4 Easter

Introduction. Vision of pastor and pastoral community

“I am the good shepherd,” says Jesus. Ah! How that warms my heart! Jesus’ vision of the good shepherd, the one who loves us, the one who cares for us, the one who searches for us when we are lost.

And later, when Jesus sends forth his church, he sends us as a pastoral community. We are to care for the wounded and the lost and the wandering.

We human beings long for the good shepherd, long for the caring community.

As a parish priest I have seen this longing in person after person. Wounded souls come to the church looking for care, looking for someone who will understand, someone who will take care of them, looking for a flock they may be part of, and in which they will find solace, security, direction.

We are called — you and I —  to be a loving flock, a group of loving shepherds. We are called to care for the wounded, for each other, for the world.

1. Flaws and failures

And of course, we fall far short. Among my most painful memories are the times when I failed to help or when I even harmed. I remember also hearing, all too often,  of lost sheep for whom no one searched, lost sheep whose absence no one even noticed.

I think of those we have lost here at Trinity. I lost several good friends who were mad at the rector. They just left, and I still miss them. Others left us because of the church’s change of position concerning gays and lesbians. The choir was splintered a few years back when our choirmaster was asked to leave. Many were upset by the departure of Carol Wageman.

I think we’re in pretty good shape as a parish, but we have gone through many hurtful ups and downs. And that’s the way it is in the church. The flock, the shepherds fall far short of being the good shepherd or the good flock.

It was so even for Jesus. His disciples showed all the flaws and failures we see in the church today. They quarreled. They fought among themselves for first place. They failed Jesus in his hour of need.

And it was so for Paul and the early evangelists. Paul and Barnabas quarreled about Mark. Barnabas wanted to take Mark along on their second or third trip, but Paul said no, because Mark had failed them earlier. The disagreement was so great that Barnabas and Paul split up. Barnabas went on a separate trip with Mark, and Paul found himself another companion, Silas, for his trip.

And church history is no better; it’s worse if anything. Look at how splintered we are! Look at our treatment of the Jews! Look at the scandals among our clergy!

It is no wonder that many people have just given up on us. We talk big. Our ideals are wonderful. But our performance leaves much to be desired.

2. Why stay (or leave)?

So why am I still here? I have asked myself that question many times over the years.

How can I still adhere to such a flawed church? And the answer is always the same — because I believe in the vision, and I am committed to the vision. I know that we fall far short. And I repent of that. I sorrow because of that. But I believe in our call, and I see around me other flawed souls who also believe in our call and are committed to it.

When would I leave a community? — I would leave when their vision, when their picture of life and what they see themselves called to, contradicts the gospel vision. I cannot, for example, belong to a community whose vision is success. Our vision is to serve, not to be king of the hill. Neither can I belong to a community that has given up, a community without Holy Spirit. I belong to a community empowered and led the by the Holy Spirit of God.

 

3. What did Jesus do?

What did Jesus do? He belonged to a religious community — the people of Israel—  whose vision he deeply criticized. We see him time after time in conflict with the religious authorities. But he did not leave. He stayed within the community, rejected false vision within that community, and held up authentic vision. He was committed to a vision and he sought to commit others to that vision.

He gathered a community around himself. He ministered to and taught a very large following of disciples. He called twelve very flawed men to be apostles. And he was disappointed in them. At the garden of Gethsemane he asked for their help and did not get it. “Could you not watch with me for one hour?” he lamented. He was hurt by them. But he did not break up with them. He did not leave them.

Their failings led instead to his commitment. They failed him; he gave himself to the cross. And he calls us to both his vision and his method. We are to hold up to the world the vision of a loving community and we are to pay the price. When we are hurt by our companions, when members of the pastoral community fail us and wound us, we are to accept that cross. We are called not to avoid pain. We are called not to reject suffering. We are to embrace it for the sake of others.

There’s a collect in the Prayer Book for Fridays in Morning Prayer that reads as follows: Almighty God, whose most dear Son went not up to joy but first he suffered pain, and entered not into glory before he was crucified: Mercifully grant that we, walking in the way of the cross, may find it none other than the way of life and peace.

We are called, you and I, to walk the way of the cross.

Conclusion. Our clash with the world

I am more and more struck, as time goes on, perhaps because I am approaching my final years, by how much Jesus’ vision is at odds with the world. He wasn’t just at odds with the world of his day; he’s at odds with our world too. We are to be servant, says Jesus, not master. Donald Trump proclaims the gospel of success — we can all become king of the hill — only wimps fail. Jesus leads us on the way of the cross. But the world admires the strong, decisive man of violence — and now, these days, the woman of violence too.

