On Saturday May 28th, all ordinands were asked to speak for 90 seconds to the annual meeting of the Toronto Conference. The task was to choose a favourite hymn, one verse of which was sung by the Conference, and to use that hymn as inspiration in order to give the delegates a "tantalizing glimpse of our call to ministry." Below is my hymn and my speech.
O sacred head sore wounded,
with grief and shame weighed down,
now scornfully surrounded
with thorns, thine only crown:
how art thou pale with anguish,
with sore abuse and scorn;
how does that visage languish,
which once was bright as morn!
My remarks
So why did I chose to speak to the Good Friday hymn, "O Sacred head?" Well, just as any Sunday service can be a celebration of Easter, so any moment can be one in which we remember the Way of the Cross, which is marked by sufferiing. For me, today is a special kind of Holy Saturday -- a time of waiting between the humiliations of life's ups and downs and tomorrow's ritual of renewal.
Ordination is a ritual that, like confirmation, refers back to our baptism. One of the key things that struck me about baptism in the course "Confessing Our Faith" was that none of the three main United Church statements of faith connect baptism to death.
Not so with St. Paul. In Romans he writes, "all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death. We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too may live a new life."
My call to ministry is on this difficult baptismal path where the hope is for rebirth into a life beyond ego.
When I was confirmed at age 14, I became a confirmed atheist. But I went through with the service anyway since the person presiding was my father, the late Rev. James Clare Kellogg. During my teenage years as my brothers and sisters and I drifted away from church, my father sometimes tried to reach us through music. We all loved choral music, and Bach was my favourite. So Dad took us to Toronto to hear St. Matthew's Passion and he led a Lenten discussion group that centered around the choruses from that work, especially O Sacred Head.
My father's efforts did not bear fruit at that time, but my memories of them remain. And so tomorrow as I put on my father's alb, receive the laying on of the hands from my younger brother and sister, and am ordained with one of my father's stoles, I will remember the promise of rebirth that is present in the glorious music of Bach and in the sacrament of baptism. I will also remember that it is a promise that only glimmers at us dimly through a veil of suffering and death.
Thank you.
Back to "Completing the Circle"
Monday, June 6, 2011
Eulogies for my parents: July 2, 2007 (Clare), January 13 and July 7, 2018 (Mary)
When I was in university, I read Sigmund Freud's book, "The Interpretation of Dreams." In the book's introduction, I was struck by a paragraph where Freud talked about the impact upon him of the death of his father while he was working on the book. He characterized the death of one's father as "the most important event, the most poignant loss in a man's life." Now, that seemed like a strong statement to me at the time. What about Moms, I thought. And surely the statement tells us more about Freud than about anyone else. But his words came back to me last week as we tried to be present with Dad as he died.
So, what impact will Dad's death have on me, or on the rest of his family, and his relatives, and his friends who have gathered here today? Of course, a related and more upbeat question is, what impact has his life had on us? Maybe I will speak a bit about both.
I feel shaken by Dad's death, and part of this comes from how strongly I identified with him. Perhaps more than my brothers and sisters, I seemed to be like Dad both physically and emotionally. Certain arcs of our lives seemed to have parallels. We both had a lot of trouble dealing with adolescence, and dating, and finding love -– though Dad was smart and lucky, and he eventually found our remarkable Mom. If ever it can be said that Dad was a recipient of grace, I think it would be when Mary fell in love with him.
I also identify with Dad's call to ministry in the church, though I have been much more successful in resisting that call than him. Instead, I turned my spiritual enthusiasm into radical politics as a young man, and into other intellectual interests as an adult.
But mostly, I identify with a wavelength of anxiety that I perceive running through Dad's life and my own. And fortunately for me, I deeply appreciate how Dad learned to often handle his anxieties and come out the other side, to live so much of his life in joy, and in love, and in faith.
Dad wrote what is now his final sermon a few weeks ago. It was to have been delivered at his home church in Welcome this August, and it's about this topic of fear and anxiety. The night before his aneurysm burst and his ordeal in the hospital began, Dad gave Catherine an envelope at the train station that said, "To Catherine, Love Dad." When she asked what it contained, he simply said, "Read it on the train." So, she did. And since then, we have come to name this remarkable sermon as "Disaster is upon us; be of good cheer," But in reality its title is simply "Good Cheer."
Still, I like our title. After all, Catherine tells us that Dad spoke to her that day of an impending sense of doom – both for himself and for our society. And the sermon talks about our many social and personal disasters and tragedies, and how we might persevere in the face of those.
Like me, Dad was always waiting for disaster. And for him, it occurred the day after he gave that sermon to Catherine, as he was rushed to Peterborough in excruciating pain.
And yet, "Good Cheer." That was his message, based upon a line ascribed to Jesus in the Gospel of John. Speaking to the disciples on the night before his execution, Jesus said, "In the world you will have tribulation, but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world."
Now, Dad notes in his sermon that the world has NOT been overcome. Our personal and social troubles persist, and we all face the certainty of pain, and struggle, and death. But while the world might not be overcome, Dad overcame his fears.
He was afraid to look for love, but nevertheless he found it, got married, helped to raise five kids, and gloried in his grandchildren. He was scared of public speaking, but he got into the pulpit thousands of times and delivered a Word of God. He was beset by all the doubts that any minister who has been through a modern seminary faces as they learn how their childhood beliefs are founded on sand; and how difficult a mature stance is in the light of modern knowledge and the amazing and dreadful moment of history that we are fated to live within. And yet, he carried his ministry through to the end.
We saw Dad triumph over his anxiety again in the hospital last week in Peterborough. Dad, unable to speak because of breathing tubes, often in discomfort, and stripped of almost everything, communicated his joy to us despite all that. On his third day in the hospital, after a 30-minute family conference where the doctor gave us very little hope that Dad would survive, and that the last-ditch therapy would mean deep sedation; we gathered in a circle around Dad. Essentially we were saying goodbye. Dad was awake. Mary put her hand on his forehead. Paul spoke to him. Dad waved his arms in recognition, he smiled, and he communicated his gratitude and his contentment to us all. It is one of my favourite memories ever of my Dad, and the last time that I saw him conscious.
Despite pain, despite imminent death, despite not being able to talk, Dad trusted in the moment; he focused on his blessings and on love. He focused on his family.
A key insight for me during my surprising return to the church these last six years has been about the word "faith." The word faith has about five different meanings in English, and my least favourite is to define it as belief in a set of incredible doctrines. On the other hand, my favourite definition of faith is as "trust:" trust in the universe despite its cosmic, awful mystery; trust in our bodies despite their pains and their finitude; trust in love despite our essential aloneness as individuals. In this sense, and in the face of his anxieties, Dad struggled all his life and every day to be a man of faith; and mostly I think he succeeded. In this best sense, Dad is my roots, my forerunner, and my role model. I treasure his memory in my heart. And I will miss him until the day of my death. Despite all the ups and downs in his role as one of our parents, I am filled with thanks that he was my Dad.
But I want to give him the last word in my remarks. So, here now is the closing paragraph of his "Disaster" sermon:
"Trouble in this world, Jesus said – no doubt about it. The world overcome? Hardly. But the word has gone out – "Fear not!" The road opens before us, the future is ours, the world waits, and wonders. "We have nothing to fear but fear itself." "If God be for us, who can be against us?" Who indeed? So pick yourself up, dust yourself off, take a deep breath, and go on. And – "Good cheer!!"
Ian Kellogg, July 2, 2007, Cobourg Ontario, Trinity United Church
And now I add the eulogy I gave at my mother's memorial in Toronto on January 13, 2018
And finally, a second eulogy for my mother at a Memorial for her in Cobourg ON on July 7, 2018
Back to "Completing the Circle"
So, what impact will Dad's death have on me, or on the rest of his family, and his relatives, and his friends who have gathered here today? Of course, a related and more upbeat question is, what impact has his life had on us? Maybe I will speak a bit about both.
I feel shaken by Dad's death, and part of this comes from how strongly I identified with him. Perhaps more than my brothers and sisters, I seemed to be like Dad both physically and emotionally. Certain arcs of our lives seemed to have parallels. We both had a lot of trouble dealing with adolescence, and dating, and finding love -– though Dad was smart and lucky, and he eventually found our remarkable Mom. If ever it can be said that Dad was a recipient of grace, I think it would be when Mary fell in love with him.
I also identify with Dad's call to ministry in the church, though I have been much more successful in resisting that call than him. Instead, I turned my spiritual enthusiasm into radical politics as a young man, and into other intellectual interests as an adult.
But mostly, I identify with a wavelength of anxiety that I perceive running through Dad's life and my own. And fortunately for me, I deeply appreciate how Dad learned to often handle his anxieties and come out the other side, to live so much of his life in joy, and in love, and in faith.
Dad wrote what is now his final sermon a few weeks ago. It was to have been delivered at his home church in Welcome this August, and it's about this topic of fear and anxiety. The night before his aneurysm burst and his ordeal in the hospital began, Dad gave Catherine an envelope at the train station that said, "To Catherine, Love Dad." When she asked what it contained, he simply said, "Read it on the train." So, she did. And since then, we have come to name this remarkable sermon as "Disaster is upon us; be of good cheer," But in reality its title is simply "Good Cheer."
Still, I like our title. After all, Catherine tells us that Dad spoke to her that day of an impending sense of doom – both for himself and for our society. And the sermon talks about our many social and personal disasters and tragedies, and how we might persevere in the face of those.
Like me, Dad was always waiting for disaster. And for him, it occurred the day after he gave that sermon to Catherine, as he was rushed to Peterborough in excruciating pain.
And yet, "Good Cheer." That was his message, based upon a line ascribed to Jesus in the Gospel of John. Speaking to the disciples on the night before his execution, Jesus said, "In the world you will have tribulation, but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world."
Now, Dad notes in his sermon that the world has NOT been overcome. Our personal and social troubles persist, and we all face the certainty of pain, and struggle, and death. But while the world might not be overcome, Dad overcame his fears.
He was afraid to look for love, but nevertheless he found it, got married, helped to raise five kids, and gloried in his grandchildren. He was scared of public speaking, but he got into the pulpit thousands of times and delivered a Word of God. He was beset by all the doubts that any minister who has been through a modern seminary faces as they learn how their childhood beliefs are founded on sand; and how difficult a mature stance is in the light of modern knowledge and the amazing and dreadful moment of history that we are fated to live within. And yet, he carried his ministry through to the end.
We saw Dad triumph over his anxiety again in the hospital last week in Peterborough. Dad, unable to speak because of breathing tubes, often in discomfort, and stripped of almost everything, communicated his joy to us despite all that. On his third day in the hospital, after a 30-minute family conference where the doctor gave us very little hope that Dad would survive, and that the last-ditch therapy would mean deep sedation; we gathered in a circle around Dad. Essentially we were saying goodbye. Dad was awake. Mary put her hand on his forehead. Paul spoke to him. Dad waved his arms in recognition, he smiled, and he communicated his gratitude and his contentment to us all. It is one of my favourite memories ever of my Dad, and the last time that I saw him conscious.
Despite pain, despite imminent death, despite not being able to talk, Dad trusted in the moment; he focused on his blessings and on love. He focused on his family.
A key insight for me during my surprising return to the church these last six years has been about the word "faith." The word faith has about five different meanings in English, and my least favourite is to define it as belief in a set of incredible doctrines. On the other hand, my favourite definition of faith is as "trust:" trust in the universe despite its cosmic, awful mystery; trust in our bodies despite their pains and their finitude; trust in love despite our essential aloneness as individuals. In this sense, and in the face of his anxieties, Dad struggled all his life and every day to be a man of faith; and mostly I think he succeeded. In this best sense, Dad is my roots, my forerunner, and my role model. I treasure his memory in my heart. And I will miss him until the day of my death. Despite all the ups and downs in his role as one of our parents, I am filled with thanks that he was my Dad.
But I want to give him the last word in my remarks. So, here now is the closing paragraph of his "Disaster" sermon:
"Trouble in this world, Jesus said – no doubt about it. The world overcome? Hardly. But the word has gone out – "Fear not!" The road opens before us, the future is ours, the world waits, and wonders. "We have nothing to fear but fear itself." "If God be for us, who can be against us?" Who indeed? So pick yourself up, dust yourself off, take a deep breath, and go on. And – "Good cheer!!"
Ian Kellogg, July 2, 2007, Cobourg Ontario, Trinity United Church
And now I add the eulogy I gave at my mother's memorial in Toronto on January 13, 2018
Eulogy for Mary Kellogg, January 13, 2018
Grieving helps me to accept reality; and yet I struggle to express it, probably because it’s painful. I’ve expressed some grief about my mother, especially when Catherine phoned on December 28 to say that she had finally died. I hope to express more today.
So, what am I struggling to accept? Not just that Mom is dead, which means I no longer have to worry about her; or wonder what she is up to; or talk to her on the phone for a few minutes each day. That is part of it, of course. But I also struggle to accept that Mary and Clare were the parents we had; that this is the time into which we were born; that we have accomplished the things we have; and that we have failed to accomplish many other things.
