ben | 
02 26th, 2010| 
You can view an archived copy of The eClarion right here.
Feb
26
The Friday Letters
26 February 2010
My Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
Our collect prayer for this coming Sunday begins thus, “O God, whose glory it is always to have mercy,” yet in the eyes of the world, mercy looks like failure.
That’s a funny phrase, isn’t it? In the eyes of the world. There is a long history of Christians using this phrase to imply that the world is not seeing things correctly—that there is a difference between how the world sees and judges things and the way in which God does. Completely true, of course, as far as it applies to God. The lie in this popular statement is that it also implies that we Christians, the habitual utterers of this phrase, do not see with the eyes of the world.
It’s a noble goal, but I don’t think it gets done very often. I know my eyes are eyes of the world most of the time. My eyes, just like the eyes of the world, see mercy as failure. It looks like loosing. It doesn’t look like glory at all.
During Lent we seek to engage with the twinned ideas of mercy and judgment. Last week I wrote about justice. Not long ago I spoke about the fear of the Lord. The season of Lent is permeated by the religious idea of sin: what it is, how it dwells with us, where we can find peace from it. In the collect this week there is no mention of the harder side of God’s operation, just the assertion that God’s glory is somehow tied up with God’s mercy, and Thank God for that.
We look to God and ask for mercy, and when it’s God we’re talking about we are willing to see mercy as glory. Where else are we willing to see that? Where else do our eyes of the world see mercy and recognize it as glory, instead of finding it to be weakness? Are our politics characterized by mercy? Are our international relations merciful? What about our own lives, and the relationships we have with both friends and strangers—is there mercy there?
God is greater than we are, to be sure. Our mercy will never match God’s. Yet we are created in the image of God, and that is not just a blessing but a responsibility. If it is God’s glory to have mercy, then it is our calling to do likewise.
Peace,
Ben.
Feb
19
The Friday Letters
19 February 2010
My Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
Here are the first and last lines from today’s reflection, as published in the Episcopal Relief and Development “2010 Lenten Meditations” booklet, available in the Parish Hall:
The Lord is full of compassion and mercy: Come let us adore him.
Compassion and mercy are difficult to measure, if we can’t recognize how deeply we need them. I want justice when you’ve wronged me and mercy when I’ve wronged you. Maybe one day we’ll learn is doesn’t work that way.
That first sentence ought to sound vaguely familiar to you as it is part of our regular Lenten liturgy. The second thought is a wonderful one, poignantly highlighting our desire to have God’s blessings applied in exactly the way that we wish.
When we are wronged, by another person or by a system indifferent to us, it is easy to call for justice. Easy, and not wrong. However, when we are the one doing wrong, even if unintentionally or accidentally, justice often means loosing some advantage or comfort that we had grown accustomed to. It’s harder to be excited about justice when it feels like we’re loosing out through no large fault of our own.
It is the same with mercy. It isn’t easy to ask for forgiveness, but once we’ve decided to do so it is often with the expectation of mercy. OK, we think, we screwed up: our fault. Once we’ve admitted it, forgiveness seems almost obligatory. Yet how much harder is it for us to forgive? How difficult to show mercy, particularly when mercy isn’t even deserved.
It is a good thing that God does not hold to our standards of justice and mercy. We are forever tied to our own perspective, while God views each of us as a unique but equally well beloved creature. Justice falls on the deserving and undeserving alike. Mercy is given to all, regardless of their individual worthiness. Several of Jesus’ best known parables illustrate this principle to the confusion and objection of his listeners. This isn’t fair. Not at all. And thank God.
Peace,
Ben.
Feb
14
A sermon by The Rev. Benjamin J. Newland on the last Sunday after the Epiphany
It seems to me that one of the pieces of vital information that the modern city-dweller must have is the location and phone number of the nearest Chinese restaurant, preferably one that delivers. I’m not talking about a good Chinese restaurant, necessarily. I’m talking about a place where you can order General Tso’s Chicken, and Sweet & Sour Pork, and all those other traditional dishes that no self-respecting Chinese person would ever even think of eating when in China. Chinese-American food, I guess we call it.
There was just such a restaurant about eight blocks from my house in Kansas City. I don’t remember the name. It was just one of those places where you called in your order and picked it up on the way home. Not the kind of place you could make part of a healthy eating plan, but a necessary place nonetheless.
