|
5TH SUNDAY AFTER THE EPIPHANY, 2011
Epiphany is the season of light –
the Light of the World shining in the darkness of mid-winter. This is the light that Isaiah had
longed for while in captivity, the light that would overcome:
·
The darkness of injustice and
self-interest;
·
The darkness of active
oppression and passive neglect;
·
The darkness of incivility
and murmuring;
·
The darkness of
inhospitality and those who strike out with a wicked fist.
It has been illuminating these
past five weeks of Epiphany to see what is unfolding before us and to wonder if
it’s more a sign of Light or Darkness – in our parish, city, nation, and world?
Egypt has commanded the world
stage, and we’ve watched wide-mouthed while gasping at pictures of throngs
calling for freedom, even as men come charging through the crowds on horse and
camel back, swinging whips, as if from another galaxy long ago and far
away. We’ve watched with awe from
the security of televised news as our Egyptian neighbors have been assaulted
first with sticks and rocks, drowned out in the end by the more familiar sound
of gunfire, all the while remaining in the streets without much food, water, or
shelter, risking all for the sake of an unformed picture of freedom and justice
and the end of generations of oppression.
This past Friday President Obama
spoke about his faith and prayer-life and what’s essential about his
relationship with God, using words that reveal the most intimate parts of human
life, even as ridicule and contempt were hurled at him by those unable to hear
beyond what they saw as mere political theater and partisan ‘performance’. Just weeks after the Tucson massacre
and our protestations of a renewed commitment to change the tone of our uncivil
public discourse, which did last-- at least-- until the end of the State of the
Union speech, we already see how hard this will be for a political system
caught in an election-cycle that never ends.
We find ourselves linked to the
world around us not by the light we shine on the threatening darkness, but by
the violence we breed, destroying lives in the District of Columbia and Prince
Georges Co. as surely as those in Tucson, and the life of David Kato in Uganda.
We have, it appears, exported our incivility across the globe, taking the form
of financial support to those writing Ugandan anti-gay legislation – money that
many gay-rights advocates believe has its source in the secretive
religious-right group known as The Family or The Fellowship, headquartered here
in the District, and ironically one of the sponsors of the National Prayer
Breakfast! The web of darkness is
tangled indeed, extending even into the festivities of Super Bowl Weekend by
those who, according to Texas law enforcement officials, have flown in tens of
thousands of child prostitutes and teenaged sex-slaves whose pimps are selling
them body and soul as part of the most expensive Super Bowl entertainment
packages. Here is
self-interest, oppression, and neglect on a scale that Isaiah and Jesus himself
probably could never have imagined.
This is the world of 2011,
seemingly linked together far more by human sins and vices, than by the pursuit
of divine virtue. Is it just
whistling in the dark to long for a light that can shine out in such darkness,
not hidden under the bushel of inhospitality, neglect, or oppression, but set
on a lampstand for all to see?
What would it mean—really-- to be a place of sanctuary from
self-interest, finger-pointing, and evil words, when the darkness around us pushes
in so insistently?
The challenges that Canon LaFond
put before us on our retreat day barely more than a week ago ring out with
added urgency as each day goes by.
How in the midst of the incessant noise of injustice, oppression, and
violence that surrounds us are we to be able to enter into the silence of God’s
presence, so that we can remember whose we are, and discover for our
particular time and place what we’re being called to do?
Today’s readings from both the
Hebrew Bible and the Christian Gospel of Matthew do not offer us a way to
sidestep or avoid either the pain of the world around us or our
responsibilities as God’s People.
Both the prophet Isaiah, and Jesus who saw himself as fulfilling the law
and prophets, challenge us to begin in the only place where justice, freedom
and mercy can arise … at that place where the light of God’s love, power, and
justice shines out to let things be seen as they are, not as we would
prefer them to be.
- Even if we start out looking not that much
different from the world around us.
- Even if it makes us uncomfortably aware that
our own light has been hidden under a bushel, where it has done others far
less good that it could have.
- Even if it makes us confront how timid we are
to be the salt of the earth, agents of change and transformation who can
help heal the world.
This is what Charles LaFond was
asking us to see with the aid of the Epiphany Light – that although it may
appear impossible for us to build a new space that can be a beacon of
light to our city and world, it’s equally impossible to be faithful to our
calling to be God’s People in this place and time without doing all we can
to achieve the impossible. This is
our mission, our call, our hope, and the Christian imperative.