One week ago today was Epiphany, a day on which the church celebrates revelation. On Sunday, I marked Epiphany by talking about the world into which my parents were born and of the revelations bequeathed to them by World War I.
I talked about 1915, ten years before Mom’s birth, and eight years before Dad’s.
In 1915, the man who would become my mother’s father, Mackenzie Rutherford, was wounded in France. In that same year, on the other side of the trenches in France, the Rev. Dr. Paul Tillich worked as a Lutheran chaplain for Germany. He would become Dad’s teacher in New York City in 1948.
For both Grandpa Rutherford and Tillich, the horror of the First World War revealed the nature of empire; and for both of them, along with millions of others, the rebellions of 1917 and 1918 that ended the War revealed the potential of ordinary people to unite, which could create a world of abundance and peace beyond empire.
Mom and Dad lived their whole lives somewhere between these two revelations, a kind of no-man’s land between the trauma of imperialist violence and the possibilities for liberation.
My grief lies buried somewhere in this no-man’s land, I believe.
I was glad to spend five days with Mom before Christmas as she was dying. In her funny quips and surprising vitality, I saw my own hoped-for vitality. In her struggles to know and express feelings, I saw my own struggles.
Our lives are filled with innumerable moments of beauty, enlightenment, and love. But to best embrace these moments of Grace we have to embrace ones we don’t like — times of sickness, pain, and confusion.
Our bodies are fragile and mortal even as they give us exquisite delight and joy. Our minds are partial and conflicted even as they open us to endless flights of imagination, connection, and understanding.
At the social level, we are burdened by multiple divisions, the terrible gifts of monarchy and patriarchy.
At the same time, we can often taste the delights of a humanity partially freed from those constraints, one that in its learning and productivity points to the possibilities of greater peace, equality, and sustainability.
I am so glad to be alive today, even though I have to face Mom’s death. I am thrilled to be a minister in the United Church of Canada even though it is a sinking ship with a leadership that seems incapable of accepting this reality. I am so grateful that I am married to you, Kim, even though I am sorry it took me so long to find you in order to finally experience love at first sight. I am filled with joy that I can experience this terrible day with my brothers and sister even though I can see my own twisted knots so clearly in each of you. I love you dearly even as I am sometimes filled with fear or pain as I watch us struggle in our own ways.
For me, one of those struggles is expressing grief, a struggle that I believe I shared with Mom. So today, I have decided to end by singing a hymn.
On Sunday December 17, I told my congregation in Edmonton that Mom was dying and that I was travelling to Toronto to say goodbye to her. That was the Sunday in Advent in which we focused on Mary, the mother of Jesus.
And as we sang “Dreaming Mary” that day, I cried. If I am lucky, I may do so again today. Eric, would you please accompany me?
“There was a child in Galilee
who wandered wild along the sea.
A holy child, alone was she,
and they called her Dreaming Mary.
And she dreamed, rejoicing in her saviour;
she dreamed of justice for the poor.
She dreamed that kings oppressed no more
when she dreamed, that Dreaming Mary.
One holy day an angel came
with voice of wind and eyes of flame.
He promised blessed would be her name
when he spoke to Dreaming Mary.
Then she spoke, rejoicing in her saviour.
She spoke of justice for the poor.
She spoke that kings oppressed no more
when she spoke, that Dreaming Mary.
And did she dream about a son?
And did he speak, the angel one?
We only know God’s will was done
in the son of Dreaming Mary.
Then she prayed, rejoicing in her saviour.
She taught him justice for the poor.
She taught that kings oppressed no more
when she taught, that Dreaming Mary.
Then Jesus grew in Galilee,
they wandered wild along the sea.
Now he calls to you and me
to dream with Dreaming Mary.
And we dream, rejoicing in our saviour.
We dream of justice for the poor.
We dream that kings oppress no more
as we dream with Dreaming Mary.
So, what am I struggling to accept? Not just that Mom is dead, which means I no longer have to worry about her; or wonder what she is up to; or talk to her on the phone for a few minutes each day. That is part of it, of course. But I also struggle to accept that Mary and Clare were the parents we had; that this is the time into which we were born; that we have accomplished the things we have; and that we have failed to accomplish many other things.
One week ago today was Epiphany, a day on which the church celebrates revelation. On Sunday, I marked Epiphany by talking about the world into which my parents were born and of the revelations bequeathed to them by World War I.
I talked about 1915, ten years before Mom’s birth, and eight years before Dad’s.
In 1915, the man who would become my mother’s father, Mackenzie Rutherford, was wounded in France. In that same year, on the other side of the trenches in France, the Rev. Dr. Paul Tillich worked as a Lutheran chaplain for Germany. He would become Dad’s teacher in New York City in 1948.
For both Grandpa Rutherford and Tillich, the horror of the First World War revealed the nature of empire; and for both of them, along with millions of others, the rebellions of 1917 and 1918 that ended the War revealed the potential of ordinary people to unite, which could create a world of abundance and peace beyond empire.
Mom and Dad lived their whole lives somewhere between these two revelations, a kind of no-man’s land between the trauma of imperialist violence and the possibilities for liberation.
My grief lies buried somewhere in this no-man’s land, I believe.
I was glad to spend five days with Mom before Christmas as she was dying. In her funny quips and surprising vitality, I saw my own hoped-for vitality. In her struggles to know and express feelings, I saw my own struggles.
Our lives are filled with innumerable moments of beauty, enlightenment, and love. But to best embrace these moments of Grace we have to embrace ones we don’t like — times of sickness, pain, and confusion.
Our bodies are fragile and mortal even as they give us exquisite delight and joy. Our minds are partial and conflicted even as they open us to endless flights of imagination, connection, and understanding.
At the social level, we are burdened by multiple divisions, the terrible gifts of monarchy and patriarchy.
At the same time, we can often taste the delights of a humanity partially freed from those constraints, one that in its learning and productivity points to the possibilities of greater peace, equality, and sustainability.
I am so glad to be alive today, even though I have to face Mom’s death. I am thrilled to be a minister in the United Church of Canada even though it is a sinking ship with a leadership that seems incapable of accepting this reality. I am so grateful that I am married to you, Kim, even though I am sorry it took me so long to find you in order to finally experience love at first sight. I am filled with joy that I can experience this terrible day with my brothers and sister even though I can see my own twisted knots so clearly in each of you. I love you dearly even as I am sometimes filled with fear or pain as I watch us struggle in our own ways.
For me, one of those struggles is expressing grief, a struggle that I believe I shared with Mom. So today, I have decided to end by singing a hymn.
On Sunday December 17, I told my congregation in Edmonton that Mom was dying and that I was travelling to Toronto to say goodbye to her. That was the Sunday in Advent in which we focused on Mary, the mother of Jesus.
And as we sang “Dreaming Mary” that day, I cried. If I am lucky, I may do so again today. Eric, would you please accompany me?
“There was a child in Galilee
who wandered wild along the sea.
A holy child, alone was she,
and they called her Dreaming Mary.
And she dreamed, rejoicing in her saviour;
she dreamed of justice for the poor.
She dreamed that kings oppressed no more
when she dreamed, that Dreaming Mary.
One holy day an angel came
with voice of wind and eyes of flame.
He promised blessed would be her name
when he spoke to Dreaming Mary.
Then she spoke, rejoicing in her saviour.
She spoke of justice for the poor.
She spoke that kings oppressed no more
when she spoke, that Dreaming Mary.
And did she dream about a son?
And did he speak, the angel one?
We only know God’s will was done
in the son of Dreaming Mary.
Then she prayed, rejoicing in her saviour.
She taught him justice for the poor.
She taught that kings oppressed no more
when she taught, that Dreaming Mary.
Then Jesus grew in Galilee,
they wandered wild along the sea.
Now he calls to you and me
to dream with Dreaming Mary.
And we dream, rejoicing in our saviour.
We dream of justice for the poor.
We dream that kings oppress no more
as we dream with Dreaming Mary.
And finally, a second eulogy for my mother at a Memorial for her in Cobourg ON on July 7, 2018
Eulogy for Mary Kellogg -- July 7, 2018
When I spoke at the Memorial for my mother in Toronto in January, I focused on grief. I was worried that I wouldn’t be able to express it, although in the end, I expressed a lot, for which I am thankful.
Today, my focus is on shame, for three reasons. First, fear of humiliation has always been a key concern of mine. This fear has kept me from doing a lot of things, and it has also walled me off from feeling shame.
Second, last week I started reading a book from my father’s library. It is titled “The Shame and The Sacrifice: the life and death of Dietrich Bonhoeffer.” Bonhoeffer was a German Lutheran minister and theologian who is known for his opposition to Hitler. This led to his arrest in 1943 and his execution in 1945 at age 39.
He became famous after the war for his writings on the future of faith in a post-religious world. I haven’t finished the book yet, but I imagine the author used the word “Shame” in the title because of how the world allowed WWI to evolve into WWII and into the Holocaust against Jews, gays, and others.
Third, last week Kim and I watched a new special on Netflix called "Nanette" by Australian comic and activist Hannah Gadsby. It starts as a stand-up comedy show and ends as a cry from the heart in which she rails against sexism, violence, and the oppression of queer people. As a lesbian, Hannah talks about being steeped in 10 years of toxic shame when she was a child growing up in small town Australia.
I identified with Gadsby even though the level of abuse and humiliation I experienced is a tiny fraction of what she suffered. I am curious why I identified with her.
When I was a child, I felt both pride and fear that our family seemed different. We Kellogg’s seemed a little queer to me. Dad was a minister in a culture that was rapidly becoming secular. We were a middle class family in the industrial and working class city of Cornwall. Our household was filled with books, newspapers, radio broadcasts, and classical music. We weren’t the most assertive bunch in a brash and harsh world. Personally, I had long stringy hair and lots of awkwardness. Few of my peers shared my interests.
Yesterday, Kim and I had a lovely visit at the farm in Welcome with Ruth and Meghan, and then also David and Elaine. It reminded me of conversations that Paul and I had with Ruth and Elaine as children during our many vacations at the farm — which life was better: farm life or city life? Paul and I argued for the farm, because things seemed so much more solid and real there. Ruth and Elaine argued for the city, probably because it wasn’t what they knew.
Back in Cornwall, I loved all the opportunities that family, library, and school offered us, but I also felt un-moored and therefore unsafe there.
My fear of feeling shame means that I struggle to accept my humble status. Like anyone, I am mortal and fragile. We live in a world of wonders and fantastic opportunities, but also one of uncontrolled economic growth and terrible violence. We have been under the shadow of nuclear weapons for 70 years now. None of us know how to stop climate change or other consequences of pollution. We are all humbled by these realities.
My mother’s life is now over, and so I and my siblings are finally orphans in our 50s and 60s. I am glad that Mom and Dad navigated the challenge of living between the exciting opportunities of a changing world and its intense discontents, and that they raised a family of five children. Like all of us, they were humble mortals, but they often found ways to love and flourish despite that.
Those of us left behind, face the same challenges. It was in my early 20s that, with grief, I gave up the illusion that I could play a big part in mending the world and fixing civilization. And yet, I continue to struggle to accept that this is the world of woes and wonders, and of violence and creativity we are fated to live within.
If I can let go of some of my fear of being humiliated, I hope to grow into the virtue of humility and accept that my work is not to mend the world, but to tend to my own heart and to my relationships with Kim, my siblings, my community of faith, and all the people I meet in joy.
Today I am grateful for my mother Mary, the life she gave us, the queerness of her marriage to Clare, and of the family they founded. I am grateful to all of you who have come to remember Mom and to be with us in our shame and our grief, and our love and our joy.
Today is a beautiful day; and next week, I look forward to a burial ritual with my brothers, sisters and their partners in the Gaspe, and to stumbling down the road toward new ways of being family in the future.
Thank you.
Back to "Completing the Circle"
Tumbleweed and rottweilers
Sent via email on May 18th, 2011
Dear friends,
Well, I've been to Borderlands, returned to Toronto and survived. In fact, I think I will quite like living and working there.
Two things prompted me to fly to Saskatchewan for four days over the past weekend: the need to find a place to rent when I begin work as the minister there on July 1st and the fact that Chinook Presbytery, which gathers only three times a year, was meeting in one of the three Borderlands churches (Wesley United in Rockglen) last Saturday, May 14th. So after graduating from Emmanuel at the convocation ceremony last Thursday, I flew to Regina the next evening, drove west to Moose Jaw, and then continued the drive south early on Saturday morning.
The geography of Rockglen, Fife Lake and Coronach -- nestled just west of Grasslands National Park and just north of the Montana border -- is varied, weird and spectacularly beautiful. Rockglen reminds me of the Badlands near Drumheller Alberta with steep hills rising everywhere. The 30 min. drive east to Coronach is one of long sloping hills, which at present are dotted with numerous sloughs that glisten dark blue when the sun shines, as it did all weekend. In between is Fife Lake, a hamlet of 50 people. To me, the latter looked like an abandoned Hollywood set of the Wild West, except that the hotel and church are still operating. The Fife Lake church is tiny and gorgeous, and the five women who came to worship there on Sunday afternoon with the current minister, Rev. Kevin Johnson, and me, welcomed me warmly.