One of my favorite things about that little restaurant was their secret annual tradition. Once a year, on a particular day which changed each year, if you said “Happy New Year” to the staff, you’d get a free order of Egg Rolls. The day in question was not January first, of course, but the more elusive Chinese Lunar New Year, which moves around irregularly between late January and mid February. I discovered this tradition on accident one year, when Google coincidentally reminded me that it was Chinese New Year while I was looking for something else. On all subsequent year I carefully marked the date, for this annual special was not advertised at the little Chinese Restaurant; you had to be an insider.
I mention this for two reasons. One, because today is the first day of the year of the Tiger. I’m particularly excited this year because Tiger is my year. Most of us born in 1975—like my wife—are Rabbits, but the lucky few born before the new moon in February are Tigers. I get a great deal of pleasure out of the fact that Tigers and Rabbits are supposed to make poor couples, a fact that it hardly seems you’d need an astrologer to tell you.
The second reason I mention that little Chinese place in Kansas City is because I got to be an insider there. I got to know something about a culture completely alien to me, and to recognize that, and to be recognized in return. Just think of me as Peter at the foot of the mountain where Jesus is being Transfigured before his eyes.
OK, that’s a long stretch, I’ll admit it, but bear with me for a moment. For Peter, Jesus is the nearly incomprehensible mediator of a completely alien divinity. Peter follows Jesus, and he can touch Jesus, and in some small sense he knows who Jesus is. Yet the divine Kingdom of God that Jesus enables around him is not something Peter has any experience of. He can’t name it, most days, let alone understand it. For me, that little Chinese Restaurant was the nearly incomprehensible mediator of a culture completely alien to me. I had no real experience of Eastern thought, let alone food. True, comparing salvation to General Tso’s Chicken is probably second degree blasphemy, though if you’re hungry enough the distinctions can start to blur.
All right, I’m done trying make Chinese New Year and The Transfiguration work together. Hopefully next year the Lunar cycle will line up with some better readings.
All three of the lectionary readings for this Sunday feature glowing faces. Moses speaks to God and returns with tablets inscribed with the law and a shining face. Paul writes to the Corinthians and compares Moses’ glowing face with Jesus’ Transfigured one. In the Gospel, Luke tells the story of Jesus climbing the mountain to pray and being transformed before the eyes of a couple sleepy Disciples.
Here are the two prominent lines in my mind as I hear these texts:
“As he came down from the mountain with the two tablets of the covenant in his hand, Moses did not know that the skin of his face shone because he had been talking with God. When Aaron and all the Israelites saw Moses, the skin of his face was shining, and they were afraid to come near him.”
“…while he was praying, the appearance of his face changed, and his clothes became dazzling white… a cloud came and overshadowed them; and they were terrified as they entered the cloud.”
These two stories, one from Exodus and one from the Gospel, are really very similar. Moses and Jesus both ascend. They both come face to face with God and are changed, or perhaps not changed but merely revealed. Upon returning to the world, those who see them can perceive this change—this unveiling—and respond with fear.
I have long been fascinated with the Biblical concept of fear. The King James version generally has it, “the fear of the Lord,” or “those who fear the Lord.” More modern translations usually seek out a word that more closely resembles what the ancients meant by ‘fear’. It is more than just ‘afraid’, though that’s in there. It’s also respect, and awe, and overwhelming reverence.
In the transfiguration stories, it’s Aaron and the Hebrews who experience this. They are afraid to come near Moses in his divinely charged state. They aren’t afraid of Moses, exactly, but they are wary of approaching too closely to such a display of God’s power. In the Gospels Peter is not afraid but terrified—a word with less useful subtexts. This is typical for Peter though, to overdo things until he’s completely missed the point.
The reason I’m so taken with the Biblical concept of fearing God is because I want to be afraid of God. I want that ancient fear in my understanding of God—that realization that I am not in control of this relationship, and that God might do anything, at anytime, with or without my permission. That is terrifying, if you think about it, but fear of God is deeper than merely being afraid.
Since it is the Chinese New Year, think about the Chinese symbol for crisis. I’m sure you’ve heard before than in the language of Chinese symbols, the greater symbol translated as ‘crisis’ is made up of two lesser symbols: one for ‘danger’ and one for ‘opportunity’. In Chinese, a crisis is not wholly negative as it tends to be in English. Then again, it’s not exactly safe, either.
