Daniel in the Lions' Den

Common English Bible Lookup

2012-01-31T22:26:00.000-05:00

Another little experiment on the blog - a passage lookup widget to give blog visitors quick and easy access to Bible verses, in this case from the Common English Bible. The CEB Blog Tour ends today, but I'll still be using this translation (along with the New Revised Standard Version and The Message) in worship and personal study.

Our Words of Faith: Sermon, January 29, 2012

2012-01-29T08:54:00.000-05:00

The LORD your God will raise up a prophet like me from your community, from your fellow Israelites. He’s the one you must listen to. That’s exactly what you requested from the LORD your God at Horeb, on the day of the assembly, when you said, “I can’t listen to the LORD my God’s voice anymore or look at this great fire any longer. I don’t want to die!”
The LORD said to me: What they’ve said is right. I’ll raise up a prophet for them from among their fellow Israelites—one just like you. I’ll put my words in his mouth, and he will tell them everything I command him. I myself will hold accountable anyone who doesn’t listen to my words, which that prophet will speak in my name. However, any prophet who arrogantly speaks a word in my name that I haven’t commanded him to speak, or who speaks in the name of other gods—that prophet must die.
- Deuteronomy 18:15-20, Common English Bible
Jesus and his followers went into Capernaum. Immediately on the Sabbath Jesus entered the synagogue and started teaching. The people were amazed by his teaching, for he was teaching them with authority, not like the legal experts. Suddenly, there in the synagogue, a person with an evil spirit screamed, “What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are. You are the holy one from God.”
“Silence!” Jesus said, speaking harshly to the demon. “Come out of him!” The unclean spirit shook him and screamed, then it came out.
Everyone was shaken and questioned among themselves, “What’s this? A new teaching with authority! He even commands unclean spirits and they obey him!” Right away the news about him spread throughout the entire region of Galilee.
- Mark 1:21-28, Common English Bible

Both of our readings today are about authority. God tells Moses that a new prophet will be raised up, and this prophet will have the authority of speaking for God, because God will put words in his mouth. And Jesus amazes people with his teaching and healing, and they say to each other, “What’s this? A new teaching with authority!”

And reading these passages makes me think about how we give authority to prophecy and teaching in the church. Now, the Bible has been our authority as Christians since the days of the first churches when followers of Jesus read the Hebrew Scriptures and began to write down the stories about Jesus and keep the letters they had received. The Bible is the witness of the church and to the church, the story of God’s revelation to humanity, to Israel and in Jesus Christ.

But of course, while we read parts of the Bible in worship each Sunday, we’re not going to be able to cover the whole story of salvation every week. I’m on a plan to read the entire New Testament in 90 days, two or three chapters a day, and even that is too long to read and discuss in our worship service. So, again from the church’s early days, we have used creeds to sum up the story told to us in the Bible. We said the Apostles’ Creed last week, which is very old. These creeds are important for us in our faith based on God being revealed to us in history, because they answer the questions we have about how, when, where, and why this revelation took place.

And today in our worship we’re using parts of the statements of faith written specifically for the United Church of Canada. The official one we have is the Articles of Faith in the Basis of Union, which is the constitution of the church. The Basis of Union is the founding document from 1925, when the United Church was formed, and it spells out how congregations and Presbyteries and Conferences and the General Council are made up and how they govern. The Basis of Union includes 20 articles that were agreed upon by the Methodists, Presbyterians and Congregationalists coming together to become the United Church, setting out their common faith in God as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and what their faith led them to believe about God’s purpose, sin, salvation, the Christian life, and the church.

So this is our formal statement of faith, printed in every copy of the Manual of the United Church, although we’re not a denomination that requires people to sign off on these articles to join. In fact, most of us have probably never read the articles of faith.

But soon after union in 1925, some people felt that because the articles were basically what the three churches coming together could agree on, they didn’t take the problems of the day into account. So the 1940 Statement of Faith was written. It says that the good news of Jesus is eternal and unchanging, but each new generation must state the good news in terms of the thought and emphasis of their own age. This statement was used quite a bit in adult education in the United Church from the 1940s through the 60s. And then, when new worship resources were being developed, A New Creed was written as a modern creed in modern language. Some folks here may remember the original New Creed, from 1968, which began “man is not alone, he lives in God’s world.” Today United Church congregations say the latest version together, dating from 1994.