Presbytery was . . . well . . . Presbytery. But I am glad to now know most of my colleagues, even if some of them are more than six hours drive away, and none closer than an hour. After the all-day meeting, Kevin graciously hosted me at his apartment, and I learned a lot by spending many hours talking with him. Borderlands has three worship services every week, with a lunch after the second one in Rockglen. Besides the five people in Fife Lake this week, there were 14 people each in Coronach and Rockglen. Worship in three small points will be a change for me, but one that I look forward to.
A highlight for me was getting a tour of the manse after the first service in Coronach. It turns out that the couple now renting it will probably move into their newly purchased home before July 1st, so after looking at some rental places in both Rockglen and Coronach on Monday, I've decided to take the manse. It is a 5-bedroom, 1970s bungalow, and I quite like it. You can see the exterior of it on Google Maps Street View if you search for 142 3rd Street West, Coronach, Saskatchewan. It is the one with a weeping willow in the front yard. 153 3rd Street W. -- the one with the blue cross on the front -- is the "Lutheran parsonage." The Lutheran minister and a Roman Catholic priest in Rockglen (a recent immigrant from India) are the only paid clergy besides me in the three communities.
Coronach is very isolated, but the beauty to be experienced in driving from there to Assinboia, or Moose Jaw or Regina (the latter is about 2.5 hour drive away) cheers me. The 30-minute drive between the two furthest points in the charge is an easy one, except when it is covered in ice or snow. Monday was a very windy day, and tumbleweed was flying everywhere. Not surprisingly, there is virtually no traffic given that only 900 people live in Coronach and only 400 in Rockglen. I saw one deer by the road when approaching Moose Jaw Tuesday, but very few cars.
And the rottweiler? He was lurking in the entrance to the bar in Rockglen, where I met the chair of the Search Committee for dinner on Monday. But despite his appearance, the dog like the owners of the bar, seemed very friendly.
I may drop you a line about further wild west adventures sometimeafter I have moved out there in July.
Cheers, Ian
Back to "Completing the Circle"
Dear friends,
Well, I've been to Borderlands, returned to Toronto and survived. In fact, I think I will quite like living and working there.
Two things prompted me to fly to Saskatchewan for four days over the past weekend: the need to find a place to rent when I begin work as the minister there on July 1st and the fact that Chinook Presbytery, which gathers only three times a year, was meeting in one of the three Borderlands churches (Wesley United in Rockglen) last Saturday, May 14th. So after graduating from Emmanuel at the convocation ceremony last Thursday, I flew to Regina the next evening, drove west to Moose Jaw, and then continued the drive south early on Saturday morning.
The geography of Rockglen, Fife Lake and Coronach -- nestled just west of Grasslands National Park and just north of the Montana border -- is varied, weird and spectacularly beautiful. Rockglen reminds me of the Badlands near Drumheller Alberta with steep hills rising everywhere. The 30 min. drive east to Coronach is one of long sloping hills, which at present are dotted with numerous sloughs that glisten dark blue when the sun shines, as it did all weekend. In between is Fife Lake, a hamlet of 50 people. To me, the latter looked like an abandoned Hollywood set of the Wild West, except that the hotel and church are still operating. The Fife Lake church is tiny and gorgeous, and the five women who came to worship there on Sunday afternoon with the current minister, Rev. Kevin Johnson, and me, welcomed me warmly.
Presbytery was . . . well . . . Presbytery. But I am glad to now know most of my colleagues, even if some of them are more than six hours drive away, and none closer than an hour. After the all-day meeting, Kevin graciously hosted me at his apartment, and I learned a lot by spending many hours talking with him. Borderlands has three worship services every week, with a lunch after the second one in Rockglen. Besides the five people in Fife Lake this week, there were 14 people each in Coronach and Rockglen. Worship in three small points will be a change for me, but one that I look forward to.
A highlight for me was getting a tour of the manse after the first service in Coronach. It turns out that the couple now renting it will probably move into their newly purchased home before July 1st, so after looking at some rental places in both Rockglen and Coronach on Monday, I've decided to take the manse. It is a 5-bedroom, 1970s bungalow, and I quite like it. You can see the exterior of it on Google Maps Street View if you search for 142 3rd Street West, Coronach, Saskatchewan. It is the one with a weeping willow in the front yard. 153 3rd Street W. -- the one with the blue cross on the front -- is the "Lutheran parsonage." The Lutheran minister and a Roman Catholic priest in Rockglen (a recent immigrant from India) are the only paid clergy besides me in the three communities.
Coronach is very isolated, but the beauty to be experienced in driving from there to Assinboia, or Moose Jaw or Regina (the latter is about 2.5 hour drive away) cheers me. The 30-minute drive between the two furthest points in the charge is an easy one, except when it is covered in ice or snow. Monday was a very windy day, and tumbleweed was flying everywhere. Not surprisingly, there is virtually no traffic given that only 900 people live in Coronach and only 400 in Rockglen. I saw one deer by the road when approaching Moose Jaw Tuesday, but very few cars.
And the rottweiler? He was lurking in the entrance to the bar in Rockglen, where I met the chair of the Search Committee for dinner on Monday. But despite his appearance, the dog like the owners of the bar, seemed very friendly.
I may drop you a line about further wild west adventures sometimeafter I have moved out there in July.
Cheers, Ian
Back to "Completing the Circle"
Sunday, June 5, 2011
Good Cheer -- June 5, 2011
Sermon preached by Ian Kellogg at Kingston Road United Church, Toronto, Ontario. I have included the text of the lesson from John because I use the RSV translation for John 16 -- the version used by my father four years ago -- and the NRSV translation for John 17. The last paragraph of the sermon is inspired by the anthem "Deep Waters," which the choir sang just before the sermon -- Ian
Text: John 16:29-John 17:11
The Gospel reading this morning is from John. I am including a bit more of from John than is printed in the bulletin. I will start with last five verses from John 16 since that is the text used by my late father, the Rev. James Clare Kellogg, in his final sermon four years ago
[On the night of his betrayal, Jesus had spoken at length to his disciples. And at the end of his teaching] they said, "Ah, now you are speaking plainly, not in any figure of speech! Now we know that you know all things, and need no one to question you; by this we believe that you came from God."
Jesus answered them, "Do you now believe? The hour is coming, indeed it has come, when you will be scattered, every one to his home, and you will leave me alone; yet I am not alone, for the Father is with me. I have said this to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you have tribulation; but be of good cheer, for I have overcome the world."
When Jesus had spoken these words, he then said "Father, the hour has come; glorify your Son so that the Son may glorify you, since you have given him authority over all people, to give eternal life to all whom you have given him. And this is eternal life, that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent.
I glorified you on earth by finishing the work that you gave me to do. So now, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had in your presence before the world existed.
I have made your name known to those whom you gave me from the world. They were yours, and you gave them to me, and they have kept your word. Now they know that everything you have given me is from you; for the words that you gave to me I have given to them, and they have received them and know in truth that I came from you; and they have believed that you sent me.
I am asking on their behalf; I am not asking on behalf of the world, but on behalf of those whom you gave me, because they are yours. All mine are yours, and yours are mine; and I have been glorified in them.
And now I am no longer in the world, but they are in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, protect them in your name that you have given me, so that they may be one, as we are one.
SERMON: Good Cheer
Let us pray . . . Gracious God, may the words of my mouth and the meditations of all of our hearts be acceptable in your sight. Amen
This coming Friday, the United Church will celebrate its anniversary. June 10th will mark 86 years since our church was formed in 1925 at a worship service in downtown Toronto. In many United Churches this year, not too much is being made about the anniversary, especially compared to last year when it was our 85th.
Nevertheless, since today is my farewell to Kingston Road; since I want to talk about the state of the church; and since the Gospel reading this morning is, as it always is on the final and Seventh Sunday of Easter, from John 17 from which the United Church adopted its motto -- "That all may be one" -- I have decided to highlight our church's anniversary today . . .
I mention that this is my farewell to KRU although I have not often been around during the past three years. In 2008-09, I fulfilled a required Field Placement in Presteign-Woodbine United Church in East York. In 2009-10, I lived in Alberta as a student intern where I was the minister of Knox United Church in Didsbury. And this past year as I finished my third and final year of a Masters of Divinity degree at Emmanuel College, I have "church-hopped" most Sundays in order to learn how other congregations worship and live out their faith. And now I am leaving on July 1st to work as a full-time minister in southern Saskatchewan.
But my absence from KRU for much of the past three years does not mean that this church doesn't hold a central place in my heart. When I first walked into KRU 10 years ago, I knew right away that I had found what I was looking for. I had no idea then how far the Spirit that dwelt here would take me, but I knew this was the right place. So, for helping to bring me back into the church, for helping me find a new purpose in life, and for supporting my journey towards ordination over these past four years, I thank Kingston Road and all of you who are here today . . .
John 17, part of which we heard this morning, marks the end of Jesus' long farewell speech to his disciples at the Last Supper. Every year at the close of the Easter season, a selection from John 17 is one of the assigned readings, and it is set alongside the story from Acts of Jesus' ascension to heaven, which we also heard today. Next week is Pentecost where we will celebrate the coming of the Holy Spirit to the early church and learn how they continued as a community without Jesus in their midst.
Personally, I don't find the text today to be the easiest one to follow. Like the rest of the 3,000 word speech of Jesus that John records from the Last Supper, the ideas are thickly packed together.
The United Church particularly picked up on Jesus' hope for unity expressed in John 17. We took this as an inspiration to mend the divisions in the Christian church. So in 1925, the Methodist Church of Canada, two-thirds of the Presbyterian Church in Canada, the Congregational Union of Ontario and Quebec, and the union churches from Canada's West united. It was a wonderful moment of hope and enthusiasm and it created what was then and remains today the largest Protestant denomination in Canada.
But many of our church's hopes have not come to be. After 40 initial years of growth, the United Church entered what is now more than 45 years of decline in the 1960s. We are probably smaller today than we were in 1925, even as there are three times more people living in Canada today than 86 years ago.
Our decline is hardly unique. All mainline churches in Canada and in most other rich, industrialized countries have been shrinking for 50 or more years. On the other hand, Christianity on a world scale is now growing quite rapidly. This growth is in rapidly industrializing countries like China, India and Brazil, and in many of the desperately poor countries in sub-Saharan Africa, Latin America and Asia. But there is reason to believe that if these countries were to achieve a level of economic and social development like that in Europe, North America, and Japan, a process of secularization similar to what we have experienced might occur there too.
The United Church's dream of greater church unity has not come to pass either. With the exception of one small union with the Evangelical United Brethren in the 1960s, we have not merged with other denominations. In fact, since the 1970s the United Church has been isolated from most other Christians because of our theological openness and our support for inclusion and justice.
Think, if you will, of the top 5,000 leaders of Christianity around the world today. This overwhelmingly male group would include the Pope, all the Roman Catholic cardinals, the leaders of the flourishing Pentecostal denominations in Africa and Latin America, the Orthodox Patriarchs, the archbishops of the various Anglican churches, the major televangelists in the United States, and small groups of leaders from all the world's other denominations. One of the few women would be Mardi Tindal, our Moderator, who would be joined by perhaps one other United Church leader. In this group of 5,000, I suspect that I would have major disagreements with well over 4500 of them. I would consider most of them to be on the wrong side of issues like equality, justice, church democracy, and attitudes towards modern culture. Most of the 5000 would oppose equality for women in both church and society. Almost all of them would be hostile to sexual minorities. I would dislike the theology of all but a handful of them.
And yet, when I was ordained in Orillia last Sunday I was ordained as a minister of Word, Sacrament, and Pastoral Care within the Holy Catholic Church -- that is, within the universal church of Christ. Similarly, when Christina was baptized this morning, she was baptized into the One, Holy, Apostolic and Catholic Church of Christ. But while Christina's baptism will be recognized by any church around the world, my ordination will not have much purchase outside our own walls.
And I don't have a problem with that. I am quite happy to work in ministry with the 200,000 or so of us who gather for worship each Sunday in thousands of United Churches across Canada. I don't want to be recognized by Pentecostal or Baptist ministers who preach a message that often strikes me as nonsense. I don't want to be recognized by Roman Catholic or Orthodox churches that don't allow women to be ordained, let alone gays or lesbians. And so on.
So while more than two billion of the seven billion people alive today are Christian, the unity that Jesus hopes for in our reading this morning and which first inspired our denomination remains only a dream. And this has often been the case.
