Sermon for: Sept 7, 2008 (St. Benedict’s, Los Osos CA) Brian H.O.A. McHugh, priest
Season: Proper 18A_RCL_Pent XVII
[Note: All Scripture quotes are from The Message.]
As I pondered the readings for this Sunday, I found most of the readings uninspiring. This happens every now and then. Usually it means that I’m in a discouraged or cynical mood. The constant drone of politics will always do it. Usually in such circumsatnces I produce a “comfort sermon”. Most of us like to come together as “church” to be comforted. To be reassured that “all will be well” both in this life and in the unknown Beyond; that God loves us unconditionally. That's OK. Of course, we often make the assumption that if God loves us unconditionally, God approves of us and what we do. This, of course, is not necessarily the case. But, I don’t want to get off on a rant, especially since rants are pretty grim. Aside from their message, maybe that’s why the prophets were so “without honor in their own country”. So, I would like to engage us in a conversation. What does it mean that God is Love – if you agree God is? What does it mean that the Gospel is a Gospel about Peace and Reconciliation – if you agree it is? I will try to take a balanced look at both the Bad News and at the Good News today.
“Israel” is a symbol for Humankind. God chooses all Humankind as Her people. God loves all Humankind equally and unconditionally. This, I think, is clear in both the Hebrew and Christian Bible – despite the fact that various sides are always trying to co-opt God for their own ends. All peoples tend now and then to confuse God’s will with their own cultural values, especially in times of distress or threat, or of scrambling for power.
Today, we hear God sending His “son of man”, the prophet Ezekiel to “speak to Israel” – remember, that’s us. The message is pretty “grim” and unequivocal: 'Wicked man, wicked woman, you're on the fast track to death!” Now, I think this is constant state of human affairs. We live on this fine edge between spiritual death and life most of the time - and I think we all know it. The lament that God has heard from Israel is the lament of Humanity when we are able to be honest: "Our rebellions and sins are weighing us down. We're wasting away. How can we go on living?” And God in frustration replies, “As sure as I am the living God, I take no pleasure from the death of the wicked. I want the wicked to change their ways and live. Turn your life around! Reverse your evil ways! Why die, Israel?'”
“Why die” indeed!? There is an old joke about a man arriving at the Heavenly Gates prepared to show his excellent credentials to St. Peter. Peter just asks to see his chequebook; that will say what he truly valued. What Peter would see in the World’s chequebook today is a vast amount spent on weapons of destruction - this is the prevailing symbol of Death hanging over us all today (except for Costa Rica, which courageously has no military). As I look around the World today, it feels to me as if we are all on the Path to Death, both spiritual and physical. Fanatical extremist terrorists of all religions and cultures; hate-and-fear-driven skinheads of all stripes; ethnic gangs who (as the mayor of Santa Maria said Wednesday) would as easily shoot you as say Hi; governments who permit millions of their people to die or suffer or be raped or starve in order to stay in power; rapacious corporate capitalists, communists, oligarchs, all of whom in their own ways ruthlessly limit freedoms in order to allow the few to become fabulously rich or powerful while the majority – including now the “middle classes” in our society – struggle along managing as best we can, while the growing number of the poor slip further and further into desperation.
Oh, I know that many of us are “doing ok” in the parts of the World with enough economic power to provide the essentials, especially in America – but we are a very small percentage of God’s people. Maybe I’m only seeing the dark picture. If so, I can’t help it. I’ve been raised on the Gospel since I was four. I’ve heard about God’s equal and unconditional love for each and every sparrow that falls. I’ve heard that the heart of the Hebrew Scripture is Love God with all your heart and soul and mind and strength, and your neighbour as yourself. I’ve heard that the summation of all of Jesus’ teaching is, Love one another as I have loved you. I have heard and sung about justice for the poor and the oppressed. I have heard about the Good Samaritan, that my neighbour is anyone in need. I have heard about being my sister’s keeper. I have heard about it not being possible to worship both God and Money/Power - what does the Psalm say today: Give me a bent for your words of wisdom, and not for piling up loot. Divert my eyes from toys and trinkets. I’ve heard about the core ministry of Peace and Reconciliation that has been given to all who have taken up the Way of the Cross.
I can’t help asking myself why, if there are over two billion Christians in the World whose Faith is centered in Love, Justice and Reconciliation, (not to mention one billion moderate Muslims, peace-loving Buddhists, etc), why is the World such a mess? And since I live here, where many of our elected leaders profess to be Christians, either Democrats or Republicans, why do I not see our foreign and domestic policy defined or at least powered by the core Christian values of Love, Justice and Reconciliation, or our Christian politicians walking the Way of the Cross – the Way of self-giving even unto death that all of God’s people may have every blessing for Life that God offers? Or, for that matter, Life, Liberty and Happiness, with equality and Justice for all?
Have I heard wrongly? Is it just simply true that Power Corrupts? If you see it differently, I’d really like you to help me with this. Is the way that I understand the Gospel completely skewed? This is the conversation I’d like to have with you, my fellow travelers.
Of course there is Good News. God, we read in Ezekiel, does not want us to die. We know in Jesus that God gives His life to give us Life. God makes a home in every human heart, and is willing to suffer rejection in order to be there when we need Her. Psalm 119 says, God has taught us lessons for living, given us insight, commanded us on the path to Love and Justice, revealed eternal Wisdom, shown us “straight paths”, made many promises that He has kept, counseled us, preserved our Life. We are here because, I hope, we have experienced this. There is only one crucial catch - it is all dead unless, as the Psalmist says, we make our whole life one long, obedient response.
Paul says to the church in Rome in today’s reading, “The law code—don't sleep with another person's spouse, don't take someone's life, don't take what isn't yours, don't always be wanting what you don't have, and any other "don't" you can think of—finally adds up to this: Love other people as well as you do yourself. 10 You can't go wrong when you love others. When you add up everything in the law code, the sum total is love.
He ends by saying: Dress yourselves in Christ. The question is, just what does this mean for how we live our lives, as individuals, as a church; and what is our witness to our local community and to our nation?
Sunday, September 7, 2008
Sunday, July 20, 2008
Sermon for: July 20, 2008 Brian McHugh, priest
Season: Proper 11A_RCL, Track 1 St. Paul’s, Cambria CA
It is one of the great privileges of my life as a priest to stand at the altar as an “icon” of the priesthood we all share in Jesus, and to preside at our Eucharistic meal. Thank you for inviting me to be with you this morning. My partner Dennis and I are glad to share worship with you.
St. Paul says to those he loves in the church in Rome this morning: For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God; for the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and – listen closely here - will obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. [Rom 8:19-21].
Ah, yes! This is why you and I are here this morning. There are many reasons why we come together as “church”. But there is one core reason that we stick with it Sunday by Sunday and year by year, often through many frustrations and disappointments. God knows there have been many times in my life when I just wanted to chuck it all through 35 years of priesthood and over 40 in ministry. We stick with each other, and with the Scripture, and with Sacrament because we were called from deep within us, some perhaps recently, some perhaps many years ago. We were called, some gently, some shockingly, by the Christ who dwells at the center. A vision, a hope, was awakened within us. It is a vision of the possibilities for ourselves and for the whole Creation. In Paul’s words, it is the vision of the glory of the children of God.