When I say these things I am conscious that I too am infected by the world. I am glad to live in a comfortable home. I am glad to have good food. I am glad to have computers and phones and e-books. I am glad not to be in conflict with the world I live in. I am not rushing out into the nearby woods to find and feed the homeless.

But I’m uncomfortable about my middle-class life, my middle-class privileges. That’s good. I think that if we are not uncomfortable at being well-off, we are not hearing the gospel.

So stick with it. The church is a community of very flawed people, people who fail a lot, but people called to a vision, and, to an important degree, committed to that vision.

2 Lent

Introduction. Evil and the four covenants

It all starts with the creation myth. At each stage of creation, as God creates light, the firmament, the waters, and so on, we hear the chorus, “and God saw that it was good.” But it wasn’t all good. How that came to be we don’t know.

But the tempter was there. And fallible human beings were there. And evil entered God’s creation. And soon there was murder, a brother killing a brother, Cain killing Abel.

God had a problem. What was he — she — to do about the evil in creation? The first, obvious step was punishment. Cain is to be a fugitive.

Later, once murder has spread among humankind, vengeance also spreads. The family of the victim can kill the murderer. A form of crude justice is emerging. But sometimes the killer is innocent of wrong-doing; so cities of refuge are established. If the killer can get to a city of refuge the family of the dead man cannot kill him.

But that’s not a good solution.

God sees such evil among human beings, it is so widespread that he — she — decides to start over. All human beings except for the righteous Noah and his family are to be destroyed by a flood. But when it’s over God decides that that is not a good solution either. So God makes a promise to Noah and all humanity, not to send another such flood. This is the first covenant, and its sign is the rainbow.

We read about that covenant last week. Today we read about a second covenant, one between God and Abraham. God has made another decision. “Instead of wiping out humankind I am going to build a new humanity. I see that Abram and Sarai are a righteous man and woman. I will choose them and their descendants to live in covenant with me. I will give them a multitude of nations for descendants.” Abram becomes Abraham. Sarai becomes Sarah. And the sign of this second covenant is circumcision.

In the next step God makes a radical new decision. Previously the covenants have been with all of humanity or with a great multitude of nations. Now God decides to choose one people, one tribe, the Israelites, with whom to make a covenant. He chooses Moses to lead this people and through him gives the Law, which is now to be his — her — instrument in the struggle against evil. Through the Law God is going to train the Israelites in righteousness.

In human terms we would call this succession of events a path of trial and error. God creates, but his creatures fall. The covenants with Noah and Abraham are not good enough; so God makes another with Moses and the people of Israel.

And now, today, in our second lesson, we hear Paul say No to the Mosaic covenant. He sees this covenant too as another inadequate solution to the problem of human evil. Paul’s argument in support of this conclusion is hard to follow. I’m going to simplify it.

1. Paul’s rejection of the third covenant

Let’s imagine ourselves in Paul’s situation. He’s a Jew, an heir of the Mosaic covenant. He’s a Pharisee, a student of the greatest Pharisaic scholar of the day, Gamaliel. He’s a Christian. He has tried to get in right relation to God by keeping the Law, by adhering to the Mosaic covenant, but has failed. Keeping the Law has not worked for him. What has worked is faith in Jesus. Through that faith he has received the Holy Spirit and has been reborn in Christ. He has become a new person. And he has witnessed the same rebirth in many other people — both Jew and gentile. You are saved, he teaches, not by keeping the Law, but by putting your faith in God and receiving the Holy Spirit. You do not keep the moral law through your own effort; you keep it through the Holy Spirit, because you have been reborn in the Holy Spirit. Faith, not human effort, is what saves you. Faith opens you to the power of God, and in that power — in that right relation to God — you are able to be good.

So, says Paul, we are not subject the covenant of Moses. Not even our father Abraham was saved through the Law; he was saved by believing the word of God.

2. Our covenant

Our church language sometimes obscures meaning. We speak, for example, of the “New Testament,” and usually understand that to mean a book. We think of the “Old Testament” as one book and the “New Testament” as another. Well, ok. But those are secondary meanings.

The Old Testament is the Old Covenant, the third covenant, the covenant made between God, on the one hand, and Moses and the Israelites, on the other. You and I are members of the New Covenant, the Covenant between all of humanity and God in Jesus. The sign of this covenant is Baptism.

Notice, in particular, that the covenants are with peoples. The covenants are not with individuals. It is Noah and all humanity. Abraham and a multitude of nations. Moses and the tribe of Israel. Us, the People of God and all humankind.

When I was ordained, Baptisms were private affairs. They were performed on a weekday at the convenience of the participants. Baptism was very much a family affair. Thus in practice the new covenant was understood privately, individualistically. What happened in Baptism, in our common understanding, was something between an infant (or occasionally an adult) and God.