In the first 300 years of the church, its small numbers and its isolation led to a profusion of wildly diverse Christian sects. Some groups thought that Jesus was divine -- a modern incarnation of Yahweh, the God of Israel -- but not also human. Some thought Jesus was human -- another prophet like Moses or Elijah -- but not also divine. Some embraced all the tenets of Judaism. Some turned their back on their Hebrew roots. Some focused on the practical work of mutual aid and healing. Others pursued ecstasy and enlightenment through strange rituals. Each city's church had its own unique collection of gospel stories and other texts.
This changed in the Fourth Century when Emperor Constantine adopted Christianity as the official religion of the Roman Empire. With a series of Councils that began in 325, the Imperial Church created a common Bible, a common creed, and a common way of running the church. But this unity was created from above through police action, book burnings and forced conversion to Catholic Christianity. The Roman Empire created a unified church that at one level might be seen as what Jesus hoped for, but at a cost. The cost was replacing a gospel of justice and love with one of oppression and fear.
I am glad that this unity did not last. First there was the break between the Greek-speaking Orthodox Church in the East and the Latin-speaking West 1,000 years ago. Later there was the Protestant Reformation of the 1500s, which shattered the church in Europe into a dozens of shards. The timing of the Reformation was ironic. This was the point where the European empires began to conquer most of the rest of the world. Through colonialism they knit all the world's continents into one economic system for the first time. European conquest also allowed Christianity to leap ahead of Islam, Hinduism and other faiths to become the most dominant religion in the world. It was both a moment of imperial glory for the universal Catholic Church and also the beginning of secularization and the fracturing of the church into the wild diversity it exhibits today.
I had an up-close experience with the diversity of Canadian churches last year during my internship in Didsbury Alberta. I represented Knox United in the meetings of the Didsbury and Carstairs Ministerial Association, which met for lunch one day each month and which planned worship services at retirement homes and long-term care facilities. I am glad that I attended these meetings with the 12 or so other pastors from the region. But also I often felt like a stranger in a strange land there. Other than me and the United Church minister from Carstairs, all of the pastors were fundamentalist right-wingers in various Mennonite, Lutheran, Missionary Alliance and Anglican garbs.
Each month, the host pastor began lunch by telling the story of his journey to faith, and I often struggled to hide my astonishment. All of them had come to adopt theological ideas that I considered to be bizarre and irrational. So I felt nervous when it was my turn to host. But the others listened respectfully as I spoke about being a preacher's kid who grew up in eastern Ontario in the 1960s and 1970s; about how along with my most of my friends, I became a secular atheist as a teenager, and a political radical as a young man; how a trip to Nicaragua in 1984 marked a turning point for me both spiritually and politically; and how I returned to church via Kingston Road after 9/11 where I found a new way to trust the Christ and follow the Way of the Cross. Perhaps my story might have confirmed their prejudices about the United Church just as their stories might have confirmed my prejudices about small-town evangelical pastors.
And yet at a deeper level, I could sometimes see our connections. Despite our differences, I liked most of the other men around the table. And I am sure that in moments of celebration such as birth and marriage and in moments of mourning such as sickness, loss and death, these men were true pastors to their congregations. Despite our theological and cultural differences, at the deepest levels of life, in moments of heightened awareness, and in ones where each of our uniqueness was most evident, we might touch hearts and hands and be united in Christ.
Jesus put it this way: by giving us the gift of a life in God through Christ, which is a birthright symbolized by the sacrament of baptism that we participated in this morning, we are also given eternal life. And what is eternal life? Jesus simply says that it is to know the God who is Love.
This eternal life is right here, right now. We may not always be aware of it, but in our deepest moments it beckons to us and helps unite us across our differences.
All of which leads me to conclude with a question: how is that we can move from the shallow end to the deep end? And the quick answer -- we don't have to do anything; life continually throws us into the deep end whether we want that or not. The deep end can be found in dark moments of illness, family conflict, social oppression, pain or loss. It can also be found in joyous moments of connection, sharing, community and love. In such deep moments, we are best able to know our own unique brokenness and loveliness and also, paradoxically, best connect with other people. Such a connection is a unity from below. It is unity built on compassion, mutual respect and solidarity. While it might not always solve our practical problems, such a unity in God through Christ heals us and put us in touch with eternity regardless of our circumstances.
I suspect that the Christian church will never achieve the denominational unity that our ancestors hoped for in 1925. Nor, I suspect, will our broken world achieve political unity, which we so badly need to solve our many military, environmental, economic and social ills. But in our individual and collective tribulations, we have experienced again and again the truth that God in Christ has overcome the world. Because of this, in the midst of fear, we often touch faith. In the midst of despair, we often touch hope. And in the midst of conflict and violence, we often touch love.
These eternal moments of union with God happen most often in the deepest waters, which is where the trials of life continually throw us. Therefore we can say with Jesus, be of good cheer. In deep waters, where only love can make us go, harvests of faith will overflow. Harvests of faith will overflow.
Thanks be to God.
Amen.
We Respond To The Word
Our hymn of response is VU#331, "The Church's One Foundation." This hymn was sung as the processional hymn at the founding worship service of the United Church on June 10, 1925 at a packed Mutual Street Arena in downtown Toronto. Years later, the first Moderator of the United Church, The Very Rev. George Pidgeon, said that as the elected General Council commissioners from the Presbyterian, Methodist, Congregationalist, and Union churches marched into the arena to mingle together for the first time as members of the United Church, the hymn was sung with quote "an emotion that can scarcely be imagined." Let us now sing it together.
HYMN: VU #331 "The Church's One Foundation"
Back to "Completing the Circle"
Text: John 16:29-John 17:11
The Gospel reading this morning is from John. I am including a bit more of from John than is printed in the bulletin. I will start with last five verses from John 16 since that is the text used by my late father, the Rev. James Clare Kellogg, in his final sermon four years ago
[On the night of his betrayal, Jesus had spoken at length to his disciples. And at the end of his teaching] they said, "Ah, now you are speaking plainly, not in any figure of speech! Now we know that you know all things, and need no one to question you; by this we believe that you came from God."
Jesus answered them, "Do you now believe? The hour is coming, indeed it has come, when you will be scattered, every one to his home, and you will leave me alone; yet I am not alone, for the Father is with me. I have said this to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you have tribulation; but be of good cheer, for I have overcome the world."
When Jesus had spoken these words, he then said "Father, the hour has come; glorify your Son so that the Son may glorify you, since you have given him authority over all people, to give eternal life to all whom you have given him. And this is eternal life, that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent.
I glorified you on earth by finishing the work that you gave me to do. So now, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had in your presence before the world existed.
I have made your name known to those whom you gave me from the world. They were yours, and you gave them to me, and they have kept your word. Now they know that everything you have given me is from you; for the words that you gave to me I have given to them, and they have received them and know in truth that I came from you; and they have believed that you sent me.
I am asking on their behalf; I am not asking on behalf of the world, but on behalf of those whom you gave me, because they are yours. All mine are yours, and yours are mine; and I have been glorified in them.
And now I am no longer in the world, but they are in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, protect them in your name that you have given me, so that they may be one, as we are one.
SERMON: Good Cheer
Let us pray . . . Gracious God, may the words of my mouth and the meditations of all of our hearts be acceptable in your sight. Amen
This coming Friday, the United Church will celebrate its anniversary. June 10th will mark 86 years since our church was formed in 1925 at a worship service in downtown Toronto. In many United Churches this year, not too much is being made about the anniversary, especially compared to last year when it was our 85th.
Nevertheless, since today is my farewell to Kingston Road; since I want to talk about the state of the church; and since the Gospel reading this morning is, as it always is on the final and Seventh Sunday of Easter, from John 17 from which the United Church adopted its motto -- "That all may be one" -- I have decided to highlight our church's anniversary today . . .
I mention that this is my farewell to KRU although I have not often been around during the past three years. In 2008-09, I fulfilled a required Field Placement in Presteign-Woodbine United Church in East York. In 2009-10, I lived in Alberta as a student intern where I was the minister of Knox United Church in Didsbury. And this past year as I finished my third and final year of a Masters of Divinity degree at Emmanuel College, I have "church-hopped" most Sundays in order to learn how other congregations worship and live out their faith. And now I am leaving on July 1st to work as a full-time minister in southern Saskatchewan.
But my absence from KRU for much of the past three years does not mean that this church doesn't hold a central place in my heart. When I first walked into KRU 10 years ago, I knew right away that I had found what I was looking for. I had no idea then how far the Spirit that dwelt here would take me, but I knew this was the right place. So, for helping to bring me back into the church, for helping me find a new purpose in life, and for supporting my journey towards ordination over these past four years, I thank Kingston Road and all of you who are here today . . .
John 17, part of which we heard this morning, marks the end of Jesus' long farewell speech to his disciples at the Last Supper. Every year at the close of the Easter season, a selection from John 17 is one of the assigned readings, and it is set alongside the story from Acts of Jesus' ascension to heaven, which we also heard today. Next week is Pentecost where we will celebrate the coming of the Holy Spirit to the early church and learn how they continued as a community without Jesus in their midst.
Personally, I don't find the text today to be the easiest one to follow. Like the rest of the 3,000 word speech of Jesus that John records from the Last Supper, the ideas are thickly packed together.
The United Church particularly picked up on Jesus' hope for unity expressed in John 17. We took this as an inspiration to mend the divisions in the Christian church. So in 1925, the Methodist Church of Canada, two-thirds of the Presbyterian Church in Canada, the Congregational Union of Ontario and Quebec, and the union churches from Canada's West united. It was a wonderful moment of hope and enthusiasm and it created what was then and remains today the largest Protestant denomination in Canada.
But many of our church's hopes have not come to be. After 40 initial years of growth, the United Church entered what is now more than 45 years of decline in the 1960s. We are probably smaller today than we were in 1925, even as there are three times more people living in Canada today than 86 years ago.
Our decline is hardly unique. All mainline churches in Canada and in most other rich, industrialized countries have been shrinking for 50 or more years. On the other hand, Christianity on a world scale is now growing quite rapidly. This growth is in rapidly industrializing countries like China, India and Brazil, and in many of the desperately poor countries in sub-Saharan Africa, Latin America and Asia. But there is reason to believe that if these countries were to achieve a level of economic and social development like that in Europe, North America, and Japan, a process of secularization similar to what we have experienced might occur there too.
The United Church's dream of greater church unity has not come to pass either. With the exception of one small union with the Evangelical United Brethren in the 1960s, we have not merged with other denominations. In fact, since the 1970s the United Church has been isolated from most other Christians because of our theological openness and our support for inclusion and justice.
Think, if you will, of the top 5,000 leaders of Christianity around the world today. This overwhelmingly male group would include the Pope, all the Roman Catholic cardinals, the leaders of the flourishing Pentecostal denominations in Africa and Latin America, the Orthodox Patriarchs, the archbishops of the various Anglican churches, the major televangelists in the United States, and small groups of leaders from all the world's other denominations. One of the few women would be Mardi Tindal, our Moderator, who would be joined by perhaps one other United Church leader. In this group of 5,000, I suspect that I would have major disagreements with well over 4500 of them. I would consider most of them to be on the wrong side of issues like equality, justice, church democracy, and attitudes towards modern culture. Most of the 5000 would oppose equality for women in both church and society. Almost all of them would be hostile to sexual minorities. I would dislike the theology of all but a handful of them.
And yet, when I was ordained in Orillia last Sunday I was ordained as a minister of Word, Sacrament, and Pastoral Care within the Holy Catholic Church -- that is, within the universal church of Christ. Similarly, when Christina was baptized this morning, she was baptized into the One, Holy, Apostolic and Catholic Church of Christ. But while Christina's baptism will be recognized by any church around the world, my ordination will not have much purchase outside our own walls.
And I don't have a problem with that. I am quite happy to work in ministry with the 200,000 or so of us who gather for worship each Sunday in thousands of United Churches across Canada. I don't want to be recognized by Pentecostal or Baptist ministers who preach a message that often strikes me as nonsense. I don't want to be recognized by Roman Catholic or Orthodox churches that don't allow women to be ordained, let alone gays or lesbians. And so on.
So while more than two billion of the seven billion people alive today are Christian, the unity that Jesus hopes for in our reading this morning and which first inspired our denomination remains only a dream. And this has often been the case.
In the first 300 years of the church, its small numbers and its isolation led to a profusion of wildly diverse Christian sects. Some groups thought that Jesus was divine -- a modern incarnation of Yahweh, the God of Israel -- but not also human. Some thought Jesus was human -- another prophet like Moses or Elijah -- but not also divine. Some embraced all the tenets of Judaism. Some turned their back on their Hebrew roots. Some focused on the practical work of mutual aid and healing. Others pursued ecstasy and enlightenment through strange rituals. Each city's church had its own unique collection of gospel stories and other texts.
This changed in the Fourth Century when Emperor Constantine adopted Christianity as the official religion of the Roman Empire. With a series of Councils that began in 325, the Imperial Church created a common Bible, a common creed, and a common way of running the church. But this unity was created from above through police action, book burnings and forced conversion to Catholic Christianity. The Roman Empire created a unified church that at one level might be seen as what Jesus hoped for, but at a cost. The cost was replacing a gospel of justice and love with one of oppression and fear.