There are perhaps some hardened souls whom the vision never touches or who don’t allow it to touch them. Such people have created and continue to create havoc and suffering in the World. They often suck many others in because of fear or deception. But most of us, in some way, have caught a glimpse of , well, let’s call it God, and we hunger for it to flower.
Jesus told many parables about the path that leads to the Glory. We gather around one of them in our worship today. But before we look at it, let me “rattle your cage” a little bit. Let’s first talk about the Bible. How people understand the Bible is the fundamental divisive issue among Christians today. Not just how they interpret it, but how they think it came about. Being a “good Episcopalian”, you can make your choices and you certainly don’t have to accept what I say! But I’ll tell you where I have gotten in over 40 years of thinking and meditating and studying and listening to greater intellects than mine.
Some believe that God dictated it word for word to various scribes. Others, that God somehow mysteriously manages by the skin of His teeth to get Her message across through the written experiences of the peoples of the Bible. Most are somewhere in between. (By the way, I use Him and Her for God interchangeably, just to remind us of a longstanding Anglican principle enunciated in what are known as the Articles of Religion (see BCP). The First Article says, God is a spirit, without body, parts, or passions - thereby reminding us that God does not have a gender, and that it is misleading and dangerous to box God in with one or the other.) I’m far to the “skin of His teeth” side. There is an icon often seen in the Eastern Orthodox Church, an icon of Christ the Teacher, holding a closed Gospel Book. This icon is to remind us of something I have believed and taught for a long time: that Christians interpret the Scriptures through Christ, and not the other way around. Once you understand this, as I think the Church did in the early centuries and until the ascendency of the Western Church, you understand why it is important to have an intimate relationship with Jesus, to know the core of His Being. It is His teachings and, most importantly, His Love, grounded in and manifesting the unconditional Love of His Father, that define how we understand and interpret Scripture.
Let’s look at the parable of the Wheat and the Weeds (or tares if you prefer). I do not believe that Jesus interpreted His parables to his followers. As I said, the Gospels are a combination of what Jesus might actually have said, and additions by the early church in the decades following His Death and Resurrection, expressing their understanding of what Jesus said and meant. They would in no way have thought that they were falsifying or misinterpreting Him. The “interpretation” we have today is, I believe, one of those additions. And to me, it doesn’t sound like Jesus. Neither God nor Jesus goes about destroying people and sending them to the “weeping and gnashing of teeth”. I think it comes from the early community defining its specialness as against the surrounding Jewish and pagan cultures and religions. Many scholars agree. And of course, you can do your own thinking.
Jesus, as usual, is clear in his parable today. It is about hope and faith in a loving God Who, having created us, knows what we human beings are like. We can choose Good and we can choose Evil. This is the human condition. And all of us, like St. Paul, have cried out in desperation at how often we fail in choosing the Good, often bewilderingly so. But God wants us, as Romans says, to shine like the sun in the kingdom of the Father. God has a covenant of Love with all of us, symbolized in the covenant with Jacob. The promise is that, despite all, God will stay by us, shower us with mercy and forgiveness and strength and hope, lead us like a faithful shepherd Who is even willing to give His life for the sheep - as He does in every Eucharist.
Our destiny is to have all causes of sin burned out of us, till we shine like the sun in the Kingdom. Even a little success brings light to our own lives and to the World. Our part of the bargain is to be as faithful as we can in repentance and humility, acknowledging our failures and accepting God’s grace and Love. We “come to church” to be held on, and to help each other along, that path.
In the words of the lovely Psalm 139: If I take the wings of the morning and settle at the farthest limits of the sea, even there your hand shall lead me, and your right hand shall hold me fast. This is the God we love and trust and serve.
Season: Proper 11A_RCL, Track 1 St. Paul’s, Cambria CA
It is one of the great privileges of my life as a priest to stand at the altar as an “icon” of the priesthood we all share in Jesus, and to preside at our Eucharistic meal. Thank you for inviting me to be with you this morning. My partner Dennis and I are glad to share worship with you.
St. Paul says to those he loves in the church in Rome this morning: For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God; for the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and – listen closely here - will obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. [Rom 8:19-21].
Ah, yes! This is why you and I are here this morning. There are many reasons why we come together as “church”. But there is one core reason that we stick with it Sunday by Sunday and year by year, often through many frustrations and disappointments. God knows there have been many times in my life when I just wanted to chuck it all through 35 years of priesthood and over 40 in ministry. We stick with each other, and with the Scripture, and with Sacrament because we were called from deep within us, some perhaps recently, some perhaps many years ago. We were called, some gently, some shockingly, by the Christ who dwells at the center. A vision, a hope, was awakened within us. It is a vision of the possibilities for ourselves and for the whole Creation. In Paul’s words, it is the vision of the glory of the children of God.
There are perhaps some hardened souls whom the vision never touches or who don’t allow it to touch them. Such people have created and continue to create havoc and suffering in the World. They often suck many others in because of fear or deception. But most of us, in some way, have caught a glimpse of , well, let’s call it God, and we hunger for it to flower.
Jesus told many parables about the path that leads to the Glory. We gather around one of them in our worship today. But before we look at it, let me “rattle your cage” a little bit. Let’s first talk about the Bible. How people understand the Bible is the fundamental divisive issue among Christians today. Not just how they interpret it, but how they think it came about. Being a “good Episcopalian”, you can make your choices and you certainly don’t have to accept what I say! But I’ll tell you where I have gotten in over 40 years of thinking and meditating and studying and listening to greater intellects than mine.
Some believe that God dictated it word for word to various scribes. Others, that God somehow mysteriously manages by the skin of His teeth to get Her message across through the written experiences of the peoples of the Bible. Most are somewhere in between. (By the way, I use Him and Her for God interchangeably, just to remind us of a longstanding Anglican principle enunciated in what are known as the Articles of Religion (see BCP). The First Article says, God is a spirit, without body, parts, or passions - thereby reminding us that God does not have a gender, and that it is misleading and dangerous to box God in with one or the other.) I’m far to the “skin of His teeth” side. There is an icon often seen in the Eastern Orthodox Church, an icon of Christ the Teacher, holding a closed Gospel Book. This icon is to remind us of something I have believed and taught for a long time: that Christians interpret the Scriptures through Christ, and not the other way around. Once you understand this, as I think the Church did in the early centuries and until the ascendency of the Western Church, you understand why it is important to have an intimate relationship with Jesus, to know the core of His Being. It is His teachings and, most importantly, His Love, grounded in and manifesting the unconditional Love of His Father, that define how we understand and interpret Scripture.