That changed for us dramatically in the late 70’s when the present Book of Common Prayer was introduced. Suddenly Baptism was to be performed on Sunday as a public event, as a ceremony of the People of God, not an intimate family event. The change caused a lot of trouble between parish clergy and parents and grandparents. I had conflict after conflict with families that wanted a private Baptism at the convenience of the participants. They resented making what they saw as a private event being turned into a public event.

In Baptism we are reborn into a new humanity, the Body of Christ. In Baptism the People of God initiate a new member. The new member takes on the identity and the mission of the People of God. If you look at pages 304-305 of the Prayer Book, where we subscribe to the New Covenant, you find our identity and mission spelled out. We are to adhere one in another through the apostles’ teaching, the breaking of bread, and the prayers. We are to persevere in resisting evil. We are to proclaim the Good News. We are to serve our neighbor. And we are to minister to all humankind by striving for justice and peace and by respecting the dignity of every human being.

In sum, we are to build a new humanity. We are to carry out the task begun in the Abrahamic Covenant. The old humanity is riddled by evil. In this covenant the evil in humankind is to be combated by the building of a new humanity in the Holy Spirit, through faith in Jesus Christ.

Conclusion. How to combat ISIS

I’ve been thinking a lot about ISIS — the Islamic State — lately. I imagine that all of us have. We have seen one horror after another — kidnapped men beheaded, or burnt alive — or in the most recent case twenty-nine coptic Christians beheaded because of being Christian. And now recently many more Christians have been kidnapped, and in all likelihood will be murdered in some gruesome fashion.

My gut reaction is anger and violence. Go after them! Send our armed forces after them! This is intolerable! They must be wiped out!

I’m reacting like the God of Noah.

If I were God I would send a flood!

But that won’t do.

So what should we do? What should our reaction be to this human evil?

I do not know in particular. I do know in general.

We, the People of God, are called to be and to build a new humanity. Jesus fought evil by giving himself to the cross. Are we to do that? Are we to be martyrs to ISIS or Boko Haram or Al Qaeda? I find that hard to believe.

Perhaps the path we are looking for is the one of non-violent confrontation taken by Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr. There is an institution —  the Albert Einstein Institution — devoted to the study and propagation of this kind of change action. Their studies show how various non-violent tactics — even against vicious dictators — can bring about change. And it isn’t just talk. Various revolutions have successfully taken place using their nonviolent method. In any case, I believe we as Christians — as the seed of the new humanity — are called to find and use ways to combat evil and build the new universal People of God. It’s our mission. That’s why the New Covenant exists.

http://www.aeinstein.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/OSNC.pdf

http://www.aeinstein.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/How-Nonviolent-Struggle-Works.pdf

http://www.aeinstein.org

 

Lent 1 A

Introduction. Our ties to one another

I’m going to talk today about sin — specifically, original sin. But in order to do that I need to talk about us — you and me — about our connections, our ties.

My great granddaughter, Olive, was born to two parents, Holly and Warren. She is tied to them and they to her by emotion, by need, by love, by bonds so strong they can be felt by me and anyone else who observes them, by bonds so strong they can almost be seen and touched. She is also tied to her grandparents — to Holly’s parents and to my son and daughter-in-law. And she is tied to me.

She is tied to family networks — to the living and the dead also — and not only to family but to the local and national networks into which she was born. She will speak with a Canadian accent because she is tied to Canadians. She will learn Canadian history. She is learning French as well as English. She will acquire western European attitudes and habits. She will pray as a Christian. She will buy and sell and work within the capitalist system. She will be protected by police systems and armies. She may even be drafted.

The number of networks into which she has been born and into which she will become increasingly tied is vast.

To illustrate how each thing on earth is connected with each other other thing on earth it is said that a petal falling from a flower in Thailand may cause a tornado in Alabama.

We are born, you and I, connected to vast networks of humanity and of earth. There is no such thing as an isolated individual. There is no such thing as a thing by itself.

1. Diseased networks

The problem for Olive and for every newborn child is that the networks into which they are born are diseased. I think my family is reasonably healthy, but I cannot maintain that it has no problems, no spiritual dysfunction whatever. And certainly, as much as I admire Canada, I cannot say that it is entirely healthy. Or the capitalist system. Or our educational systems. Or our businesses. Or the church. Every human network is diseased.

Olive was born into dysfunctional, diseased networks. Olive will struggle all her life against the dysfunction in which she is embedded.