I am glad that this unity did not last. First there was the break between the Greek-speaking Orthodox Church in the East and the Latin-speaking West 1,000 years ago. Later there was the Protestant Reformation of the 1500s, which shattered the church in Europe into a dozens of shards. The timing of the Reformation was ironic. This was the point where the European empires began to conquer most of the rest of the world. Through colonialism they knit all the world's continents into one economic system for the first time. European conquest also allowed Christianity to leap ahead of Islam, Hinduism and other faiths to become the most dominant religion in the world. It was both a moment of imperial glory for the universal Catholic Church and also the beginning of secularization and the fracturing of the church into the wild diversity it exhibits today.
I had an up-close experience with the diversity of Canadian churches last year during my internship in Didsbury Alberta. I represented Knox United in the meetings of the Didsbury and Carstairs Ministerial Association, which met for lunch one day each month and which planned worship services at retirement homes and long-term care facilities. I am glad that I attended these meetings with the 12 or so other pastors from the region. But also I often felt like a stranger in a strange land there. Other than me and the United Church minister from Carstairs, all of the pastors were fundamentalist right-wingers in various Mennonite, Lutheran, Missionary Alliance and Anglican garbs.
Each month, the host pastor began lunch by telling the story of his journey to faith, and I often struggled to hide my astonishment. All of them had come to adopt theological ideas that I considered to be bizarre and irrational. So I felt nervous when it was my turn to host. But the others listened respectfully as I spoke about being a preacher's kid who grew up in eastern Ontario in the 1960s and 1970s; about how along with my most of my friends, I became a secular atheist as a teenager, and a political radical as a young man; how a trip to Nicaragua in 1984 marked a turning point for me both spiritually and politically; and how I returned to church via Kingston Road after 9/11 where I found a new way to trust the Christ and follow the Way of the Cross. Perhaps my story might have confirmed their prejudices about the United Church just as their stories might have confirmed my prejudices about small-town evangelical pastors.
And yet at a deeper level, I could sometimes see our connections. Despite our differences, I liked most of the other men around the table. And I am sure that in moments of celebration such as birth and marriage and in moments of mourning such as sickness, loss and death, these men were true pastors to their congregations. Despite our theological and cultural differences, at the deepest levels of life, in moments of heightened awareness, and in ones where each of our uniqueness was most evident, we might touch hearts and hands and be united in Christ.
Jesus put it this way: by giving us the gift of a life in God through Christ, which is a birthright symbolized by the sacrament of baptism that we participated in this morning, we are also given eternal life. And what is eternal life? Jesus simply says that it is to know the God who is Love.
This eternal life is right here, right now. We may not always be aware of it, but in our deepest moments it beckons to us and helps unite us across our differences.
All of which leads me to conclude with a question: how is that we can move from the shallow end to the deep end? And the quick answer -- we don't have to do anything; life continually throws us into the deep end whether we want that or not. The deep end can be found in dark moments of illness, family conflict, social oppression, pain or loss. It can also be found in joyous moments of connection, sharing, community and love. In such deep moments, we are best able to know our own unique brokenness and loveliness and also, paradoxically, best connect with other people. Such a connection is a unity from below. It is unity built on compassion, mutual respect and solidarity. While it might not always solve our practical problems, such a unity in God through Christ heals us and put us in touch with eternity regardless of our circumstances.
I suspect that the Christian church will never achieve the denominational unity that our ancestors hoped for in 1925. Nor, I suspect, will our broken world achieve political unity, which we so badly need to solve our many military, environmental, economic and social ills. But in our individual and collective tribulations, we have experienced again and again the truth that God in Christ has overcome the world. Because of this, in the midst of fear, we often touch faith. In the midst of despair, we often touch hope. And in the midst of conflict and violence, we often touch love.
These eternal moments of union with God happen most often in the deepest waters, which is where the trials of life continually throw us. Therefore we can say with Jesus, be of good cheer. In deep waters, where only love can make us go, harvests of faith will overflow. Harvests of faith will overflow.
Thanks be to God.
Amen.
We Respond To The Word
Our hymn of response is VU#331, "The Church's One Foundation." This hymn was sung as the processional hymn at the founding worship service of the United Church on June 10, 1925 at a packed Mutual Street Arena in downtown Toronto. Years later, the first Moderator of the United Church, The Very Rev. George Pidgeon, said that as the elected General Council commissioners from the Presbyterian, Methodist, Congregationalist, and Union churches marched into the arena to mingle together for the first time as members of the United Church, the hymn was sung with quote "an emotion that can scarcely be imagined." Let us now sing it together.
HYMN: VU #331 "The Church's One Foundation"
Back to "Completing the Circle"
Sunday, May 8, 2011
Royal families: where two or three are gathered . . .
I preached this sermon at Bloor Street United in Toronto on May 8, 2011. Thanks to Rev. Martha ter Kuile for asking me to come to Bloor Street.
Text: Luke 24:13-35 (The Road to Emmaus)
Today is Mother's Day and the focus is on families. And so this morning I contrast the stories from two different royal families. The first is the one we just encountered in the reading from Luke: two followers of Jesus who discover in the act of breaking bread with a stranger that they are in the presence of their King, the risen Christ. The second is the House of Windsor, which has been much in the news lately with the wedding of Prince William and Kate Middleton on April 29th. By looking at these two families, we touch upon family politics today and also ask -- where might we find a royal sovereign in this broken world?
The Road to Emmaus story from Luke includes two family scenes. The first involves two friends -- or are they lovers? husband and wife? parent and child? The text does not make it clear. Whoever they are, they have been with Jesus in Jerusalem for Passover, and now are walking home to their village after a week of joy, terror and confusion. A stranger joins them as they walk, and he talks with them about the execution of the King of the Jews by the Romans, about Scripture, and about their deepest values. When they arrive at Emmaus, the two invite this stranger to eat dinner and spend the night. And as the stranger takes bread and blesses it, they become aware that he is no ordinary companion. He is Jesus, who is both God's Love incarnate, and also the Christ or King of Israel.
This story is only found in Luke. But whenever I hear it, I am reminded of another saying of Jesus. In Matthew 18, Jesus says, "Where two or three are gathered in my name, there I am in the midst of them."
The story reaches its high point around a family dinner table. It is a family in which the actions of walking together, talking about issues close to the heart, and sharing food result in a brief glimpse of the risen Christ and the Spirit of God.
The story doesn't end there, though. After their glimpse of Jesus, the two friends run back to Jerusalem to tell the 11 remaining disciples that the report of Mary Magdalene and other women is true. Jesus has been raised from the dead.
This scene in Jerusalem is also of a kind of family. The group that Jesus gathered around him in Galilee as he taught and healed formed an unconventional family. Cleopas and his friend are part of this larger family of faith, and their vision of the risen Christ in Emmaus inspires them to return to it.
Because of the presence of Jesus, this unconventional family of disciples can be called a royal family. His followers proclaim him as God's anointed, the successor to King David, Israel's Messiah, or the Christ.
But what happens to Jesus' royal title after his execution? The two friends from Emmaus are dejected. Surely his death means that Jesus is not the one to redeem Israel. He must not have been the King or Christ after all. But then they glimpse Jesus in the face of their companion at dinner and they realize that their king and their dreams of salvation live on. For that moment at least, they again become a royal family. And so the two return to Jerusalem filled with enthusiasm to tell the rest of their friends that though Jesus has been killed, Love lives on . . .
In contrast to this humble story of two poor people in which the Christ becomes visible in sharing food, we have the Royal Wedding between Prince William and Kate Middleton on April 29th. I admit that I loved the pageantry and beauty of their wedding and I was impressed by the huge numbers who watched the wedding and the media interest in it. But I believe that the wedding revealed some problems. For one, it renewed a focus on royal succession. In the House of Windsor, as in most monarchies, securing royal succession through children is of central importance, with a legal preference for boys.
If Kate's first priority as wife of the future king is to give birth to boys -- just as it was for the many wives of King Henry VIII 500 years ago -- what effect does this have on discussions around reproduction, gender, race, religion, and the types of families we are supposed to live within?
The pleasure I felt in watching the Royal Wedding and the big splash it made led me to wonder just what we had witnessed. In some ways, the wedding seemed to me like a Disney production. Perhaps the wedding could best be viewed as parody: a parody of monarchy, a parody of the established Church, and a parody of marriage. The wedding was a royal affair, but the future King William, like his grandmother, the current Queen, will be a figurehead. The wedding was a high Anglican service with the glorious language of the 16th Century Book of Common Prayer, the 400-year old King James Bible, and beloved hymns like Guide Me O Thou Great Jehovah and Love Divine All Love's Excelling. But despite being the state church, almost no one in England regularly attends Anglican services anymore. And finally, it was a wedding between two modern, university-educated, and attractive young people. But the first focus in their marriage may simply be upon attempts to give birth to a son.
In a secular and democratic age where monarchy has disappeared from many countries and the world's empires no longer rely on the support of popes and archbishops, the Royal Wedding might make some of us feel nostalgia for lost glories of Church and Empire.
But I am pleased that -- other than at TV spectaculars like the wedding in Westminster Abbey -- our churches are no longer bound hand and foot to empire. A United Church moderator will never have two billion people hear one of her sermons as was the sermon delivered by the Bishop of London on April 29th. But our marginalization, like that of Jesus and his followers in the 1st Century, gives us space in which to recapture the counter-cultural family values of the gospels.
The sayings of Jesus do not support traditional notions of family. In Mark 3, Jesus is told that his mother and brothers have come to see him. In reply, Jesus says this: '"Who are my mother and my brothers?" Looking around on those who sat about him, he said, "Here are my mother and my brothers! Whoever does the will of God is my brother, and sister, and mother."' In Matthew 8, Jesus tells one of his followers to neglect the burial of his father and to follow him instead. "Let the dead bury the dead," he says. In Luke 14, Jesus says, "If any one comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple. Whoever does not bear his own cross and come after me, cannot be my disciple."
Jesus turns his back on traditional notions of family and asks his followers to do the same. He helps them to create a new type of family, a chosen group of fellow pilgrims on a spiritual journey. In this unconventional family, the members support one another, love each other, and resist religious and state authorities in the name of sacred values. It is a family made up of self-confessed sinners; people who are broken like you and me and who know they are broken; and people who are encouraged by the Spirit of God to face up to the pain in their lives and their mortality and so find a new and resurrected life beyond the realm of moralism or state authority.
On this path and in this royal family we receive the Spirit's help to be aware of each moment in all its beauty and danger. It is a life beyond tradition, beyond ego, and beyond the illusory search for security in a violent society. It is a life open to the grace of God's love: a life in and with the Christ.
So how is it that over the centuries, Christian family values have come to stand for traditional morality? Traditional images of the family are all around us, and church and political leaders are often the source of these images.
In the federal election campaign that ended on Monday -- where, as usual, more than 60% of the voters chose candidates from parties other than the Conservatives, but where the Conservatives won 55% of the seats anyway -- the word "family" was used constantly. The Liberals had a Family Pack of five policies to strengthen ordinary families. The NDP had a platform designed to, quote, "give your family a break." And the Conservatives also pledged to support families.
I fear that the talk of "ordinary Canadian families" in the election shunts to the side people like me who don't want to be ordinary, or who are single, or queer, or who have romantic or household arrangements that don't fit traditional models. I would prefer it if our leaders appealed to us as queer people, or extra-ordinary people, or people who care for all of humanity and the earth more than country instead of as people who identify ourselves as members of a, quote, "ordinary Canadian family."
In contrast, "church families" such as this one at Bloor Street are places where we don't have to pretend to be ordinary. They are places where we remind ourselves that we are held in God's grace regardless of our limitations or brokenness. Such places give us room in which to breathe unfettered by traditional definitions of citizenship or family.
But how can we be like the two friends from Emmaus and encounter the risen Christ in our homes or congregations? St Paul teaches us that Christ rises to new life within us simply through the ups and downs of life. In Galatians 2 he writes, "I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me." And in Romans he writes, "all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death. We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life."
Paul is telling us that though Jesus may have been killed, he lives on as the Christ or King within us. This is another way of saying that the king can no longer be found on a throne in Jerusalem, or in Rome in or London. Instead, the Royal Sovereign lives inside the heart of all who receive a trusting faith amid the difficulties of life.
In a community of faith like this one, simply by remembering our baptism, we remind ourselves that we too are members of a royal family where God in Christ is present within, between and among us.
So on this Mother's Day, may we rest assured that all households of any shape or form are royal families in which sovereignty rests with the humble and the poor, and God's Spirit can be glimpsed living amongst us . . .
Where two or three are gathered in search of love, there God's Spirit in Christ Jesus also is.