Let’s look at the parable of the Wheat and the Weeds (or tares if you prefer). I do not believe that Jesus interpreted His parables to his followers. As I said, the Gospels are a combination of what Jesus might actually have said, and additions by the early church in the decades following His Death and Resurrection, expressing their understanding of what Jesus said and meant. They would in no way have thought that they were falsifying or misinterpreting Him. The “interpretation” we have today is, I believe, one of those additions. And to me, it doesn’t sound like Jesus. Neither God nor Jesus goes about destroying people and sending them to the “weeping and gnashing of teeth”. I think it comes from the early community defining its specialness as against the surrounding Jewish and pagan cultures and religions. Many scholars agree. And of course, you can do your own thinking.
Jesus, as usual, is clear in his parable today. It is about hope and faith in a loving God Who, having created us, knows what we human beings are like. We can choose Good and we can choose Evil. This is the human condition. And all of us, like St. Paul, have cried out in desperation at how often we fail in choosing the Good, often bewilderingly so. But God wants us, as Romans says, to shine like the sun in the kingdom of the Father. God has a covenant of Love with all of us, symbolized in the covenant with Jacob. The promise is that, despite all, God will stay by us, shower us with mercy and forgiveness and strength and hope, lead us like a faithful shepherd Who is even willing to give His life for the sheep - as He does in every Eucharist.
Our destiny is to have all causes of sin burned out of us, till we shine like the sun in the Kingdom. Even a little success brings light to our own lives and to the World. Our part of the bargain is to be as faithful as we can in repentance and humility, acknowledging our failures and accepting God’s grace and Love. We “come to church” to be held on, and to help each other along, that path.
In the words of the lovely Psalm 139: If I take the wings of the morning and settle at the farthest limits of the sea, even there your hand shall lead me, and your right hand shall hold me fast. This is the God we love and trust and serve.
Monday, July 14, 2008
Brian H. O. A. McHugh, priest
Sermon for: July 13, 2007
Season: St. Benedict’s, Los Osos, CA, on their Feast of Title
What do we know about Benedict? Personally, relatively little. He was the son of a Roman noble, born about 480, in Nursia, in what is now Italy. It seems that at about age 19, he became disgusted with the way of life of Rome, which he thought dissolute. He may also have been jilted in love. These things are deduced from the only “biography”, more a character sketch in the hagiographic style, done by Pope St. Gregory the Great. Benedict left the city, taking his nurse and a servant, to live quietly, apparently in some kind of association with a group of “virtuous men”. He apparently knew the Gospels, and was drawn to the life they manifested.
Benedict received the distinctive monastic habit from a monk in the areas named Romanus, with whom he had discussed the reasons that brought him to Subiaco, where Romanus had his monastery. At Romanus’s advice, Benedict became a hermit for 3 years, and he lived in a cave above the river, pondering the Gospel and how one should live to be a part of the Kingdom of God. Some monks begged him to be their abbot, but that experiment failed, and Benedict returned to his solitary life. But many people, attracted by his sanctity and by the various miracles that he is recorded to have performed, came to join him. He had 12 monasteries built, where 12 seekers lived with an abbot. Benedict lived in a separate monastery with a few close followers. Somewhere in this time, he wrote a Rule for his monks, based on an earlier rule called “The Rule of the Master”. Benedicts “Rule”, described by Gregory as “firm but reasonable”, became the basis for Western monasticism in following centuries and up until the present day.
Benedict intended the Rule to be a way of life that honoured Christ’s teachings. The rule allows all that is necessary to each individual: sufficient and varied clothing, abundant food (excluding meat from quadrupeds), wine and ample sleep. Possessions could be held in common; they might be large, but they were to be administered for the furtherance of the work of the community and for the benefit of others. While the individual monk was porr, the monastery was to be in a position to give alms, not to be compelled to seek them. It was to relieve the poor, clothe the naked, visit the sick, bury the dead, help the afflicted, and – what became a central Benedictine character - to offer hospitality to all strangers. The poor came to Benedict to get help to pay their debts, and for food.
Work was critical in the common life, and even more important than liturgical prayer. This is enshrined in the famous phrase, “Laborare est Orare”, to Work is to Pray, and it reflects Gospel teaching that religious faith must manifest itself in good works to be authentic. Work was not to be considered the task of slaves, but seen as a necessary path to for holiness for all men and women. But Prayer was the common bond; the average day provides for a little over four hours to be spent in liturgical prayer, a little over five hours in spiritual reading and private prayer, about six hours of work, one hour for eating, and about eight hours of sleep. The entire Psalter is to be recited in the Divine Office once every week.
All possessions were held in common. And all were equal, whether once slave or noble. Benedictine communities are families. The local community is more important than the larger order, a character that is reflected in our Anglican tradition, where parish communities are the heart and the diocesan level serves the local communities. Unlike many religious orders which take the vows of Poverty, Chastity, and Obedience, Benedictines take the vows of Obedience (so that God comes first), Stability (so that the prime place where holiness is sought is in one’s parish family), and Amendment/Conversion of Life, the goal being to become as Christ. These vows reflect the Baptismal vows.
Benedict is the icon of our community of faith here, what we call our “patron saint”. We live under his bright shadow. Most people are not called to be monastics. But Benedict is a worthy icon for us as followers of Jesus. We are here because we have the same desire as Benedict and his monks did. I was a monk for 15 years. I only knew many years after why I was led to try the monastic life. The monk is an archetype – a symbol of the radical call to become as Christ. Which is the same as the radical call to become fully human and fully the unique individual we have been created to be. But even more amazingly, to become Divine – for that is what the Gospel says we are, an incarnated expression of holy love.
We are not called to be monks or nuns. But Benedict’s radical search for the Gospel life is our search. That is why we come together around the altar and the Eucharist and Scripture. Archbishop Cranmer, in the early 16th C, apparently designed English parish life on the Benedictine model. We pray together, we seek to understand the Gospel life. We commit to obedience to God, to a stable parish family life, and to learning in that family how to let God shape us in the image of Christ. And we work together to reach out to those in need, especially offering hospitality to those on the journey to God, as our mission statement says.
Today we gather to join Benedict on the path to holiness. To thank and honour him as a faithful model and guide for parish life over the last 1500 years. And to recommit ourselves to each other as diverse people brought together by God to help and support each other on our journey of transfiguration into people of Divine Light.
Sermon for: July 13, 2007
Season: St. Benedict’s, Los Osos, CA, on their Feast of Title
What do we know about Benedict? Personally, relatively little. He was the son of a Roman noble, born about 480, in Nursia, in what is now Italy. It seems that at about age 19, he became disgusted with the way of life of Rome, which he thought dissolute. He may also have been jilted in love. These things are deduced from the only “biography”, more a character sketch in the hagiographic style, done by Pope St. Gregory the Great. Benedict left the city, taking his nurse and a servant, to live quietly, apparently in some kind of association with a group of “virtuous men”. He apparently knew the Gospels, and was drawn to the life they manifested.