And, finally, as we entered this new century, the General Council of the church asked for a new statement of faith, and the result was A Song of Faith, composed as a long poem. We did a worship service on it last year and are using parts of it today.

The General Council is the gathering every three years of elected commissioners from across the country. The last one, in Kelowna BC, voted to send a remit on whether to include these faith statements in the Basis of Union. A remit is a vote on whether to change the Basis of Union. Usually remits just go to Presbyteries to make minor changes to the Basis, but larger issues require a remit to Presbyteries and congregational Sessions. So before May 15 every Presbytery and every Session in the United Church will have to vote on whether to add the 1940 Statement of Faith, A New Creed, and A Song of Faith to the 20 articles of faith in the Basis of Union.

There are a few points I want to make here. One is that this is not rare in churches like ours that are in the Protestant Reformed tradition; we’re actually unusual in that we haven’t added anything to the doctrine part of the Basis of Union in 87 years. Other Reformed churches have added new statements to their original doctrine over time.

Another is that the remit is to add these statements of faith as what are called “subordinate standards” to Scripture. The United Church, like other Reformed churches, holds that the Bible is as the second of the 1925 articles of faith says, the only infallible rule of faith and life, a faithful record of God’s revelation, and the witness of Christ. Faith statements are important, but can only ever be summaries. They cannot express the entire truth about God. They are never the last word. And these statements are always products of the time when they were written. We can see this if we compare the language in these different statements. For instance, God in the articles of faith and the 1940 Statement of Faith is always masculine.

And there are separate remit votes. A Presbytery or Session may vote to add one, or two, or three statements of faith to the Basis of Union. And the 1925 articles of faith stay in the Basis of Union no matter what. They, and anything added, are our formal declaration of doctrine.

Now, this can seem very inside baseball. People in congregations have said to me, “Who cares? We will believe whatever we want. Let’s just vote and get this over with.” But I think this is important. It may not make a big difference to our worship if we formally adopt faith statements and place them in the Basis of Union – the 1940 Statement of Faith and A New Creed and A Song of Faith were adopted by General Councils and are part of our church life whether or not they are formally placed in the Basis of Union – but there are times and places when we refer to our official doctrine. When ministers are ordained or commissioned they are required to answer a question about whether they are in essential agreement with the Basis of Union, which right now means the 20 articles from 1925. And most of us don’t know this, but the deed under which the trustees hold this building requires that its use comply with the doctrine of the United Church. And folks inside and outside the church do want to know what it is the church believes, even if this may not be the same as what each and every person in the church believes. If our doctrine remains unchanging, this sends one message about how we see ourselves as a church; if our doctrine is a living document which we add onto as times change, this sends a different message about being a church that is reformed and always reforming.

And even though statements of faith can seem dry, they are summaries of the good news that God is acting to save us. And that can get people excited, particularly if they change. Someone stood up at a church near here the other week and said that they heard there would be a vote in the United Church on taking Jesus out of the Basis of Union. So rumours are starting. Now I think I’ve explained that isn’t what this vote is at all. In fact, if these three other faith statements were all added to the Basis of Union, the number of references to Jesus would probably more than double.

So in the spring the Elders here are going to study these faith statements, and look at questions about whether each one reflects continuity with the Bible and with the articles of faith, whether each one reflects the practice of the church today, and whether each one is an authentic expression of our faith here in Newington and Ingleside. And everyone, not just members of the Session, can do this with us. And then the Sessions will vote.

We don’t require that members of our church sign off on any of these statements of faith, but they all have authority, just as God’s prophets had authority, just as Jesus taught with authority. When we say with A New Creed, “we are not alone, we live in God’s world,” that has authority. When we say with the 1940 Statement of Faith that in the greatness of God’s love Christ opened up for us a way deliverance from the guilt and power of sin, that has authority. When we say with A Song of Faith that we are called together as a community of broken but hopeful believers, loving what Jesus loved, living what Jesus taught, striving to be faithful servants of God in our time and place, this has authority. These have authority even though they may not be identical to the beliefs of every individual believer. They hold faith together, despite and even because of our differences. This is who we are. This is our faith. We are being called to decide how formal to make these expressions of our faith, but they remain authoritative, cherished, and honoured.