Thanks be to God, Amen
Text: Luke 24:13-35 (The Road to Emmaus)
Today is Mother's Day and the focus is on families. And so this morning I contrast the stories from two different royal families. The first is the one we just encountered in the reading from Luke: two followers of Jesus who discover in the act of breaking bread with a stranger that they are in the presence of their King, the risen Christ. The second is the House of Windsor, which has been much in the news lately with the wedding of Prince William and Kate Middleton on April 29th. By looking at these two families, we touch upon family politics today and also ask -- where might we find a royal sovereign in this broken world?
The Road to Emmaus story from Luke includes two family scenes. The first involves two friends -- or are they lovers? husband and wife? parent and child? The text does not make it clear. Whoever they are, they have been with Jesus in Jerusalem for Passover, and now are walking home to their village after a week of joy, terror and confusion. A stranger joins them as they walk, and he talks with them about the execution of the King of the Jews by the Romans, about Scripture, and about their deepest values. When they arrive at Emmaus, the two invite this stranger to eat dinner and spend the night. And as the stranger takes bread and blesses it, they become aware that he is no ordinary companion. He is Jesus, who is both God's Love incarnate, and also the Christ or King of Israel.
This story is only found in Luke. But whenever I hear it, I am reminded of another saying of Jesus. In Matthew 18, Jesus says, "Where two or three are gathered in my name, there I am in the midst of them."
The story reaches its high point around a family dinner table. It is a family in which the actions of walking together, talking about issues close to the heart, and sharing food result in a brief glimpse of the risen Christ and the Spirit of God.
The story doesn't end there, though. After their glimpse of Jesus, the two friends run back to Jerusalem to tell the 11 remaining disciples that the report of Mary Magdalene and other women is true. Jesus has been raised from the dead.
This scene in Jerusalem is also of a kind of family. The group that Jesus gathered around him in Galilee as he taught and healed formed an unconventional family. Cleopas and his friend are part of this larger family of faith, and their vision of the risen Christ in Emmaus inspires them to return to it.
Because of the presence of Jesus, this unconventional family of disciples can be called a royal family. His followers proclaim him as God's anointed, the successor to King David, Israel's Messiah, or the Christ.
But what happens to Jesus' royal title after his execution? The two friends from Emmaus are dejected. Surely his death means that Jesus is not the one to redeem Israel. He must not have been the King or Christ after all. But then they glimpse Jesus in the face of their companion at dinner and they realize that their king and their dreams of salvation live on. For that moment at least, they again become a royal family. And so the two return to Jerusalem filled with enthusiasm to tell the rest of their friends that though Jesus has been killed, Love lives on . . .
In contrast to this humble story of two poor people in which the Christ becomes visible in sharing food, we have the Royal Wedding between Prince William and Kate Middleton on April 29th. I admit that I loved the pageantry and beauty of their wedding and I was impressed by the huge numbers who watched the wedding and the media interest in it. But I believe that the wedding revealed some problems. For one, it renewed a focus on royal succession. In the House of Windsor, as in most monarchies, securing royal succession through children is of central importance, with a legal preference for boys.
If Kate's first priority as wife of the future king is to give birth to boys -- just as it was for the many wives of King Henry VIII 500 years ago -- what effect does this have on discussions around reproduction, gender, race, religion, and the types of families we are supposed to live within?
The pleasure I felt in watching the Royal Wedding and the big splash it made led me to wonder just what we had witnessed. In some ways, the wedding seemed to me like a Disney production. Perhaps the wedding could best be viewed as parody: a parody of monarchy, a parody of the established Church, and a parody of marriage. The wedding was a royal affair, but the future King William, like his grandmother, the current Queen, will be a figurehead. The wedding was a high Anglican service with the glorious language of the 16th Century Book of Common Prayer, the 400-year old King James Bible, and beloved hymns like Guide Me O Thou Great Jehovah and Love Divine All Love's Excelling. But despite being the state church, almost no one in England regularly attends Anglican services anymore. And finally, it was a wedding between two modern, university-educated, and attractive young people. But the first focus in their marriage may simply be upon attempts to give birth to a son.
In a secular and democratic age where monarchy has disappeared from many countries and the world's empires no longer rely on the support of popes and archbishops, the Royal Wedding might make some of us feel nostalgia for lost glories of Church and Empire.
But I am pleased that -- other than at TV spectaculars like the wedding in Westminster Abbey -- our churches are no longer bound hand and foot to empire. A United Church moderator will never have two billion people hear one of her sermons as was the sermon delivered by the Bishop of London on April 29th. But our marginalization, like that of Jesus and his followers in the 1st Century, gives us space in which to recapture the counter-cultural family values of the gospels.
The sayings of Jesus do not support traditional notions of family. In Mark 3, Jesus is told that his mother and brothers have come to see him. In reply, Jesus says this: '"Who are my mother and my brothers?" Looking around on those who sat about him, he said, "Here are my mother and my brothers! Whoever does the will of God is my brother, and sister, and mother."' In Matthew 8, Jesus tells one of his followers to neglect the burial of his father and to follow him instead. "Let the dead bury the dead," he says. In Luke 14, Jesus says, "If any one comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple. Whoever does not bear his own cross and come after me, cannot be my disciple."
Jesus turns his back on traditional notions of family and asks his followers to do the same. He helps them to create a new type of family, a chosen group of fellow pilgrims on a spiritual journey. In this unconventional family, the members support one another, love each other, and resist religious and state authorities in the name of sacred values. It is a family made up of self-confessed sinners; people who are broken like you and me and who know they are broken; and people who are encouraged by the Spirit of God to face up to the pain in their lives and their mortality and so find a new and resurrected life beyond the realm of moralism or state authority.
On this path and in this royal family we receive the Spirit's help to be aware of each moment in all its beauty and danger. It is a life beyond tradition, beyond ego, and beyond the illusory search for security in a violent society. It is a life open to the grace of God's love: a life in and with the Christ.
So how is it that over the centuries, Christian family values have come to stand for traditional morality? Traditional images of the family are all around us, and church and political leaders are often the source of these images.
In the federal election campaign that ended on Monday -- where, as usual, more than 60% of the voters chose candidates from parties other than the Conservatives, but where the Conservatives won 55% of the seats anyway -- the word "family" was used constantly. The Liberals had a Family Pack of five policies to strengthen ordinary families. The NDP had a platform designed to, quote, "give your family a break." And the Conservatives also pledged to support families.
I fear that the talk of "ordinary Canadian families" in the election shunts to the side people like me who don't want to be ordinary, or who are single, or queer, or who have romantic or household arrangements that don't fit traditional models. I would prefer it if our leaders appealed to us as queer people, or extra-ordinary people, or people who care for all of humanity and the earth more than country instead of as people who identify ourselves as members of a, quote, "ordinary Canadian family."
In contrast, "church families" such as this one at Bloor Street are places where we don't have to pretend to be ordinary. They are places where we remind ourselves that we are held in God's grace regardless of our limitations or brokenness. Such places give us room in which to breathe unfettered by traditional definitions of citizenship or family.
But how can we be like the two friends from Emmaus and encounter the risen Christ in our homes or congregations? St Paul teaches us that Christ rises to new life within us simply through the ups and downs of life. In Galatians 2 he writes, "I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me." And in Romans he writes, "all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death. We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life."
Paul is telling us that though Jesus may have been killed, he lives on as the Christ or King within us. This is another way of saying that the king can no longer be found on a throne in Jerusalem, or in Rome in or London. Instead, the Royal Sovereign lives inside the heart of all who receive a trusting faith amid the difficulties of life.
In a community of faith like this one, simply by remembering our baptism, we remind ourselves that we too are members of a royal family where God in Christ is present within, between and among us.
So on this Mother's Day, may we rest assured that all households of any shape or form are royal families in which sovereignty rests with the humble and the poor, and God's Spirit can be glimpsed living amongst us . . .
Where two or three are gathered in search of love, there God's Spirit in Christ Jesus also is.
Thanks be to God, Amen
Monday, January 31, 2011
Egypt in Revolution: Justice, Kindness, Humility
I have added this sermon because I appreciated trying to relate Micah to the revolution in Egypt this week. I delivered this sermon at Grace United in Brampton Ontario on Jan 30, 2011 as part of an Emmanuel College Southwest Presbytery "blitz" . . . Ian
Text: Micah 6:1-8
Justice, kindness, humility: we gather here this morning to reflect again on these virtues. They come down to us over the centuries from the ancient Hebrew prophet Micah and they ring again with their usual clarity, beauty and power. But this morning, we reflect on these virtues against the backdrop of extraordinary news: the revolution in Egypt. What a moment this is turning out to be! One protestor in downtown Toronto yesterday suggested that this week we are all Egyptians, and I agree with him. I pray that in solidarity with our Arab brothers and sisters we feel empowered by God's freely given grace to seek justice, love kindness and walk humbly with our God. For this is a moment filled with wonderful promise and grave dangers.
The events in Egypt, Tunisia, Yemen, Lebanon and other Arab countries this week surprise me even as they also seem as evocative as first the breath of spring. The surprise comes from asking, "Why now?" Yes, there is poverty, corruption, and brutality in these countries -- but such conditions have existed for decades. So what caused the dam to burst this week and not another time?
The sense of recognition comes from memories of similar abrupt changes: the fall of the Berlin Wall and the reunification of Europe after 1989; People's Power in the Philippines in 1986; the popular revolts in Central America in the 70s and 80s; the revolution against the Shah of Iran in 1979, and many others over the centuries. The Arab revolts can remind us that sometimes, everything changes in an instant. I am also reminded that such changes can sometimes lead to unforeseen consequences that the rebels later regret.
Here in peaceful and prosperous Canada we enjoy civil liberties and the rule of law. We often look upon poverty and repression in other lands with pain and regret; and we cheer popular movements to bring justice and freedom in places like Egypt from the sidelines. This morning we watch, pray and hope for Egypt and other Arab countries. Will the protestors succeed in ridding themselves of brutal governments? Will there be more bloodshed? Will new governments be even worse than the old ones? Or will a new era of human rights, peace and prosperity dawn in North Africa?
As late as Friday morning, when I met with Rev. Ross to discuss this service, I didn't think I was going to relate our Scripture reading from Micah to current events. Instead, my plan was to focus on requirements for worship. But then I watched the evening news on Friday, and a shift in focus seemed appropriate.
In today's reading, Micah contrasts Israel practices of animal sacrifices with what he says is most acceptable in God's sight: to do justice, to love kindness and to walk humbly with our God. This is a much-loved passage, especially in a church like ours that is focused more on ethics and social justice than on ritual and dogma.
This semester, I am taking a course on the history of the United Church of Canada, and in a 1931 article we read two weeks ago titled "The Genius of the United Church," the author says that the passage from Micah we read this morning represents "the highest point in Old Testament religion."
But even though Micah's simple virtues of justice, kindness, and humility might seem less difficult to us than the 613 commandments of the Hebrew Torah or the rituals of sacrifice in the Jerusalem Temple, they are still presented to us as requirements from God. For me, this highlights an ongoing tension in our faith between God's requirements and God's grace.
When Ross asked me on Tuesday for a title for my sermon, the idea of requirements in worship was rattling around in my mind, so I came up with the phrase "No Jacket Required." A quick search via Google showed me that I probably remembered the phrase from a 1985 Grammy-award winning pop album of Phil Collins called "No Jacket Required." Collins' title was inspired by an evening where he was denied entry into a posh "jackets-only" restaurant despite his wealth and fame. In turn, his annoyance referred to in his album title reminded me of my childhood.
In the United Church of my youth in the 1960s, polished shoes, bow ties, and suit jackets were part of the Sunday-morning routine. By insisting that we dress up, my parents gave us the message that respect for God was conveyed through proper attire.
But despite dress requirements for church, Hebrew sacrificial rites, or even Micah's prophecy from God, I don't believe that God truly does require anything from us. In his New Testament letters, Paul reminds us again and again of grace. God's Grace freely accepts and heals regardless of our religious practices or our good works for justice. We don't have to do anything to receive God's grace.
So how does this understanding of grace square with ethical requirements such as doing justice, loving kindness and walking humbly with God?
For me, responding to God's call comes from an awareness of grace and not as a requirement. 10 years ago, I surprised myself by returning to worship at my local United Church. In these worship services, I remembered and woke up again to the wonderful news that amid the difficulties, pains, and disappointments of life, God's gracious love and acceptance is freely given to us. Being transformed like this in worship led me to get involved in the work of the church -- not from a sense of obligation, but from gratitude and new-found freedom. And so . . . justice, kindness and humility. I will examine these three virtues in reverse order.
The older we get, the easier humility seems to come for many of us. This is not because of any great qualities we might posses. Quite the opposite. Our lives are filled with inevitable stumbles, failures and embarrassments. Bodies age and betray us. Relationships sour and sometimes break down. Worldly success eludes us or else reveals that it lacks the spiritual wealth that our hearts most yearn for. A long life tends to be one in which we are humbled -- especially when we accept God's acceptance of us in our less-than-perfect reality. Accepting God's acceptance can transform life's humiliations into a humble self-acceptance.