Benedict received the distinctive monastic habit from a monk in the areas named Romanus, with whom he had discussed the reasons that brought him to Subiaco, where Romanus had his monastery. At Romanus’s advice, Benedict became a hermit for 3 years, and he lived in a cave above the river, pondering the Gospel and how one should live to be a part of the Kingdom of God. Some monks begged him to be their abbot, but that experiment failed, and Benedict returned to his solitary life. But many people, attracted by his sanctity and by the various miracles that he is recorded to have performed, came to join him. He had 12 monasteries built, where 12 seekers lived with an abbot. Benedict lived in a separate monastery with a few close followers. Somewhere in this time, he wrote a Rule for his monks, based on an earlier rule called “The Rule of the Master”. Benedicts “Rule”, described by Gregory as “firm but reasonable”, became the basis for Western monasticism in following centuries and up until the present day.
Benedict intended the Rule to be a way of life that honoured Christ’s teachings. The rule allows all that is necessary to each individual: sufficient and varied clothing, abundant food (excluding meat from quadrupeds), wine and ample sleep. Possessions could be held in common; they might be large, but they were to be administered for the furtherance of the work of the community and for the benefit of others. While the individual monk was porr, the monastery was to be in a position to give alms, not to be compelled to seek them. It was to relieve the poor, clothe the naked, visit the sick, bury the dead, help the afflicted, and – what became a central Benedictine character - to offer hospitality to all strangers. The poor came to Benedict to get help to pay their debts, and for food.
Work was critical in the common life, and even more important than liturgical prayer. This is enshrined in the famous phrase, “Laborare est Orare”, to Work is to Pray, and it reflects Gospel teaching that religious faith must manifest itself in good works to be authentic. Work was not to be considered the task of slaves, but seen as a necessary path to for holiness for all men and women. But Prayer was the common bond; the average day provides for a little over four hours to be spent in liturgical prayer, a little over five hours in spiritual reading and private prayer, about six hours of work, one hour for eating, and about eight hours of sleep. The entire Psalter is to be recited in the Divine Office once every week.
All possessions were held in common. And all were equal, whether once slave or noble. Benedictine communities are families. The local community is more important than the larger order, a character that is reflected in our Anglican tradition, where parish communities are the heart and the diocesan level serves the local communities. Unlike many religious orders which take the vows of Poverty, Chastity, and Obedience, Benedictines take the vows of Obedience (so that God comes first), Stability (so that the prime place where holiness is sought is in one’s parish family), and Amendment/Conversion of Life, the goal being to become as Christ. These vows reflect the Baptismal vows.
Benedict is the icon of our community of faith here, what we call our “patron saint”. We live under his bright shadow. Most people are not called to be monastics. But Benedict is a worthy icon for us as followers of Jesus. We are here because we have the same desire as Benedict and his monks did. I was a monk for 15 years. I only knew many years after why I was led to try the monastic life. The monk is an archetype – a symbol of the radical call to become as Christ. Which is the same as the radical call to become fully human and fully the unique individual we have been created to be. But even more amazingly, to become Divine – for that is what the Gospel says we are, an incarnated expression of holy love.
We are not called to be monks or nuns. But Benedict’s radical search for the Gospel life is our search. That is why we come together around the altar and the Eucharist and Scripture. Archbishop Cranmer, in the early 16th C, apparently designed English parish life on the Benedictine model. We pray together, we seek to understand the Gospel life. We commit to obedience to God, to a stable parish family life, and to learning in that family how to let God shape us in the image of Christ. And we work together to reach out to those in need, especially offering hospitality to those on the journey to God, as our mission statement says.
Today we gather to join Benedict on the path to holiness. To thank and honour him as a faithful model and guide for parish life over the last 1500 years. And to recommit ourselves to each other as diverse people brought together by God to help and support each other on our journey of transfiguration into people of Divine Light.
Sunday, June 29, 2008
The Rev. Brian H. O. A. McHugh
Episcopal Diocese of El Camino Real
Sermon for: June 29, 2008
Season: Gay Pride Service, United Church of Christ, San Luis Obispo, CA
Title: May They All Be One
Let me tell you up front what the central point of my reflection at this Gay Pride service is. Doing this will hold me accountable to myself and to you for my words. I’m following the first of the Four Agreements enunciated by Don Miguel Ruiz, by which I try to live: Be impeccable with your word. My point - and I believe it to be the Good News of the Gospel - is this:
Each and every human person is a manifestation of the holy energy at the core of all life. Every human being is a sacrament of that Holy Mystery - if I may use an old Anglican phrase, an outward and visible sign of an inward and spiritual grace. Every person, irrespective of the particular configuration or manifestation of their sexuality or any other characteristic, is a unique, beautiful, sacred Being. God does not disown or reject any person, for God cannot disown or reject Herself.
Now you may ask, Where the hell in the Bible did he get that?! Believe me, I got it from the Bible alright. But not because it is written out in just those words. I got it from the Bible, and from the Gospel, and from the eternal Christ who shines at the heart. I got it filtered through my own personal experience over fifty years and that of thousands of others, of hearing and pondering the Word. I got it through the reasoning of my and many minds, through the longing of my heart, and through the working of the Spirit of Truth which the Christ promised and bestowed.
When I was ordained a priest, I took and oath that I believed the “Holy Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments to be the word of God, and to contain all things necessary to salvation”. And I do. But not in some simplistic, literalist way. I firmly believe that the Mystery we call “God” dwells within and not without. That God is revealed from the inside out. That God is always vulnerable to the workings of the human mind and heart. All Scriptures are written by human beings who are seeking out the meaning of their lives. The myriad pictures we have of God reflect the experience of human beings in every time and culture. Many, if not most, are projections of individuals and cultures, their times and experiences. Many claim to know God, to know that God is “on their side” - a projection that Bob Dylan so aptly parodied. Most of those pictures are misleading, in my view, in terms of the actual nature of “God”. The wonder of sacred writings, for me, is that the still, small voice of God manages to be heard in the minds and hearts of those who are willing to be surprised by the vast and infinite Compassion of God. Over 40 years in ministry, I have learned the wisdom of the old rabbi who said of the Bible’s message, God is Love; all else is commentary.
God has insinuated Herself in sneaky ways into many hearts. Certainly into the hearts of many Gayfolk, many of whom were brought up in cultures and religions which filled them with shame and terror, and caused them to doubt their worth and beauty. It is a wonder to me that so many Gayfolk continue to be part of religious communities, almost all of which have excluded and condemned and brutalized them for millennia. Happily, some of those faith communities have changed their ways, and many of the rest of us are slowly struggling to get there. That “still small voice” has quietly, persistently whispered, and been heard in generous and loving and open and sometimes needy hearts. Hearts that have seen that the orientation of Gayfolk is not a sinful or unnatural choice. Just another facet of human nature. The only choice involved is to reject lies and self-doubt and to be one’s authentic self. The God I know wills this freedom for Gayfolk and for all persons.