That All May Be One: Sermon, January 22, 2012 (Week of Prayer For Christian Unity)

2012-01-22T08:43:00.000-05:00

Though the fig tree doesn’t bloom,
and there’s no produce on the vine;
though the olive crop withers,
and the fields don’t provide food;
though the sheep is cut off
from the pen,
and there is no cattle in the stalls;
I will rejoice in the LORD.
I will rejoice in the God
of my deliverance.
The LORD God is my strength.
He will set my feet like the deer.
He will let me walk upon the heights.
- Habakkuk 3:17-19

Listen, I’m telling you a secret: all of us won’t die, but we will all be changed — in an instant, in the blink of an eye, at the final trumpet. The trumpet will blast, and the dead will be raised with bodies that won’t decay, and we will be changed. It’s necessary for this rotting body to be clothed with what can’t decay, and for the body that is dying to be clothed in what can’t die. And when the rotting body has been clothed in what can’t decay, and the dying body has been clothed in what can’t die, then this statement in scripture will happen:
Death has been swallowed up by a victory.
Where is your victory, Death?
Where is your sting, Death?
(Death’s sting is sin, and the power of sin is the Law.) Thanks be to God, who gives us this victory through our Lord Jesus Christ! As a result of all this, my loved brothers and sisters, you must stand firm, unshakable, excelling in the work of the Lord as always, because you know that your labor isn’t going to be for nothing in the Lord.
- 1 Corinthians 15:51-58

Jesus replied, “The time has come for the Human One to be glorified. I assure you that unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it can only be a single seed. But if it dies, it bears much fruit. Those who love their lives will lose them, and those who hate their lives in this world will keep them forever. Whoever serves me must follow me. Wherever I am, there my servant will also be. My Father will honor whoever serves me."
- John 12:23-26

Scriptural texts from the Common English Bible.

I have learned a lot this week. I was reading the package from the World Council of Churches that included the worship service we are using today for the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity, and there is a brief description of the Polish churches that came together to prepare this year’s service. I knew that Poland is almost entirely Roman Catholic, but I didn’t know that in Poland among a number of Protestant churches there is an Evangelical Methodist Church with 5,000 followers, who as Methodists would be heirs of the same tradition as our United Church of Canada.

I have also been learning in this Week of Prayer for Christian Unity about the church around the world, as I have been re-reading a study about global Christianity. This report found that a third of the world’s population, over two billion people, is Christian. Last century most Christians would have been living in Europe and North and South America. But if you look at the 2011 list of the top 10 Christian populations, of the countries you would expect the United States is number 1 – no surprise there - Russia is fourth, Germany is ninth. But Brazil is number two. Nigeria, which is only half Christian, is number six. China, which has a Christian minority, is seventh. Today there are more Christians in Asia and Africa than in Europe.

And these Christians are divided. Half of the world’s Christians are Roman Catholic, more than a third are Protestant, 12 percent are Eastern Orthodox. Last Monday was Martin Luther King Day, and I was reading – I guess I did a lot of reading this week – a sermon that Martin Luther King gave in Alabama in 1956. And King preached this sermon as if it was an imaginary letter from the Apostle Paul, a letter to go with the letters to the Romans and Corinthians and Galatians we have in our Bibles. And here is part of what Martin Luther King, speaking as Paul, said:

I must remind you, as I have said to so many others, that the church is the Body of Christ. So when the church is true to its nature it knows neither division nor disunity. But I am disturbed about what you are doing to the Body of Christ. They tell me that you have within Protestantism more than 256 denominations. The tragedy is not so much that you have such a multiplicity of denominations, but that most of them are warring against each other with a claim to absolute truth. This narrow sectarianism is destroying the unity of the Body of Christ. You must come to see that God is neither a Baptist nor a Methodist. He is neither a Presbyterian nor an Anglican; God is bigger than all our denominations. If you are to be true witnesses for Christ, you must come to see that.

