we all have in mind?  There is a project that will occupy us for all of this Lent.  Work on it.

The Role of Religion

          I found myself stunned when I learned that the Lutheran clergyperson who participated in the joint prayer service in Newtown, Connecticut had to apologize for his appearance there because his Missouri synod superiors were afraid that he stepped over the line in seeming to offer some kind of recognition to other religions.  I have also been somewhat puzzled by the way that the bishops of the Roman Catholic church have argued against the way that the Affordable Health Care law provides for birth control for people who want it.  The bishops don’t want to have to pay for it.  The government has bent over backwards to try to insure that their paying for it won’t be the case.  I also wonder why the newly appointed Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby sees fit to say that he stands in opposition to gay marriage in England.  He is just entering office and it seems to me that there are a lot of other things that religious people in England and indeed all over the world need to hear from him other than this.

            What all of this says to me is that religion seems to be trying very hard to commit suicide.  There is nothing new in that, it has been going on for two thousand years.  As soon as religion gains a foothold, it begins with its claims of certainty to undermine its very existence.  I’m not surprised by this, human arrogance being what it is, we will not see the end of it any time soon. 

            In Luke’s gospel, he tells the story of Jesus taking Peter, James and John with him up to the top of the mountain in Galilee where he is transfigured before them and they see Moses and Elijah with him and out of the deep cloud that covers Jesus, they hear the voice of God say to all of them: This is my son, my chosen, listen to him! The disciples are deeply moved by this.  But what really interests me about this story is what happens next.  They come down the mountain and a man calls to Jesus to come and to heal his son, who has been seized by a spirit that makes him shriek and convulse.  The man tells Jesus that he asked his disciples to cure the son, but they were unable to do it.  Jesus throws a fit and says:  You faithless and perverse generation, how much longer must I be with you?  He asks the man to bring his son to him.  He calls the evil spirit out of the child and cures him. 

            The reason that I love that story is because it is a mirror of what we do with our religion.  God gave us all of the tools that we need to provide comfort to those in need in this world, and we continue to squander them on issues such as I raised above.  We fight our religious battles in the world of politics, not human need.  No wonder God becomes impatient with us.  We need to learn that our religion is not absolute.  Our religion is simply a way for us to express our faith, and our faith is the only thing that binds us to our God.  Our particular religion is one of many ways to honor that faith.  When we fight over it we dishonor ourselves and our faith.