We can call that fact the doctrine of original dysfunction or original disease. Our Hebrew ancestors, however, detected more than dysfunction. They sensed alienation. Somehow they were alienated from their source of being. They told stories from one generation to the next about their fundamental alienation, about a good God who created all things good, and from whom they had cut themselves off, about a righteous God who saw their evil deeds and in outrage destroyed all humankind except Noah and his family, about a loving God who rescued his people from slavery and made a covenant of law with them. From this God, who kept pursuing them, they felt themselves alienated.

Original dysfunction, original spiritual disease proceeding from alienation — that is the doctrine of original sin. We are born into a dysfunctional world alienated from its source of being, God.

I hasten to add that there are other aspects to the doctrine, that there are other ways of expressing it. But this is the best way I know to make it clear that we are each born in sin.

2. Guilt

Notice that Olive is not to blame. Olive did not choose to be born into an alienated, dysfunctional world. Olive did not choose to be born in sin. She has done nothing wrong. She is not guilty of sin. She has, however, been born into a world of sin.

But here’s the joker for Olive. Because she lives and will continue to live in diseased networks, she’ll catch their disease. She will do things she ought not to do; she will sin. And even though she did not choose to be born into such a world, and even though sinful behavior — at least some — is inevitable on her part, she will be guilty. She will come down with spiritual disease and from time to time she will do things she ought not to do, and for that she will be guilty. It happens to us all.

St. Paul calls it slavery. He graphically describes how he is enslaved to sin. And we are too — each of us. I have sinful habits I struggle against in vain. So do you. And so will Olive. That’s the human condition. You and I and our networks are enslaved to sin.

3. Human improvement

There’s a counter-story that needs to be told.

Not only is human history the story of war and strife and alienation; it is also the story of peacemaking and reconciliation and improvement in the human condition. You and I can look around us and bewail a downward trend in American life, but the fact is that our lives are vastly better than the lives of our ancestors. Our political system, as bad as it is, is far preferable to most of those in the world or those that have gone before. Humankind has gone in stages little by little from savagery to rule by petty kings or barons, then to kingdoms and empires, and eventually to democracies, each stage bringing — usually — an improvement in human relations and behavior. So human effort, human learning, human virtue amount to something.

How do such improvements take place?

Each step must be understood, I believe, as a giving up of self. I get better when I stop trying to heal myself by myself. I get better when I give up self to God or to another, loving human being. I get better when I stop trying to protect my ego.

Institutions get better when they stop trying to protect self, when they stop trying to enrich self, when they give up self-interest and seek the good of othersl

Think of some recent battles for and against reform. I’ll take some simple ones — tobacco sales, bottle and can deposits, and now, on the horizon, no more free plastic one-use bags. I choose these issues not because they are specially evil, but because it is easy to see the dynamics. The self-interest of tobacco companies fought and is still fighting against reform. Bottle and can deposits became successful law when the drink manufacturers discovered they could make money from the way the deposits are handled. And, you know, with plastic bags I can see several sets of self-interest that will have to be conquered if change is to take place. Consumers — you and I — and stores will have to give up convenience. Plastic bag makers will probably fight to the end. Giving up their self-interest means giving up a lot of money. And change will take place only when enough people give up self-interest.

Human advance means giving up self. And then I look with amazement at the shelves of books about self-improvement, about expanding the self, about enriching self-esteem. We are really hooked, you and I! We really are centered on self!

Conclusion. The church

That’s where the church comes in — on both the individual and corporate levels.

When we say, “Jesus saves,” we think immediately — at least I do — of individual salvation, of a person accepting Jesus and being saved. John Wesley, whose feast day we celebrated recently, comes to mind. He experienced an inner conversion on May 24, 1738, while listening to a reading of Luther’s Preface to the Epistle to the Romans. “I felt my heart strangely warmed,” he recorded, “I felt I did trust in Christ, Christ alone, for salvation; and an assurance was given me that he had taken away my sins, even mine, and saved me from the law of sin and death.”

We Anglicans don’t usually go in for such drama. We are likely to express more doubt, but at the same time more confidence in the church. We are likely to believe that partaking in the sacraments and confessing our sins we’ll turn out all right in the end. We are likely to believe more in a process of conversion than in a one time event.

Corporate conversion gets expressed, gets acted out successfully from time to time. Pope Francis appeals, I believe, because he is calling for corporate conversion, for a converted church. I loved the Episcopal Church I grew up in, but the Episcopal Church of today seems to me to have become a gradually converted church. Our witness and action have helped change many sinful networks — those that oppress women, those that oppress people of color, those that oppress sexual minorities, those that oppress religious minorities. I think we still have a long way to go when it comes to sinful business and social networks.

Such conversion — individual and corporate — is what Jesus is for. That’s what his self-lessness is for. That’s what we are called individually and as a body to be — self-less in the midst of a self-interested, self-centered, self-confident world.