And since this year is the year of the Tiger, I share with you part of a poem. In this poem, a tiger represents Jesus, and in the particular verse I’m going to read you, we are at that wedding in Caana of Galilee.
Now, therefore, Tiger.
The time of celebration is at hand.
Prepare the wedding feast.
The bridegroom crouches
motionless
outside the door
and licks his fangs.
I’m not much of a poetry critic myself, but I’ve always liked the idea of Jesus as a Tiger: beautiful and powerful and deceptively lazy in his movements, but always capable of being dangerous. A predator who hunts not other animals but our own failings and weaknesses. A spiritual predator of sin, if you will.
It is appropriate, I suppose, that Transfiguration Sunday comes just before the season of Lent. It is as if we’re being shown a bit of the stick for which Easter’s redemption is the carrot, and now we have six weeks to come to terms with than. I maintain that while there is much opportunity in the crisis, and much awe and reverence in the fear, that there is still danger—there is still fear. To come face to face with God is no small thing, and not something that can be survived if you wish to stay as you have always been. That’s what Aaron and the Israelites were really afraid of, I think. That’s what had Peter so terrified: to witness transfiguration is to be transfigured yourself. To come face to face with God is to die to what you had been and then to be reborn into something else. In the season of Lent which is about to start, my prayer is that we all might come to find the opportunity within the danger—that we all might come to fear God anew. AMEN.
Feb
12
You can view an archived copy of this edition of The eClarion here.
Feb
12
The Friday Letters
12 February 2010
My Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
Lots of things to tell you about this week!
First, it is my proud duty to report to you the results of last Saturday’s 2nd Annual CECoP Chili Cook-Off. In the “Best Presentation” category, the award went to Diana Mears, who’s display was both impressive and tasteful. Second, in the “Most Original” category, the award went to Kathy Mason, who’s turkey and chic pea chili stood out from the crowd. Of the two non-elective awards, the “Father’s Choice” award (chosen this year by my father rather than the Father) went to then five-week old Julian Class, who graciously allowed his grandfather to cook his chili for him; and the “Best 18 y/o and Under” award went to Elena Barry, who deserved it despite the lack of competition. Finally, the “Best Overall” chili award, the coveted Golden Chili Bowl, goes to two pots of chili this year as the voting was split exactly. Congratulations to Barry O’Brien and Elena Barry: your trophy is being engraved as we speak!
Now on to our upcoming events. Hopefully you’ve been adequately forewarned about next week’s Shrove Tuesday Pancake Supper and Game Night. Come on down next Tuesday around 5pm, enjoy the cooking of our Men’s Group, and stick around to play a favorite board or card game. Bring one to share, even.
Following Shrove Tuesday is Ash Wednesday of course. We’ll have two services for your convenience: the first at noon and the second at seven in the evening.
As in previous years, each Wednesday in Lent will be an opportunity to gather for a shared dinner of soup and bread. Dinner (for which you can sign up to bring something) will be followed by a presentation and discussion. This year we’re doing a DVD by the BBC called, “Ancient Evidence: the Mysteries of Jesus”. Topics for the weeks include, “King Herod: Madman or Murderer?”, “The Real Disciples of Jesus”, “Who Killed Jesus?”, and “The Real Mary Magdalene.” We’ll finish each evening off with a short prayer service. Please come and participate in the food, fellowship, and prayer.
Finally, I want to give you a heads up on a couple more events I have in the works right now. The first will come on Palm Sunday, March 28th, at about 11:30am. Following the 10am Eucharist, there will be a pot luck lunch (sign-up sheet to come) and two different activities for all. One activity will be to make your own Palm Cross out of the palm fronds we use during the liturgy. In previous years these have been pre-made by the Altar Guild, but this year you get to make your own. Skilled Palm Cross makers will be on hand to assist you. The second activity will be Natural Easter Egg dyeing. I’ve done this before, but would love to have an assistant if anyone is interested. There’s an announcement in The eClarion about a few things to save for this—you’d be amazed at the beautiful color you can get out of yellow onion skins!