There may have been 256 Protestant denominations when King spoke 56 years ago; the last statistic I could find for the United States had 6,000. Now, he went on in his sermon to address Roman Catholicism as well, saying “I am disturbed about any church that refuses to cooperate with other churches under the pretense that it is the only true church. I must emphasize the fact that God is not a Roman Catholic.”

Now, there has been some change since the days when Martin Luther King spoke. There is more ecumenical cooperation among churches. The days when it was not proper for Catholics and Protestants to marry are hopefully gone. My Catholic grandmother and Anglican grandfather married in the 1920s, so they were probably pioneers! Local churches collaborate on projects. We joined with Anglican, Presbyterian and Pentecostal churches on the Alpha Course last year, we led the Stormont County fair service with our neighbours at Newington Wesleyan Church, and we had joint Good Friday worship. Clergy get together across denominational lines. I belong to a ministerial association in South Stormont, and another one in Cornwall where I’m now the president. And at our last meeting we had worship on the theme of Christian unity, and it was very moving to have Roman Catholic and mainline Protestant and evangelical Protestant pastors all worshipping together.

But we’re nowhere near what Jesus talked about when he said of his followers, may they be one. We can worship together, but we can’t share Communion because of our traditions’ different understandings of the Lord’s Supper. At the Cornwall meeting all of us were united in worship, then began the business part of our gathering and found that we had deep disagreements in a discussion about gay and lesbian people in the church.

But, you know, I was reminded this week that at the beginning of our United Church of Canada, there was a lot of enthusiasm for union, but there was a lot of despair too. High hopes in some towns and villages were crushed when some Presbyterian congregations voted not to join the United Church. I was visiting a 94 year-old man this week who remembered the period of church union well, and how even in the United Church old attitudes survived – he was visiting a family in Kemptville, and asked if that house was the minister’s manse. And he was told that was the parsonage, as “manse” was a Presbyterian word that Methodists would never use. They would say “parsonage.”

The theme chosen by the Polish churches for this year’s Week of Prayer for Christian Unity is victory, from our reading from First Corinthians, God gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Now, Poland has not had a happy history the last couple of hundred years or so. The countries around it divided it among themselves, and when. Poland became a country again it was only to be invaded by the Nazis and the Soviets at the start of the Second World War, and over 5 million Poles, including most Polish Jews, died during that war. And when Poland was recreated after the war it was under Soviet domination.

So it would seem a bit strange for Poles to be celebrating victory, when their country has usually been getting ground under some other nation’s boot. But the group writing the service asks how we understand “victory” and how Christ shows us a different way. This year the European soccer championship will be held in Poland and Ukraine, which would have been unthinkable years ago as these are two countries with long-standing historical grievances. This is a victory for peace. Yet as we hear news of winning teams – and I know that England will go all the way – the Polish churches ask that we consider those who do not win, not only in sports, but in their lives and communities, those of us who are like Poland in its recent history in constantly suffering defeat.

Jesus Christ does show us a different way than the world’s way of having winners and losers, in politics and business and society and even the church. In our reading from the Good News According to John, Jesus talks about being like a servant, and about letting our old selves and lives die so that we can live a better life. Jesus is talking about victory, but a different kind of victory, victory through mutual service, and working to include all those who are defeated and forgotten and excluded. And that is what Jesus himself did and how he lived, and died. As he dies and is raised from death to defeat death and evil, he is the grain of wheat which falls into the earth and dies to bear a bountiful harvest.

And so we as followers of Jesus must work, not in competition with each other, but with each other – as Martin Luther King would say, we must be true witnesses to Christ, working for a victory which will remove all divisions and make all Christians one in serving God and our neighbours. This victory may be a long time coming, as it took time for the United Church to become truly united, as it took time for Poland to free itself from the powers around it. But through this work for victory we will be transformed, changed to be more like Christ.

This is exciting, but scary. Real Christian unity, really being the body of Christ, doesn’t mean being comfortable with just friendliness between denominations. It means setting aside competition, opening ourselves to each other, cooperating and collaborating and giving and receiving in new ways. Perhaps as we debate how to be in the church in the Seaway Valley, we can consider sharing buildings and ministries, not just among United Church congregations, but among Presbyterians and Catholics and Anglicans and Pentecostals and Wesleyans and others.