It is a cliché, but ….. God does indeed work in mysterious ways! She has in mine. And I think that my experience is a kind of metaphor for the way the Divine Spirit works. I knew what my sexual orientation was when I was a little boy. Luckily I was born in Canada in the late 40’s, among somewhat dour Scots Presbyterians who were both upright and whiskey drinkers. The topic of sex, at any level, was avoided. I did not have to deal with the particular ingrained Puritanism which lies at the root of the American psyche until I came here in the late sixties. There was a counterbalance to Puritanism then in the Flower Revolution, and I am proud, at 62, to be a Hippie throwback. I came here to be a monk, which I was for 15 years. And so - and I can’t help crediting God in this - I ended up in a community of almost all Gay men! What a coup for the guidance of the Unconscious! I could be myself as a Gay man. Equally important, I was then free, in a religious setting of daily prayer and Scripture and learning, to enter into a relationship with the God Who created me and unconditionally loved me just as I was. What a blessing, considering the hell that so many Gayfolk still go through in accepting their gift.
I spent 26 years in parish ministry, often filled with rage at the homophobia of society and of Religion – and we all know what rage can do to us. I was profoundly frustrated at the either inability or unwillingness of people to see the reality before their eyes and hearts in the Gayfolk they knew - the normal glorious fragile humanity we all share, in the heart of the Mystery of God I had come to know. But I chose or was blessed with parishes in which I was basically accepted and appreciated for my gifts. When I finally “retired” in utter frustration at our House of Bishops seeming to kow-tow to homophobic bigots in the Anglican Communion and at the affront (as I see it) to my seminary classmate Bishop Gene Robinson, I considered renouncing my orders. But my partner and other friends counseled wisely. The gift I was given was that the rage was taken away. I resolved to “make no peace with oppression”, to live calmly but passionately as the sacred being I knew myself and each of us to be. And I ended up in a California that now – and I hope forever - allows same-sex couples to marry with the same equality under the law promised by the founding documents of this land.
The title of my sermon today is from the great prayer of Jesus in the Gospel called “John”. May they all be One, as You, Father, and I are one. Jesus wants us all to know the unity that He knew with the Source of His Being. What he prayed for was not superficial in any way. It is not about looking alike; not about a renunciation of uniqueness; not about male or female, “Jew or Greek” (metaphorically speaking), Gay or so-called “Straight” – though I am happy to say that most of my heterosexual friends are anything but what I would call “straight”; “wonderfully bent” would be more like it! It is about knowing at the gut level that each of us is part of the Mystery we call God. It is about knowing that together we are one unquenchable blaze of Compassion, Love and Justice. It is about knowing that our calling as people of Faith is to actualize and make real, by our practice, the truth of our making in the image of the God of Compassion, and our unity as human persons free to be whole.
“Pride” is a paradox. It is both a sin and a blessing. A sin (that is, a rejection of our nature as Love) when we fail to live into our divine nature. A blessing, when we gather together as we do this afternoon, “of many tribes and people and tongues”, of theological perspectives, and of shades of sexual orientation, to claim our sacred selves, and to claim the essential unity we each and all have.
It is my duty and privilege to say today to all Gayfolk: Be proud. Be joyfully and passionately yourselves, with unwavering confidence and power and love. And to say the same to all who have gathered here in support of their sisters and brothers in the family of God. May we all be One, for such I know to be the desire and longing of God. As the lovely Psalm 139 says: You created my inmost being; You knit me together in my mother's womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well.
Episcopal Diocese of El Camino Real
Sermon for: June 29, 2008
Season: Gay Pride Service, United Church of Christ, San Luis Obispo, CA
Title: May They All Be One
Let me tell you up front what the central point of my reflection at this Gay Pride service is. Doing this will hold me accountable to myself and to you for my words. I’m following the first of the Four Agreements enunciated by Don Miguel Ruiz, by which I try to live: Be impeccable with your word. My point - and I believe it to be the Good News of the Gospel - is this:
Each and every human person is a manifestation of the holy energy at the core of all life. Every human being is a sacrament of that Holy Mystery - if I may use an old Anglican phrase, an outward and visible sign of an inward and spiritual grace. Every person, irrespective of the particular configuration or manifestation of their sexuality or any other characteristic, is a unique, beautiful, sacred Being. God does not disown or reject any person, for God cannot disown or reject Herself.
Now you may ask, Where the hell in the Bible did he get that?! Believe me, I got it from the Bible alright. But not because it is written out in just those words. I got it from the Bible, and from the Gospel, and from the eternal Christ who shines at the heart. I got it filtered through my own personal experience over fifty years and that of thousands of others, of hearing and pondering the Word. I got it through the reasoning of my and many minds, through the longing of my heart, and through the working of the Spirit of Truth which the Christ promised and bestowed.
When I was ordained a priest, I took and oath that I believed the “Holy Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments to be the word of God, and to contain all things necessary to salvation”. And I do. But not in some simplistic, literalist way. I firmly believe that the Mystery we call “God” dwells within and not without. That God is revealed from the inside out. That God is always vulnerable to the workings of the human mind and heart. All Scriptures are written by human beings who are seeking out the meaning of their lives. The myriad pictures we have of God reflect the experience of human beings in every time and culture. Many, if not most, are projections of individuals and cultures, their times and experiences. Many claim to know God, to know that God is “on their side” - a projection that Bob Dylan so aptly parodied. Most of those pictures are misleading, in my view, in terms of the actual nature of “God”. The wonder of sacred writings, for me, is that the still, small voice of God manages to be heard in the minds and hearts of those who are willing to be surprised by the vast and infinite Compassion of God. Over 40 years in ministry, I have learned the wisdom of the old rabbi who said of the Bible’s message, God is Love; all else is commentary.
God has insinuated Herself in sneaky ways into many hearts. Certainly into the hearts of many Gayfolk, many of whom were brought up in cultures and religions which filled them with shame and terror, and caused them to doubt their worth and beauty. It is a wonder to me that so many Gayfolk continue to be part of religious communities, almost all of which have excluded and condemned and brutalized them for millennia. Happily, some of those faith communities have changed their ways, and many of the rest of us are slowly struggling to get there. That “still small voice” has quietly, persistently whispered, and been heard in generous and loving and open and sometimes needy hearts. Hearts that have seen that the orientation of Gayfolk is not a sinful or unnatural choice. Just another facet of human nature. The only choice involved is to reject lies and self-doubt and to be one’s authentic self. The God I know wills this freedom for Gayfolk and for all persons.
It is a cliché, but ….. God does indeed work in mysterious ways! She has in mine. And I think that my experience is a kind of metaphor for the way the Divine Spirit works. I knew what my sexual orientation was when I was a little boy. Luckily I was born in Canada in the late 40’s, among somewhat dour Scots Presbyterians who were both upright and whiskey drinkers. The topic of sex, at any level, was avoided. I did not have to deal with the particular ingrained Puritanism which lies at the root of the American psyche until I came here in the late sixties. There was a counterbalance to Puritanism then in the Flower Revolution, and I am proud, at 62, to be a Hippie throwback. I came here to be a monk, which I was for 15 years. And so - and I can’t help crediting God in this - I ended up in a community of almost all Gay men! What a coup for the guidance of the Unconscious! I could be myself as a Gay man. Equally important, I was then free, in a religious setting of daily prayer and Scripture and learning, to enter into a relationship with the God Who created me and unconditionally loved me just as I was. What a blessing, considering the hell that so many Gayfolk still go through in accepting their gift.