The other upcoming event doesn’t have a date yet, but it’ll be forthcoming shortly. At some point after Easter, most likely in April, we’ll do another pot luck meal with activities for all. This time both activities will involve wax. To use up the many ends of candles we’ve got lying around (and you probably do too) we’re going to make campfire starters out of cardboard egg cartons, dryer lint, and cedar chips. Also, since we have a couple Paschal Candles to melt down as well and campfire starters seem a bit irreverent a use for retired Paschal candles, we’ll also be making votive candles for you to take home.
Are you detecting a theme here? I hope so. Both I and the Vestry are focusing this year on being thankful for the wonderful community we share, and celebrating that community by being together in simple and fun ways. I hope you’ll come and participate in these events as you feel called. I know I’m looking forward to them!
See you Sunday.
Peace,
Ben.
Feb
7
A sermon by the Rev. Benjamin J. Newland on the 5th Sunday after the Epiphany
“Woe is me! I am lost, for I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips; yet my eyes have seen the King, the LORD of hosts!”
-Isaiah 6:5
“Go away from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man.”
-Luke 5:8
In the Gospels of Mark and Matthew, there are short descriptions of the calling of the first Disciples. Jesus walks along the shores of Lake Galilee and finds Andrew and Peter, James and John, fishing. He says, “come, follow me.” And they do.
In the Gospel of John, after Jesus had been crucified, Peter and the Disciples are again at the shores of Lake Galilee. “I’m going fishing,” says Peter. So they went out, but they caught nothing. Just at dawn, a strange man appears and tells them to cast their nets again, on the other side of the boat. Despite misgivings, they do so, and a huge abundance of fish are caught.
In another place, Jesus comes upon a great crowd. Taking pity on them, he climbs a hill, or goes out on a boat, or sits down, and he teaches them.
In another place, Jesus takes just a few fish, and makes them into many.
The first eleven verses of the fifth chapter of the Gospel of Luke contains all of these stories, all mashed up together. What is going on in this morning’s Gospel reading? Is this a story of the calling of Disciples? Is this a miracle of abundance? Is it a foreshadowing of resurrection? Is it a tale of Jesus as the great teacher of the people? In short, yes. It is. All of those things.
I have decided that I like this story. I wasn’t sure at the beginning of the week, but now I have decided. The story is kind of a pain, honestly. It’s hard to figure out what to say about a passage that has so many different things going on. What does one preach on? The miracle? Peter’s confession? Discipleship or Resurrection? But in the end I decided I liked this story for just that reason: it’s complicated. The story is an amalgamation (which is a fun word), a mash-up of Jesus themes all muddled about together, which is a pretty accurate description of my faith life when you get right down to it.
Does Jesus call us to discipleship? Yes, Jesus does. Usually while he’s also teaching and halfway through a miracle. Does Jesus do miracles? Yes, Jesus does. Usually only so someone nearby will realize that God is present and have an Epiphany of their own.
There are many things to say about this passage. I’m going to limit myself to three for right now.
First, is there even a miracle going on here? I mean, it’s not like Jesus turned the lake water into wine, or even multiplied any fish. The Disciples are fishing and they don’t catch much. Then Jesus says to try again. Then they catch a bunch of fish. A miracle? Maybe, but as any fisherman can tell you there’s more than a bit of luck involved in how many fish you catch at any given time. Besides which, saying Jesus knew when and where to catch a lot of fish makes him seem less divine and more like fish-finding radar.
The thing that really makes this a miracle story is how Peter responds to the fish. Whatever just happened, Peter sees in Jesus for the first time (in the Gospel of Luke anyways) the presence of something beyond the merely human. Peter responds in his own typically grandiose and bumbling way, by yelling at Jesus to get away, for he, Peter, is not worthy. This miracle story ranks high on the list of miracle stories for me precisely because of Peter’s reaction. For once Jesus doesn’t follow up a miracle by saying, “Don’t you understand?” Peter does understand. Peter gets the miracle right away. This miracle isn’t a reward for existing faith, it’s a sign meant to terrify the casually faithful into repentance and Discipleship.