At our clergy meeting in Cornwall, one of the Roman Catholic priests talked about a document on Christian unity written by Pope John Paul II, called in Latin ut unum sint, may they be one. And that is also part of the motto on the crest of the United Church of Canada: that all may be one, as Jesus prayed, not just Congregationalists and Methodists and Presbyterians and Evangelical United Brethren in our denomination, but all, all from Baptists to Greek Orthodox, united not in erasing all the richness of our diverse traditions, united not in blandness and conformity, but united in seeing God and truth as bigger than any denomination, united in openness that really enters into the new life in Christ that has no winners or losers. And that is the true and the only victory.

Thief, bandit, or outlaw?

2012-01-19T18:01:00.004-05:00

I'm on day 19 of the Common English Bible 90 day reading plan, today reading Mark 13 and 14. I was struck by Mark 14:48, in the story of the arrest of Jesus in Gethsemane:
Jesus responded, “ Have you come with swords and clubs to arrest me, like an outlaw?

The Common English Bible translators have chosen "outlaw" for the Greek lestes. I haven't seen that one before; my old Greek New Testament lexicon defines the Greek word as "a robber, brigand, bandit." Other translators have chosen similar words:
Authorized Version (King James): thief
New Revised Standard Version: bandit
American Standard Version: robber
English Standard Version: robber
The Message: dangerous criminal
French translations, like the Louis Segond, tend to use the translation "un brigand."

The New International Version renders the noun as a verb, as Jesus asks "am I leading a rebellion?" Only the Good News Translation translates lestes as the Common English Bible does, as "outlaw."

But I like it. It makes me think about how Jesus is treated as a criminal outlaw, arrested by an armed mob, but he really is an outlaw in the sense of living outside of, and setting us free from, the law of sin and death (Romans 8:2).

For Martin Luther King Day

2012-01-16T21:29:00.001-05:00

God is love, and those who remain in love remain in God and God remains in them.
1 John 4:16, Common English Bible

"I have decided to love. If you are seeking the highest good, I think you can find it through love. And the beautiful thing is that we are moving against wrong when we do it, because John was right, God is love. He who hates does not know God, but he who has love has the key that unlocks the door to the meaning of ultimate reality."
Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Where Do We Go from Here: Chaos or Community?, 1967

Speak; Your Servant is Listening: Sermon, January 15, 2012

2012-01-15T17:34:00.003-05:00

Now the boy Samuel was serving the LORD under Eli. The LORD ’s word was rare at that time, and visions weren’t widely known. One day Eli, whose eyes had grown so weak he was unable to see, was lying down in his room. God’s lamp hadn’t gone out yet, and Samuel was lying down in the LORD's temple, where God’s chest was.
The LORD called to Samuel. “I’m here,” he said.
Samuel hurried to Eli and said, “I’m here. You called me?”
“I didn’t call you,” Eli replied. “Go lie down.” So he did.
Again the LORD called Samuel, so Samuel got up, went to Eli, and said, “I’m here. You called me?”“I didn’t call, my son,” Eli replied. “Go and lie down.”
(Now Samuel didn’t yet know the LORD, and the LORD’s word hadn’t yet been revealed to him.)
A third time the LORD called Samuel. He got up, went to Eli, and said, “I’m here. You called me?”Then Eli realized that it was the LORD who was calling the boy. So Eli said to Samuel, “Go and lie down. If he calls you, say ‘Speak, LORD. Your servant is listening.’” So Samuel went and lay down where he’d been.
Then the LORD came and stood there, calling just as before, “Samuel, Samuel!”
Samuel said, “Speak. Your servant is listening.”
- 1 Samuel 3:1-10, Common English Bible

The next day Jesus wanted to go into Galilee, and he found Philip. Jesus said to him, “Follow me.” Philip was from Bethsaida, the hometown of Andrew and Peter.
Philip found Nathanael and said to him, “We have found the one Moses wrote about in the Law and the Prophets: Jesus, Joseph’s son, from Nazareth.”
Nathanael responded, “Can anything from Nazareth be good?”
Philip said, “Come and see.”
Jesus saw Nathanael coming toward him and said about him, “Here is a genuine Israelite in whom there is no deceit.”
Nathanael asked him, “How do you know me?”
Jesus answered, “Before Philip called you, I saw you under the fig tree.”
Nathanael replied, “Rabbi, you are God’s Son. You are the king of Israel.”
Jesus answered, “Do you believe because I told you that I saw you under the fig tree? You will see greater things than these! I assure you that you will see heaven open and God’s angels going up to heaven and down to earth on the Human One."
- John 1:43-51, Common English Bible

Giving all glory and honour to God.