I spent 26 years in parish ministry, often filled with rage at the homophobia of society and of Religion – and we all know what rage can do to us. I was profoundly frustrated at the either inability or unwillingness of people to see the reality before their eyes and hearts in the Gayfolk they knew - the normal glorious fragile humanity we all share, in the heart of the Mystery of God I had come to know. But I chose or was blessed with parishes in which I was basically accepted and appreciated for my gifts. When I finally “retired” in utter frustration at our House of Bishops seeming to kow-tow to homophobic bigots in the Anglican Communion and at the affront (as I see it) to my seminary classmate Bishop Gene Robinson, I considered renouncing my orders. But my partner and other friends counseled wisely. The gift I was given was that the rage was taken away. I resolved to “make no peace with oppression”, to live calmly but passionately as the sacred being I knew myself and each of us to be. And I ended up in a California that now – and I hope forever - allows same-sex couples to marry with the same equality under the law promised by the founding documents of this land.
The title of my sermon today is from the great prayer of Jesus in the Gospel called “John”. May they all be One, as You, Father, and I are one. Jesus wants us all to know the unity that He knew with the Source of His Being. What he prayed for was not superficial in any way. It is not about looking alike; not about a renunciation of uniqueness; not about male or female, “Jew or Greek” (metaphorically speaking), Gay or so-called “Straight” – though I am happy to say that most of my heterosexual friends are anything but what I would call “straight”; “wonderfully bent” would be more like it! It is about knowing at the gut level that each of us is part of the Mystery we call God. It is about knowing that together we are one unquenchable blaze of Compassion, Love and Justice. It is about knowing that our calling as people of Faith is to actualize and make real, by our practice, the truth of our making in the image of the God of Compassion, and our unity as human persons free to be whole.
“Pride” is a paradox. It is both a sin and a blessing. A sin (that is, a rejection of our nature as Love) when we fail to live into our divine nature. A blessing, when we gather together as we do this afternoon, “of many tribes and people and tongues”, of theological perspectives, and of shades of sexual orientation, to claim our sacred selves, and to claim the essential unity we each and all have.
It is my duty and privilege to say today to all Gayfolk: Be proud. Be joyfully and passionately yourselves, with unwavering confidence and power and love. And to say the same to all who have gathered here in support of their sisters and brothers in the family of God. May we all be One, for such I know to be the desire and longing of God. As the lovely Psalm 139 says: You created my inmost being; You knit me together in my mother's womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well.
Sunday, June 8, 2008
Sermon: June 8, 2007 Proper 5 A (RCL)
[Hosea 5:15-6:6][Ps 50: 7-15][Rom 4:13-25][Mt 9:9-13,18-26]
Avoiding Rock Bottom
In the reading from the prophet Hosea this morning, we hear a somewhat petulant God whining. God is ticked off that Ephraim and Judah, who have behaved badly themselves and are now being oppressed and suffering, have turned to the great king of Assyria instead of Him for help. God is heard saying:
I’ll go back where I came from until they come to their senses.
When they finally hit rock bottom, maybe they’ll come looking for me.[1]
The people seem to understand the process of their Life and of their relationship with their God. They say:
Come on, let’s go back to God. He hurt us, but He’ll heal us.
He hit us hard, but He’ll put us right again.
In a couple of days we’ll feel better.
By the third day, He’ll have made us brand new.[2]
Don’t be distracted by the portrayal of God as hurtful and causing pain. I’ve pondered the Scriptures for decades. Of course, being Episcopalians, you are free to interpret as you like! Personally, I know, and I think any of us who truly know God knows, that God does not hurt or cause pain or death. As is said elsewhere, “God does not desire the death of a sinner, but that they should repent and live.” Speaking of God as the origin of both good an evil is an ancient way of saying that God is present in and to all things. It is we human beings who cause suffering and pain and death to ourselves and others, physically and emotionally. It is in embracing the Divine source of Life that we find the power and grace to Live.
Living is what it is all about. Living is why we are here this morning. If you have been doing this for a long time, I suspect it is because you know what Ephraim and Judah knew. If this is new to you, you have brought your hunger for life to the right place. There is a deep and powerful energy that flows through the great Mystery we call Life. A deep and powerful movement – into and away from pain and death and into Life. Our Baptism into Christ is a mind-blowing, blazing image of the power we have laid claim to in our saying Yes to the Gospel. There is indeed a way by which we can be drowned in suffering, where we die at one or many levels, and rise to healing and new life.
The Mystery of the Passion, Death, and Resurrection of Jesus throbs at the heart of our Faith. The same Mystery lies at the heart of our own human lives. But as we hear from Hosea, this is an old, ancient, eternal Truth. Ephraim and Judah understood and experienced it. It is heard in every faith and religion, and in all the great literature of every language and people. Have you read Ursula LeGuin’s Earthsea Trilogy? Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings? Beowulf? The same Message rings out:
Come on, let’s go back to God. He hurt us, but He’ll heal us.
He hit us hard, but He’ll put us right again. In a couple of days we’ll feel better.
By the third day, He’ll have made us brand new.
The eternal pattern familiar to Christians in the Christ’s Passion, Death, and Resurrection goes on. We suffer, we “die”, we are buried, we are raised to Life. This is why the Cross shines as the core symbol of the Christian faith. Beyond anything else, it speaks of the God of Love Who is never absent from us, holds us in our pain, walks through the valley of the shadow of death with us, and lifts us up to new Life. The great Holy Week hymn says it all:
Inscribed upon the cross we see in shining letters, God is love:
it cheers with hope the gloomy day, and sweetens every bitter cup.
It makes the coward spirit brave, it takes its terror from the grave, and gilds the bed of death with light.
The balm of life, the cure of woe, the measure and the pledge of love.[3]
But we, like Ephraim and Judah, must do our part. Come on, let’s go back to God. He hurt us, but He’ll heal us. Twenty-six years ago, I left a monastic vocation after 15 years; but, new life opened up in front of my sadness. Six years ago I had heart surgery; I was prepared to awake or not; I did, and knew I was healed. Three years ago I met Dennis; a whole new Life opened up. Two years ago my colon burst; I almost died; I had a colostomy that was later reversed. I was raised to life. In April I “retired”, the culmination of decades of fury at how I and other Gayfolk are treated by society and the church; but out of it came a gift: my anger was taken away, and I am ready to lay hold on Life again. I have aggressive prostate cancer; I face it with calm and trust. Think about it - every one of you here today has experienced this Great Love healing us and giving us Life as we turn into the embrace.
We are not here being “the church”, waiting for an arbitrary God to decide if we have followed the rules/contract suitably enough that She will throw us a tidbit which we have “earned”. We are here, avoiding rock bottom, being “the church”, together eating and drinking God’s Life, holding ourselves in the context of the Death, Burial, and Resurrection of Jesus, in the sure and certain knowledge of at least some of the people of Hosea’s time - After two days God will revive us; on the third day [God] will raise us up, that we may live before Him.[4] We are instruments of that trust and embrace each to the other. Crucified, dead, we rise on the third day. Weeping may tarry for the night, but joy comes in the morning.”