When we embrace our sacred but humble reality, we also become more open to kindness. What could be kinder than accepting ourselves just as we are, even though we are broken sinners. Such self-acceptance is kindness at its best. Having forgiven ourselves, we will better empathize with all our fellow pilgrims, who are as broken and foolish as we are. And so we walk both humbly and with kindness on God's path of faith, hope and love.
And what about justice? Justice means several things in the Bible: being in right relationship with God, in right relationship with ourselves, and in right relationship with our neighbours. When we notice that something is out of line, we are moved to seek justice. Perhaps our actions show that we have strayed from love. Perhaps we are suffering in an abusive relationship or from physical or emotional disease. Perhaps at the social level, we notice unnecessary poverty, neglect, violence, or cruelty. When we become aware of such imbalances, we seek God's help to bring us back in alignment with love and well-being. We seek to do justice.
As sinful mortals, our efforts to achieve justice often fail to achieve their objectives. This is yet another reason for us to remain humble and to be kind to each other. Life is not easy and the world is filled with problems that we can't easily solve. And yet God's grace is available to all of us, and at the deepest and most important levels we are accepted and healed. When we remember this, we might feel freed to heed God's call to throw ourselves into the work of the church, its mission, and its social justice programs regardless of whether our efforts will be successful.
This week, millions of Egyptians, after suffering years of injustice at the hands of police, courts and government, heeded a call. Parents have been called from balconies to join their children in the street. Colleagues have been called to join their fellow workers in standing up to a corrupt and brutal government. Neighbours have been called to join neighbours to protect their homes from looting.
Whether a better life comes from the response of millions of Egyptians to these calls for justice, only time will tell. But I am deeply moved when I hear that Muslims arose from prayers this past Friday with cries of "Freedom, freedom, freedom." And I am sure that a similar cry rose from the lips of Coptic Christian worshippers after Sunday morning worship in Egypt today.
There is much that is out of alignment in our lives and in our societies. There is much that we can struggle to make right. But regardless of our actions, our successes or our failures, God's healing acceptance of us is assured. May this assurance give us and our Egyptian brothers and sisters the courage to humbly and kindly struggle in the days and weeks ahead for a world of greater justice, peace and love.
Thanks be to God. Amen.
Text: Micah 6:1-8
Justice, kindness, humility: we gather here this morning to reflect again on these virtues. They come down to us over the centuries from the ancient Hebrew prophet Micah and they ring again with their usual clarity, beauty and power. But this morning, we reflect on these virtues against the backdrop of extraordinary news: the revolution in Egypt. What a moment this is turning out to be! One protestor in downtown Toronto yesterday suggested that this week we are all Egyptians, and I agree with him. I pray that in solidarity with our Arab brothers and sisters we feel empowered by God's freely given grace to seek justice, love kindness and walk humbly with our God. For this is a moment filled with wonderful promise and grave dangers.
The events in Egypt, Tunisia, Yemen, Lebanon and other Arab countries this week surprise me even as they also seem as evocative as first the breath of spring. The surprise comes from asking, "Why now?" Yes, there is poverty, corruption, and brutality in these countries -- but such conditions have existed for decades. So what caused the dam to burst this week and not another time?
The sense of recognition comes from memories of similar abrupt changes: the fall of the Berlin Wall and the reunification of Europe after 1989; People's Power in the Philippines in 1986; the popular revolts in Central America in the 70s and 80s; the revolution against the Shah of Iran in 1979, and many others over the centuries. The Arab revolts can remind us that sometimes, everything changes in an instant. I am also reminded that such changes can sometimes lead to unforeseen consequences that the rebels later regret.
Here in peaceful and prosperous Canada we enjoy civil liberties and the rule of law. We often look upon poverty and repression in other lands with pain and regret; and we cheer popular movements to bring justice and freedom in places like Egypt from the sidelines. This morning we watch, pray and hope for Egypt and other Arab countries. Will the protestors succeed in ridding themselves of brutal governments? Will there be more bloodshed? Will new governments be even worse than the old ones? Or will a new era of human rights, peace and prosperity dawn in North Africa?
As late as Friday morning, when I met with Rev. Ross to discuss this service, I didn't think I was going to relate our Scripture reading from Micah to current events. Instead, my plan was to focus on requirements for worship. But then I watched the evening news on Friday, and a shift in focus seemed appropriate.
In today's reading, Micah contrasts Israel practices of animal sacrifices with what he says is most acceptable in God's sight: to do justice, to love kindness and to walk humbly with our God. This is a much-loved passage, especially in a church like ours that is focused more on ethics and social justice than on ritual and dogma.
This semester, I am taking a course on the history of the United Church of Canada, and in a 1931 article we read two weeks ago titled "The Genius of the United Church," the author says that the passage from Micah we read this morning represents "the highest point in Old Testament religion."
But even though Micah's simple virtues of justice, kindness, and humility might seem less difficult to us than the 613 commandments of the Hebrew Torah or the rituals of sacrifice in the Jerusalem Temple, they are still presented to us as requirements from God. For me, this highlights an ongoing tension in our faith between God's requirements and God's grace.
When Ross asked me on Tuesday for a title for my sermon, the idea of requirements in worship was rattling around in my mind, so I came up with the phrase "No Jacket Required." A quick search via Google showed me that I probably remembered the phrase from a 1985 Grammy-award winning pop album of Phil Collins called "No Jacket Required." Collins' title was inspired by an evening where he was denied entry into a posh "jackets-only" restaurant despite his wealth and fame. In turn, his annoyance referred to in his album title reminded me of my childhood.
In the United Church of my youth in the 1960s, polished shoes, bow ties, and suit jackets were part of the Sunday-morning routine. By insisting that we dress up, my parents gave us the message that respect for God was conveyed through proper attire.
But despite dress requirements for church, Hebrew sacrificial rites, or even Micah's prophecy from God, I don't believe that God truly does require anything from us. In his New Testament letters, Paul reminds us again and again of grace. God's Grace freely accepts and heals regardless of our religious practices or our good works for justice. We don't have to do anything to receive God's grace.
So how does this understanding of grace square with ethical requirements such as doing justice, loving kindness and walking humbly with God?
For me, responding to God's call comes from an awareness of grace and not as a requirement. 10 years ago, I surprised myself by returning to worship at my local United Church. In these worship services, I remembered and woke up again to the wonderful news that amid the difficulties, pains, and disappointments of life, God's gracious love and acceptance is freely given to us. Being transformed like this in worship led me to get involved in the work of the church -- not from a sense of obligation, but from gratitude and new-found freedom. And so . . . justice, kindness and humility. I will examine these three virtues in reverse order.
The older we get, the easier humility seems to come for many of us. This is not because of any great qualities we might posses. Quite the opposite. Our lives are filled with inevitable stumbles, failures and embarrassments. Bodies age and betray us. Relationships sour and sometimes break down. Worldly success eludes us or else reveals that it lacks the spiritual wealth that our hearts most yearn for. A long life tends to be one in which we are humbled -- especially when we accept God's acceptance of us in our less-than-perfect reality. Accepting God's acceptance can transform life's humiliations into a humble self-acceptance.
When we embrace our sacred but humble reality, we also become more open to kindness. What could be kinder than accepting ourselves just as we are, even though we are broken sinners. Such self-acceptance is kindness at its best. Having forgiven ourselves, we will better empathize with all our fellow pilgrims, who are as broken and foolish as we are. And so we walk both humbly and with kindness on God's path of faith, hope and love.
And what about justice? Justice means several things in the Bible: being in right relationship with God, in right relationship with ourselves, and in right relationship with our neighbours. When we notice that something is out of line, we are moved to seek justice. Perhaps our actions show that we have strayed from love. Perhaps we are suffering in an abusive relationship or from physical or emotional disease. Perhaps at the social level, we notice unnecessary poverty, neglect, violence, or cruelty. When we become aware of such imbalances, we seek God's help to bring us back in alignment with love and well-being. We seek to do justice.
As sinful mortals, our efforts to achieve justice often fail to achieve their objectives. This is yet another reason for us to remain humble and to be kind to each other. Life is not easy and the world is filled with problems that we can't easily solve. And yet God's grace is available to all of us, and at the deepest and most important levels we are accepted and healed. When we remember this, we might feel freed to heed God's call to throw ourselves into the work of the church, its mission, and its social justice programs regardless of whether our efforts will be successful.
This week, millions of Egyptians, after suffering years of injustice at the hands of police, courts and government, heeded a call. Parents have been called from balconies to join their children in the street. Colleagues have been called to join their fellow workers in standing up to a corrupt and brutal government. Neighbours have been called to join neighbours to protect their homes from looting.
Whether a better life comes from the response of millions of Egyptians to these calls for justice, only time will tell. But I am deeply moved when I hear that Muslims arose from prayers this past Friday with cries of "Freedom, freedom, freedom." And I am sure that a similar cry rose from the lips of Coptic Christian worshippers after Sunday morning worship in Egypt today.
There is much that is out of alignment in our lives and in our societies. There is much that we can struggle to make right. But regardless of our actions, our successes or our failures, God's healing acceptance of us is assured. May this assurance give us and our Egyptian brothers and sisters the courage to humbly and kindly struggle in the days and weeks ahead for a world of greater justice, peace and love.
Thanks be to God. Amen.
Sunday, September 19, 2010
The Trouble with Timothy
I have included the following sermon, delivered on Sept 19, 2010 at Caledon East United Church, which is one hour's drive north of Toronto, since it comments on my time in Didsbury -- Ian
Text: 1 Timothy 2: 1-7 (Prayers for those in high positions)
Last summer, when I was preparing to move to a small town in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains in Central Alberta, I was nervous. Some of my fear came from preconceptions about what such a town might be like. I wondered if I would be able to fit in. But in the event, most of my fears proved to be unfounded. And I loved my 10 months serving as supply minister and student intern at Knox United Church in the town of Didsbury Alberta.
One of my preconceptions was that everyone in a small town like Didsbury would be conservative, both in politics and religion. One place where I learned that this was not the case was a reading group that met at Knox every Thursday morning. And I thought of that reading group when I looked at the assigned Scripture readings for this week.
Caledon East, like most mainline congregations, follows the three-year Scripture reading list called "The Revised Common Lectionary" of 1992. When I looked at the list for this Sunday a few weeks ago, I worried that I might have trouble relating to any one of the four suggested readings. So I decided to focus on the passage that I disliked the most. Perhaps this is an unusual choice, but the reading from First Timothy, which we heard before the last hymn, reminded me of my time in Didsbury.
Last September, as the Thursday reading group in Didsbury started up again, the book it read was called "The First Paul: Reclaiming the Radical Visionary Behind the Church's Conservative Icon." Here's my copy. Published last year, it is the latest work by two of my heroes: Marcus Borg and John Crossan. And it is a book that provides all the background one needs to understand why people like me don't like First Timothy.
First Timothy is one of 13 letters in the New Testament of our Bible that claim to be written by the Apostle Paul. In fact, the reason the early Church included these letters in the New Testament is their status as the work of Paul. However, as Borg and Crossan point out, there is now consensus among Bible scholars that perhaps only seven of those 13 letters are actually written by Paul. And of the six letters that may not be by Paul, First and Second Timothy are two that scholars are most convinced to be wrong in their claim to be written by Paul.
Given that we are convinced that First Timothy is not by Paul, we can now say that First Timothy is in the Bible by mistake! And not only does First Timothy falsely claim to be written by Paul, many of the ideas in this letter are completely opposite to the heart and mind of the real Paul.
Perhaps these controversies explain why the creators of the 1992 Lectionary only include three short excerpts from First Timothy in its assigned readings. This means that a congregation that follows the Lectionary only has to deal with a few bits from First Timothy every third September.
The most notorious passage in First Timothy follows immediately upon the one read here this morning. Fortunately, the creators of the Lectionary did not include it in their list. But at the risk of offense, I will now read this passage. It says, "Let a woman learn in silence with full submission. I permit no woman to teach or to have authority over a man; she is to keep silent. For Adam was formed first, then Eve; and Adam was not deceived, but the woman was deceived and became a transgressor. Yet she will be saved through childbearing." (1 Tim. 2:11-15)
Now, not only is this viewpoint not shared today by most people in a denomination like the United Church, it also runs counter to the life and work of Jesus. Jesus included many women among his closest friends and co-workers. And the high place of women in his work is clearest in the accounts of Jesus' death and resurrection. After his arrest, all of Jesus' male friends deserted him. But many of his women friends stood by him on Good Friday; it was to women such as Mary Magdalene that Jesus first appeared on Easter Sunday; and it was these women who first proclaimed the Good News that Jesus has been raised by God.
Paul is similar. Paul's authentic letters show that, like Jesus, many of his friends and co-workers were women. And the real Paul stands for the equality of men and women. For instance, in Galatians Paul writes, "There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus."
In their book, Borg and Crossan argue that Paul's message is anti-Roman, grace-filled and egalitarian. Paul, they argue, is a radical in every way.