Our bishop, John Chane, delivered
his last convention address to the diocese two weeks ago. And a bishop’s last words to the people
they serve are always worthy of note.
His last words to us, you need to know, were about mission:
·
“It is not the
Church of God that has a mission in the world,” said Bishop Chane, “but the God of mission that has a Church in the
world.” It means that where God’s mission is being undertaken in the
world, there is where the Church must be, or it is no longer Church, but a club
or civic group or a membership-based nonprofit.
·
But have no doubt doing
God’s mission in the world has never been easy. As Bishop Chane went on to say, “Today the ability of the diocese to be the Church of God’s mission is
being challenged by the worst financial meltdown in the American economy since
the Great Depression…as a church I fear we’re pulling in the reins, cutting
back—playing it close to the vest—waiting until the market returns. Let’s wait and see. Let’s be cautious. We should not give away what we don’t
have. We need more people in the
pews and we can be more responsive.
This is, for many persons prudent management of resources… Yet let me
challenge you a bit. I believe
that too often we play, as the church, what I call the numbers game…when we do,
we’ve already become bankrupt…we claim to be a people and a church that lives
by faith. And yet, for me, my
understanding of faith is that which sustains us when we cannot know something
with certainty. These are times of
financial uncertainty for our churches, for The Episcopal Church and for our
diocese. Yet as absolutely
irresponsible as it may seem to some, I believe as a diocese and churches in
the diocese, even as we’re being whipsawed by a failing economy that it is now
time by faith to reclaim our roots.
We need to reconnect as disciples of Jesus Christ and by faith, run the
great risk of dying for the sake of Christ’s mission.”
From my own perspective as a
priest of the Episcopal Church, I think that too often we settle, maybe even
desire, a pleasant and easy religion that gives us a comfortable relationship
with God. Even though there is
universal spiritual hunger and a search for spiritual fulfillment, there is at
the same time an equal disinterest in any form of spirituality that asks us to
confront the uncomfortable questions, make prophetic judgments, or exercise our
own responsibility.
It doesn’t have to be that way,
once we realize that God is not asking us to be religious, but to be faithful –
that God doesn’t want an hour on Sunday, but a lifetime of love. It’s what
George Herbert meant when he longed for us to be able to say to God: “Seven whole days, not one in seven, I will
praise thee.” For to be great
in the kingdom of heaven, Jesus already had told us, means to have the courage
to take up our part in God’s mission here on earth, and that’s a full time job,
whatever else we may do to make a living.
A visitor here said to me a while
back, following a prophetically-themed sermon: “Well, you don’t
believe in an easy-peezy-Jesus, do you?!” And I don’t.
Being a Christian has never been a walk in the park; it’s never
risk-free. For God is always asking the impossible of us, hoping the impossible for us,
and offering the impossible to
us. This means that we will
always live in the tension between God’s desire for our full commitment
“seven whole days not one in seven,” and God’s compassionate patience with
our own repeated shortcomings, in the words of that great old hymn, the “wideness in God’s mercy like the wideness
of the sea.”
So whether we gather here in the
upper room next to where a great house of prayer once stood, or do the
impossible and build a new church for a new generation, we do well to remember
that any house of worship is never an end in itself, but a filling station and
a launching pad. Or as Jesus put it, a lamp stand from which the lights of our
lives can shine with Epiphany brightness, a salt shaker that seasons and
enriches the lives of all those we meet.
When we cut through all the noise
of life’s injustice, oppression, and violence; when we take our lights out from
under the bushels of our fear and neglect;
and when we allow ourselves to become God’s agents of grace and
reconciliation, we bring to fulfillment Isaiah’s prophesy: “Your light shall rise in the darkness and your gloom be like the
noonday. …. Your ancient ruins shall be rebuilt; you shall raise up the
foundations of many generations; you shall be called the repairer of the
breach, the restorer of streets to live in.” In short, we become the church, a place where God’s
future can be built in the present, a place where God’s Reign can break in here
on earth as it is in heaven, impossible as that may seem. For to be the church is to believe
in the God of the impossible, who even today is bringing life to places
that know too well the taste of death, and in this place, and on this day, is
making all things new, starting with me, starting with you.
Amen
|