We’re here to practice our religion, which by Word and Sacrament and Fellowship hold us in the cycle of hurt, healing and revival. We bear each others’ burdens and so fulfill the law of Love. With the ancient Hebrews we say, Come on, let’s go back to God. To the God who lives in us. In Her we find the power to rise and live.
[bm+/060808]
[1] The Message, Hosea 5: 15
[2] ibid, 6: 1ff
[3] Hymnal 1982, #471
[4] The Message, Eugene Peterson
In the reading from the prophet Hosea this morning, we hear a somewhat petulant God whining. God is ticked off that Ephraim and Judah, who have behaved badly themselves and are now being oppressed and suffering, have turned to the great king of Assyria instead of Him for help. God is heard saying:
I’ll go back where I came from until they come to their senses.
When they finally hit rock bottom, maybe they’ll come looking for me.[1]
The people seem to understand the process of their Life and of their relationship with their God. They say:
Come on, let’s go back to God. He hurt us, but He’ll heal us.
He hit us hard, but He’ll put us right again.
In a couple of days we’ll feel better.
By the third day, He’ll have made us brand new.[2]
Don’t be distracted by the portrayal of God as hurtful and causing pain. I’ve pondered the Scriptures for decades. Of course, being Episcopalians, you are free to interpret as you like! Personally, I know, and I think any of us who truly know God knows, that God does not hurt or cause pain or death. As is said elsewhere, “God does not desire the death of a sinner, but that they should repent and live.” Speaking of God as the origin of both good an evil is an ancient way of saying that God is present in and to all things. It is we human beings who cause suffering and pain and death to ourselves and others, physically and emotionally. It is in embracing the Divine source of Life that we find the power and grace to Live.
Living is what it is all about. Living is why we are here this morning. If you have been doing this for a long time, I suspect it is because you know what Ephraim and Judah knew. If this is new to you, you have brought your hunger for life to the right place. There is a deep and powerful energy that flows through the great Mystery we call Life. A deep and powerful movement – into and away from pain and death and into Life. Our Baptism into Christ is a mind-blowing, blazing image of the power we have laid claim to in our saying Yes to the Gospel. There is indeed a way by which we can be drowned in suffering, where we die at one or many levels, and rise to healing and new life.
The Mystery of the Passion, Death, and Resurrection of Jesus throbs at the heart of our Faith. The same Mystery lies at the heart of our own human lives. But as we hear from Hosea, this is an old, ancient, eternal Truth. Ephraim and Judah understood and experienced it. It is heard in every faith and religion, and in all the great literature of every language and people. Have you read Ursula LeGuin’s Earthsea Trilogy? Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings? Beowulf? The same Message rings out:
Come on, let’s go back to God. He hurt us, but He’ll heal us.
He hit us hard, but He’ll put us right again. In a couple of days we’ll feel better.
By the third day, He’ll have made us brand new.
The eternal pattern familiar to Christians in the Christ’s Passion, Death, and Resurrection goes on. We suffer, we “die”, we are buried, we are raised to Life. This is why the Cross shines as the core symbol of the Christian faith. Beyond anything else, it speaks of the God of Love Who is never absent from us, holds us in our pain, walks through the valley of the shadow of death with us, and lifts us up to new Life. The great Holy Week hymn says it all:
Inscribed upon the cross we see in shining letters, God is love:
it cheers with hope the gloomy day, and sweetens every bitter cup.
It makes the coward spirit brave, it takes its terror from the grave, and gilds the bed of death with light.
The balm of life, the cure of woe, the measure and the pledge of love.[3]
But we, like Ephraim and Judah, must do our part. Come on, let’s go back to God. He hurt us, but He’ll heal us. Twenty-six years ago, I left a monastic vocation after 15 years; but, new life opened up in front of my sadness. Six years ago I had heart surgery; I was prepared to awake or not; I did, and knew I was healed. Three years ago I met Dennis; a whole new Life opened up. Two years ago my colon burst; I almost died; I had a colostomy that was later reversed. I was raised to life. In April I “retired”, the culmination of decades of fury at how I and other Gayfolk are treated by society and the church; but out of it came a gift: my anger was taken away, and I am ready to lay hold on Life again. I have aggressive prostate cancer; I face it with calm and trust. Think about it - every one of you here today has experienced this Great Love healing us and giving us Life as we turn into the embrace.
We are not here being “the church”, waiting for an arbitrary God to decide if we have followed the rules/contract suitably enough that She will throw us a tidbit which we have “earned”. We are here, avoiding rock bottom, being “the church”, together eating and drinking God’s Life, holding ourselves in the context of the Death, Burial, and Resurrection of Jesus, in the sure and certain knowledge of at least some of the people of Hosea’s time - After two days God will revive us; on the third day [God] will raise us up, that we may live before Him.[4] We are instruments of that trust and embrace each to the other. Crucified, dead, we rise on the third day. Weeping may tarry for the night, but joy comes in the morning.”
We’re here to practice our religion, which by Word and Sacrament and Fellowship hold us in the cycle of hurt, healing and revival. We bear each others’ burdens and so fulfill the law of Love. With the ancient Hebrews we say, Come on, let’s go back to God. To the God who lives in us. In Her we find the power to rise and live.
[bm+/060808]
[1] The Message, Hosea 5: 15
[2] ibid, 6: 1ff
[3] Hymnal 1982, #471
[4] The Message, Eugene Peterson
Sunday, March 23, 2008
Sermon for: Easter Day_March 23, 2008_A_RCL
Brian McHugh, priest & vicar
[Ezk 37: 1-14][Ps 130][Romans 8: 6-11][John 11: 1-45]
This is the miracle that happens every time to those who really love:
the more they give, the more they possess.
Words of the poet Rainer Maria Rilke.
It seems illogical. It seems counterintuitive. Human logic would say that the more you give, the less you possess.
But I know, in my spirit, however faulty my or our love may be, that Rilke’s words are true. Those who love, and give, discover the truth. Jesus is recorded as saying that, in following Him, we would know the truth and the truth would set us free. I am convinced that is not some theological doctrinal “truth” that makes us “right” that He wanted us to know. What Jesus means us to discover is a way of Life: Rilke has spoken it: “This is the miracle that happens every time to those who really love: the more [you] give, the more [you] possess.”
This paradox - that for those who really love, the more they give the more they possess - I know and passionately believe is at the heart of the Mystery of God, of the Christ, of the Gospel, and of our humanity. We ponder the hints of our holy writings. We listen to longings and hopes that rise up in our hearts and minds. From these, we have imagined a God who pours out unconditional love endlessly. In my view, no other God is worth knowing. No other God can lead us to a mature and authentic humanity.