The fake Paul, on the other hand, often has very different messages. Take our reading from this morning. In it, the author urges the Church to pray and give thanks for kings and all who are in high positions. But who were the kings in the First Century? The Roman Emperors, the Caesars, whose empire executed Jesus. Jesus' central message stands in opposition to worldly kings and their unjust rule. Jesus proclaims the kingdom of God in which the first will be last and the last first; and that message is probably the main reason why Jesus was executed by Rome.
Some people say they feel liberated by ideas about First Timothy as portrayed in the book "The First Paul." But others say they are disturbed by them. For years now, some Christians have argued that scientific criticism of Scripture such as that by Borg and Crossan might damage our faith. And I can understand this concern. The various books of the Bible are written by humans? Some of the books are included by mistake? There is more than one message on key topics in the Bible and these messages sometimes contradict each other? Are these really matters that we should be studying or talking about in church? There is even a stereotype that people like me who study in seminary are in danger of being turned off religion entirely.
Against such fears, I turn again to Marcus Borg. In another of his best-selling books called "Reading the Bible Again for the First Time," Borg talks about his own faith journey. In childhood, he naively accepted whatever his parents and church told him including magical figures such as Santa Claus and supernatural tales about God and Jesus from the Bible. But as Borg grew up in our modern and scientific society, he adopted a critical point of view. Like many of us, in this second stage he discarded supernatural beliefs not only in Santa Claus but also in God. But later, Borg entered a third stage when he switched from his conservative Lutheran background to worship in a liberal Episcopalian church. In this last stage, Borg encountered the Living God again.
Borg calls this last stage post-critical naivete. The third stage didn't cancel out the critical stage that preceded it -- the one where he had abandoned some of his beliefs in the supernatural. But in this third stage, Borg graciously found a deeper truth in biblical stories, church tradition, and rituals; and these truths had a profound effect on him regardless of any contradictions in the Bible or of any sins in church history. Borg remained a critical thinker even as he let his heart be open to a message of justice and love on the Way of Jesus.
I strongly identify with Borg in this. When I surprised myself by returning to worship in my local church, Kingston Road United, in east Toronto nine years ago, I did so as a thoroughly modern skeptic. But then I found myself swept up by the spirit of that congregation and felt my heart opening in worship. After my first Good Friday service there in 2002, I told the minister that it was almost enough to break an old atheist's heart. The choir had sung the chorus "Lacrimosa" from Mozart's Requiem Mass. And as we sang and prayed, I glimpsed how the stories of Jesus as a God-filled teacher who suffered and died for love of his friends could be a place where, with God's grace, we are given an opportunity to wake up in the midst of life. In a congregation like that and within our flawed Christian tradition and our Sacred Scriptures, we can find a place in which to take up our own crosses and follow Jesus on a path of faith, hope and love. And I have been trying to follow His path ever since.
So there it is -- First Timothy in our New Testament. And there also was the group in Didsbury last September reading Borg and Crossan's criticism of letters like First Timothy. And because of that group and their book, I felt relieved.
The reading group was led by two retired United Church ministers and their wives, all in their 80s, and all quite active in Knox United. I relied on these two ministers last year for support, advice, and to co-preside at communion and baptisms. We got along well, and I felt in tune with them on most issues.
Now Knox United, like other active and vital congregations, includes people with a wide range of views on politics and religion. But despite not sharing the same background or perspectives as everyone, I felt welcomed and embraced by the people of Knox. The spirit of the people at Knox in conjunction with the Spirit of God helped us to tell stories from the Bible and to relate them to our life together. And so we were able to worship God in a way that seemed to nurture us all, despite differences. In a year filled with a great deal of learning, this was perhaps the most hopeful thing that I experienced. At its best and with God's help, worship can unite us across great personal, political or religious divides.
Worship is the work of the people of God regardless of our beliefs. This morning, some of us here might believe in the literal truth of all the stories in the Bible. Others of us might be modern skeptics who basically believe nothing. Others might feel in tune with deep sacred truths in the hymns, silences, sermons and Scripture readings -- even readings from First Timothy! -- without being concerned about the historical accuracy of the stories. And all this diversity seems quite natural and wonderful to me. Together, congregations made up of diverse people like us can rely on God's Spirit to connect to sacred values of life and love in a broken world and in pain-filled lives.
Knox United in Didsbury, like all congregations, had its share of divisions and bad feelings. But I loved that community of faith and found it to be a place where the healing power of God's love abounds. I have no doubt that Caledon East is just such a place as well.
And so this morning we give thanks for places of worship -- mosques, temples, and churches of all kinds -- where mortal sinners like us relate to our troubled and grace-filled Scriptures and traditions, and where we again encounter the Living God whose Love enfolds and heals us regardless of where we might be on our journeys of faith, hope and love.
Thanks be to God.
Amen.
Text: 1 Timothy 2: 1-7 (Prayers for those in high positions)
Last summer, when I was preparing to move to a small town in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains in Central Alberta, I was nervous. Some of my fear came from preconceptions about what such a town might be like. I wondered if I would be able to fit in. But in the event, most of my fears proved to be unfounded. And I loved my 10 months serving as supply minister and student intern at Knox United Church in the town of Didsbury Alberta.
One of my preconceptions was that everyone in a small town like Didsbury would be conservative, both in politics and religion. One place where I learned that this was not the case was a reading group that met at Knox every Thursday morning. And I thought of that reading group when I looked at the assigned Scripture readings for this week.
Caledon East, like most mainline congregations, follows the three-year Scripture reading list called "The Revised Common Lectionary" of 1992. When I looked at the list for this Sunday a few weeks ago, I worried that I might have trouble relating to any one of the four suggested readings. So I decided to focus on the passage that I disliked the most. Perhaps this is an unusual choice, but the reading from First Timothy, which we heard before the last hymn, reminded me of my time in Didsbury.
Last September, as the Thursday reading group in Didsbury started up again, the book it read was called "The First Paul: Reclaiming the Radical Visionary Behind the Church's Conservative Icon." Here's my copy. Published last year, it is the latest work by two of my heroes: Marcus Borg and John Crossan. And it is a book that provides all the background one needs to understand why people like me don't like First Timothy.
First Timothy is one of 13 letters in the New Testament of our Bible that claim to be written by the Apostle Paul. In fact, the reason the early Church included these letters in the New Testament is their status as the work of Paul. However, as Borg and Crossan point out, there is now consensus among Bible scholars that perhaps only seven of those 13 letters are actually written by Paul. And of the six letters that may not be by Paul, First and Second Timothy are two that scholars are most convinced to be wrong in their claim to be written by Paul.
Given that we are convinced that First Timothy is not by Paul, we can now say that First Timothy is in the Bible by mistake! And not only does First Timothy falsely claim to be written by Paul, many of the ideas in this letter are completely opposite to the heart and mind of the real Paul.
Perhaps these controversies explain why the creators of the 1992 Lectionary only include three short excerpts from First Timothy in its assigned readings. This means that a congregation that follows the Lectionary only has to deal with a few bits from First Timothy every third September.
The most notorious passage in First Timothy follows immediately upon the one read here this morning. Fortunately, the creators of the Lectionary did not include it in their list. But at the risk of offense, I will now read this passage. It says, "Let a woman learn in silence with full submission. I permit no woman to teach or to have authority over a man; she is to keep silent. For Adam was formed first, then Eve; and Adam was not deceived, but the woman was deceived and became a transgressor. Yet she will be saved through childbearing." (1 Tim. 2:11-15)
Now, not only is this viewpoint not shared today by most people in a denomination like the United Church, it also runs counter to the life and work of Jesus. Jesus included many women among his closest friends and co-workers. And the high place of women in his work is clearest in the accounts of Jesus' death and resurrection. After his arrest, all of Jesus' male friends deserted him. But many of his women friends stood by him on Good Friday; it was to women such as Mary Magdalene that Jesus first appeared on Easter Sunday; and it was these women who first proclaimed the Good News that Jesus has been raised by God.
Paul is similar. Paul's authentic letters show that, like Jesus, many of his friends and co-workers were women. And the real Paul stands for the equality of men and women. For instance, in Galatians Paul writes, "There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus."
In their book, Borg and Crossan argue that Paul's message is anti-Roman, grace-filled and egalitarian. Paul, they argue, is a radical in every way.
The fake Paul, on the other hand, often has very different messages. Take our reading from this morning. In it, the author urges the Church to pray and give thanks for kings and all who are in high positions. But who were the kings in the First Century? The Roman Emperors, the Caesars, whose empire executed Jesus. Jesus' central message stands in opposition to worldly kings and their unjust rule. Jesus proclaims the kingdom of God in which the first will be last and the last first; and that message is probably the main reason why Jesus was executed by Rome.
Some people say they feel liberated by ideas about First Timothy as portrayed in the book "The First Paul." But others say they are disturbed by them. For years now, some Christians have argued that scientific criticism of Scripture such as that by Borg and Crossan might damage our faith. And I can understand this concern. The various books of the Bible are written by humans? Some of the books are included by mistake? There is more than one message on key topics in the Bible and these messages sometimes contradict each other? Are these really matters that we should be studying or talking about in church? There is even a stereotype that people like me who study in seminary are in danger of being turned off religion entirely.
Against such fears, I turn again to Marcus Borg. In another of his best-selling books called "Reading the Bible Again for the First Time," Borg talks about his own faith journey. In childhood, he naively accepted whatever his parents and church told him including magical figures such as Santa Claus and supernatural tales about God and Jesus from the Bible. But as Borg grew up in our modern and scientific society, he adopted a critical point of view. Like many of us, in this second stage he discarded supernatural beliefs not only in Santa Claus but also in God. But later, Borg entered a third stage when he switched from his conservative Lutheran background to worship in a liberal Episcopalian church. In this last stage, Borg encountered the Living God again.
Borg calls this last stage post-critical naivete. The third stage didn't cancel out the critical stage that preceded it -- the one where he had abandoned some of his beliefs in the supernatural. But in this third stage, Borg graciously found a deeper truth in biblical stories, church tradition, and rituals; and these truths had a profound effect on him regardless of any contradictions in the Bible or of any sins in church history. Borg remained a critical thinker even as he let his heart be open to a message of justice and love on the Way of Jesus.
I strongly identify with Borg in this. When I surprised myself by returning to worship in my local church, Kingston Road United, in east Toronto nine years ago, I did so as a thoroughly modern skeptic. But then I found myself swept up by the spirit of that congregation and felt my heart opening in worship. After my first Good Friday service there in 2002, I told the minister that it was almost enough to break an old atheist's heart. The choir had sung the chorus "Lacrimosa" from Mozart's Requiem Mass. And as we sang and prayed, I glimpsed how the stories of Jesus as a God-filled teacher who suffered and died for love of his friends could be a place where, with God's grace, we are given an opportunity to wake up in the midst of life. In a congregation like that and within our flawed Christian tradition and our Sacred Scriptures, we can find a place in which to take up our own crosses and follow Jesus on a path of faith, hope and love. And I have been trying to follow His path ever since.
So there it is -- First Timothy in our New Testament. And there also was the group in Didsbury last September reading Borg and Crossan's criticism of letters like First Timothy. And because of that group and their book, I felt relieved.
The reading group was led by two retired United Church ministers and their wives, all in their 80s, and all quite active in Knox United. I relied on these two ministers last year for support, advice, and to co-preside at communion and baptisms. We got along well, and I felt in tune with them on most issues.
Now Knox United, like other active and vital congregations, includes people with a wide range of views on politics and religion. But despite not sharing the same background or perspectives as everyone, I felt welcomed and embraced by the people of Knox. The spirit of the people at Knox in conjunction with the Spirit of God helped us to tell stories from the Bible and to relate them to our life together. And so we were able to worship God in a way that seemed to nurture us all, despite differences. In a year filled with a great deal of learning, this was perhaps the most hopeful thing that I experienced. At its best and with God's help, worship can unite us across great personal, political or religious divides.
Worship is the work of the people of God regardless of our beliefs. This morning, some of us here might believe in the literal truth of all the stories in the Bible. Others of us might be modern skeptics who basically believe nothing. Others might feel in tune with deep sacred truths in the hymns, silences, sermons and Scripture readings -- even readings from First Timothy! -- without being concerned about the historical accuracy of the stories. And all this diversity seems quite natural and wonderful to me. Together, congregations made up of diverse people like us can rely on God's Spirit to connect to sacred values of life and love in a broken world and in pain-filled lives.
Knox United in Didsbury, like all congregations, had its share of divisions and bad feelings. But I loved that community of faith and found it to be a place where the healing power of God's love abounds. I have no doubt that Caledon East is just such a place as well.
And so this morning we give thanks for places of worship -- mosques, temples, and churches of all kinds -- where mortal sinners like us relate to our troubled and grace-filled Scriptures and traditions, and where we again encounter the Living God whose Love enfolds and heals us regardless of where we might be on our journeys of faith, hope and love.
Thanks be to God.
Amen.
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