Second, and this is minor, but I feel there’s something here. Jesus doesn’t ask for well rested Disciples. We aren’t given the exact time of day like we are in John’s version of this fish tale, but we are told that the soon-to-be Disciples are done fishing. They’ve been at it all night, and now they’re done. Then Jesus comes along and commandeers their boats for his lecture. Then, after all that, he suggests they go back to fishing. At that point Peter complains, and rightly so. Again, this is minor, but I think significant. Jesus waits until the Disciples are done, and spent, and tired, and then he asks them for more. They give it, and are presented with an abundance they didn’t expect to find. I think that if we asked people who could tell us their own clear and vivid stories of being called to discipleship, they would tell us that it often works that way: Jesus waits until we’ve given all that we think we can, and then asks for more. And somehow, we find that we have more to give; there is abundance in faith that we cannot normally see.
Third, and finally, a word about that whole “fishers of men” thing. They’ve cleaned up the gender specific language in the modern version, so that now Jesus says, “from now on you will be catching people”. If you were an expert at ancient Greek and had studied the scriptures in their original language, or if you’re not but you own a book by someone who is, then you would realize that the verb in that sentence is tricking us. Jesus says that the Disciples will “catch” people, and to us it seems the same kind of thing that they had been doing to the fish just a minute ago. But the Greek verb translated as “catch” means something closer to “to rescue from the peril of death” than it does “capture”. To apply this verb to fish that are dying is ridiculous. To apply it to living people called into God’s Kingdom is something else altogether.
In the year that King Uzziah died, Isaiah had a vision. He was called. His first response, upon realize what he was dealing with, was despair. “Woe is me!” he said, “for I am a man of unclean lips.” Peter had the same reaction. As the fish were pulled into the now overloaded boat, he realized what he was dealing with. And he said “Go away from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man.” The Isaiah story is cleaner. Three verses later Isaiah has arrived at, “Here am I; send me!” Peter would need all of the rest of Luke’s Gospel and some of the Book of Acts to get to the same place.
These are the great stories of being called. First of all you recognize, somehow, the presence of the divine—the intersection of the holy with your life. Then you feel unworthy. Then God, or Jesus, or a six winged Seraph bearing a burning coal held in metal tongs says that your unworthiness is not real. Then you follow. Here am I; send me. Jesus said come, follow me. And he was sent. And they followed. AMEN.
Feb
5
You can view an archived copy of The eClarion here.
Feb
5
The Friday Letters
5 February 2010
My Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
The Epistle reading last Sunday contained this well-known line:
“And now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is love.”
The beginning of the thirteenth chapter of Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians is a well worn piece of scripture. I’ve seen these words painted on many an ornamental mailbox and cross-stitched onto fabric framed and hung in many a kitchen. These words are read aloud at more than half of all the weddings I’ve been a part of, my own included.
I’m always happy when this passage comes up in a regular Sunday rotation. Having to preach on them in the context of a wedding means trying to extract the word love from out of the romantic mire it’s always drug into at such events. Not that I’m against romance—don’t get me wrong, but that’s not what Paul was talking about.
I’ll spare you my usual sermon on the word “love” today. Instead I wanted simply to point at a different line in this famous passage, and to highlight a translation quirk that I especially enjoy. In the NRSV translation that we read in church, the sentence before that famous one about faith, hope, and love is this:
“For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then we will see face to face.”
It’s a good line. Too bad it comes right before a great line, so we tend to overlook it. There’s a world of beautiful theology in that sentence; a very simple reading of what we imagine life with God in a blessed future might be like. Here’s the same line again, in the King James English:
“For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face.”
Of course I’m only pointing out the difference because I like the King James better. There’s nothing wrong with the more modern translation; ‘a glass’ in the early seventeenth century was certainly what we’d call a mirror. Nevertheless, I like “through a glass, darkly” better.
Besides making me wonder if Paul had been reading too much Plato, the mirror metaphor invites thoughts of looking at yourself, of trying to see your own reflection but not quite managing it because there isn’t enough light. The through a glass metaphor is better, I think, because it invited imagining yourself looking out at something else. I imagine being inside a cabin in the woods as the sun is coming up. The glass in the windows is old and dirty and you can’t see out of it very well. Nevertheless, the light of the sun begins to come through, and you know that if you step out into the wider world you’ll feel that light fully.
What a beautiful way of describing our looking for God. There is much between us and the divine; the glass is dark indeed. Yet there is hope of seeing through, however dimly, in this life, and greater hope of seeing face to face in the life to come.
See you Sunday!
Peace,
Ben.