As “church”, we spend year after year in our worship. We walk with Jesus. We recognize a true child of the God of Love. We listen to His Good News, His teaching about Life. In the week before this day of His rising from the dead, we see His unswerving love of His God; His compassion for God’s oppressed people; His firm clear loving servanthood in washing feet; His mystical gift of Himself in bread and wine; His refusal to compromise God’s integrity in willingly accepting suffering and death.
However and at whatever level we grasp it, Christ’s death and resurrection is a sign to us about the great Mystery of being alive. It is about the mundane miracle of Love. This is the miracle that happens every time to those who really love: the more they give, the more they possess. We will not grasp this truth by reading the tortuous sentences of the Letter to the Hebrews. We will not grasp it by comprehending intellectually Paul’s or Aquinas’s doctrine of salvation. We will only grasp it by embracing Christ’s commandment to “love one another as I have loved you”. This is what it means to “take up his cross and follow me”. It is why the cross is the core symbol of the Christian faith. It is why our primary “work” is exploring what Love is.
Paul the apostle tells us what happens if we love: He wrote in his second letter to the faithful in Corinth:
People are watching us as we stay at our post … working … in gentleness, holiness, and honest love ….. terrifically alive, though rumored to be dead; beaten within an inch of our lives, but refusing to die; 10 immersed in tears, yet always filled with deep joy; living on handouts, yet enriching many; having nothing, (yet) possessing all. [1]
Jesus had set the standard for authentic discipleship and authentic humanity, as recorded in John’s Gospel: “See how they love one another”. And Jesus has requested, putting aside as secondary the whole Law of Moses, only one thing: “Love one another as I have loved you.”
Hanging on the cross, Jesus looked as if His love brought Him nothing, took away everything, including His life. But on the morning of the third day, the angel says to the women, “Why are you seeking the living among the dead?”
Here is the pattern for our life, yours and mine. Paul understood it when he said, “I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live but Christ who lives in me.” The Christ lives in each of us, and to live we must become One with that Christ. It might seem that pouring ourselves out in love will bring us nothing. But Jesus and His Gospel and His Cross and Resurrection says, with Rilke, “This is the miracle that happens every time to those who really love: the more they give, the more they possess.
The invitation this Easter morning, my friends in Christ, is the same as always: Really love; the more we give, the more we possess of what gives meaning to our lives. It is Love that broke open the tomb in which the dead Christ was buried. It is Love that breaks open the tombs we so often are buried in and gives us Life. It is love that liberates the Christ Who lives within the heart of each of us.
The Rich Young Ruler asked Jesus what he must do to have Eternal Life. The answer he was not ready to hear was, “Really love” – and though you give up all the worldly goods you have, you will possess everything. “
On this Easter morning, may we take one step further on the path of Love. It is our calling as the Body of Christ and as the Beloved of God. The more we give, the more we will possess. And the World will be transformed.
Alleluia! Christ is Risen. Let us be raised with Him!
[1] 2 Cor 6: 4-10 [MSG]
Brian McHugh, priest & vicar
[Ezk 37: 1-14][Ps 130][Romans 8: 6-11][John 11: 1-45]
This is the miracle that happens every time to those who really love:
the more they give, the more they possess.
Words of the poet Rainer Maria Rilke.
It seems illogical. It seems counterintuitive. Human logic would say that the more you give, the less you possess.
But I know, in my spirit, however faulty my or our love may be, that Rilke’s words are true. Those who love, and give, discover the truth. Jesus is recorded as saying that, in following Him, we would know the truth and the truth would set us free. I am convinced that is not some theological doctrinal “truth” that makes us “right” that He wanted us to know. What Jesus means us to discover is a way of Life: Rilke has spoken it: “This is the miracle that happens every time to those who really love: the more [you] give, the more [you] possess.”
This paradox - that for those who really love, the more they give the more they possess - I know and passionately believe is at the heart of the Mystery of God, of the Christ, of the Gospel, and of our humanity. We ponder the hints of our holy writings. We listen to longings and hopes that rise up in our hearts and minds. From these, we have imagined a God who pours out unconditional love endlessly. In my view, no other God is worth knowing. No other God can lead us to a mature and authentic humanity.
As “church”, we spend year after year in our worship. We walk with Jesus. We recognize a true child of the God of Love. We listen to His Good News, His teaching about Life. In the week before this day of His rising from the dead, we see His unswerving love of His God; His compassion for God’s oppressed people; His firm clear loving servanthood in washing feet; His mystical gift of Himself in bread and wine; His refusal to compromise God’s integrity in willingly accepting suffering and death.
However and at whatever level we grasp it, Christ’s death and resurrection is a sign to us about the great Mystery of being alive. It is about the mundane miracle of Love. This is the miracle that happens every time to those who really love: the more they give, the more they possess. We will not grasp this truth by reading the tortuous sentences of the Letter to the Hebrews. We will not grasp it by comprehending intellectually Paul’s or Aquinas’s doctrine of salvation. We will only grasp it by embracing Christ’s commandment to “love one another as I have loved you”. This is what it means to “take up his cross and follow me”. It is why the cross is the core symbol of the Christian faith. It is why our primary “work” is exploring what Love is.
Paul the apostle tells us what happens if we love: He wrote in his second letter to the faithful in Corinth:
People are watching us as we stay at our post … working … in gentleness, holiness, and honest love ….. terrifically alive, though rumored to be dead; beaten within an inch of our lives, but refusing to die; 10 immersed in tears, yet always filled with deep joy; living on handouts, yet enriching many; having nothing, (yet) possessing all. [1]
Jesus had set the standard for authentic discipleship and authentic humanity, as recorded in John’s Gospel: “See how they love one another”. And Jesus has requested, putting aside as secondary the whole Law of Moses, only one thing: “Love one another as I have loved you.”
Hanging on the cross, Jesus looked as if His love brought Him nothing, took away everything, including His life. But on the morning of the third day, the angel says to the women, “Why are you seeking the living among the dead?”
Here is the pattern for our life, yours and mine. Paul understood it when he said, “I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live but Christ who lives in me.” The Christ lives in each of us, and to live we must become One with that Christ. It might seem that pouring ourselves out in love will bring us nothing. But Jesus and His Gospel and His Cross and Resurrection says, with Rilke, “This is the miracle that happens every time to those who really love: the more they give, the more they possess.
The invitation this Easter morning, my friends in Christ, is the same as always: Really love; the more we give, the more we possess of what gives meaning to our lives. It is Love that broke open the tomb in which the dead Christ was buried. It is Love that breaks open the tombs we so often are buried in and gives us Life. It is love that liberates the Christ Who lives within the heart of each of us.
The Rich Young Ruler asked Jesus what he must do to have Eternal Life. The answer he was not ready to hear was, “Really love” – and though you give up all the worldly goods you have, you will possess everything. “
On this Easter morning, may we take one step further on the path of Love. It is our calling as the Body of Christ and as the Beloved of God. The more we give, the more we will possess. And the World will be transformed.
Alleluia! Christ is Risen. Let us be raised with Him!
[1] 2 Cor 6: 4-10 [MSG]
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