We have two stories today about call: God calls Samuel, and Jesus calls Philip and Nathanael. My childhood Bible had a coloured picture of Samuel looking up and saying, “Speak, Lord, your servant is listening.”

Today I’m thinking of a little illustration from Søren Kierkegaard. He lived in Denmark about 170 years ago, and is one of my favourite thinkers. Actually, at first I thought he was the Danish guy who wrote the story about the ugly duckling who turns into a swan, but that turned out to be Hans Christian Andersen.

Kierkegaard had some great little illustrations for what he was saying about God, and Christ, and the Christian life. I thought of one of them when we were at Upper Canada Village for Alight at Night. We rode on the big wagon, but you could also book a carriage with just one horse and driver, with lanterns on each side. It looked very nice on the dark village streets. Kierkegaard lived when people did travel like this, and he used this in one of his word pictures, one very appropriate for Epiphany, this season of light.

When the prosperous man on a dark but star-lit night drives comfortably in his carriage and has the lanterns lighted, then he is safe, he fears no difficulty, he carries his light with him, and it is not dark close around him. But because he has the lanterns lighted, and has a strong light close to him, precisely for this reason he cannot see the stars, for his lights obscure the stars, which the poor farmer driving without lights can see gloriously in the dark but starry night. So many people are among the deceived ones; either, occupied with the necessities of life, they are too busy to see the view of the stars, or in their prosperity, it is as if they have lanterns lighted, and close around them everything is so satisfactory, so pleasant, so comfortable – but the view is lacking, and they cannot see the stars.
This story comes from Kierkegaard's The Gospel of Suffering, quoted in Vernand Eller, The Simple Life, Grand Rapids MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 1973.

We can be like the rich man in that antique carriage, comfortable, safe with the lanterns lit. And then we miss the stars: the stars God made, these balls of gas thousands and millions of light years away – I was reading the other day that our own galaxy, the Milky Way, has over 100 billion stars. We can see only a few of them. And we can miss them if we don’t look, or we don’t go outside, or our view is limited by lights around us. To use another example, if you live east of Ingleside and all the lights are turned on where they’re building that new solar farm, you miss the stars because the whole sky is lit up.

Just as we can miss the stars in the night sky with our eyes, we can miss God’s call with our senses and our minds. Samuel hears God calling to him, calling over and over, but assumes it’s Eli. Philip goes to his friend Nathanael to tell him that Jesus has called him and told him to follow, and he says to Nathanael, “We have found the one written about in the Bible, Jesus son of Joseph from Nazareth.” And Nathanael is a typical young guy who just snorts and blows Philip off, dismissing him by saying, “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?” Nathanael is from a different town, and he rejects anyone or anything that is from anywhere else. It’s like a Montreal Canadiens fan dissing a new player for the Toronto Maple Leafs.

God called Samuel to be a prophet. Jesus called Philip and Nathanael to be his followers, to travel with him and learn his message and bring it to the world. We talk about call in these Bible stories, and when we call a minister. But we can’t hem in God’s call to a few people long ago and ministers today.

God calls all of us. Our Psalm today, Psalm 139, says that God has a destiny for us, known to God since before we were created. God may be calling us to a new ministry here in our congregation or our community or the wider church, or a new or renewed focus in what we’re already doing. God may be calling us to leadership in a church committee, in a role where we touch the lives of many people, or God may be calling us to make a difference in one person’s life. God may be calling us to use our talents in a role we are good at and experienced in, or God may be calling us to discover a gift we did not know we had. God may be calling us to step back and spend less time acting and more time reflecting. God may be calling us over and over, to different things or the same thing. Sometimes God calls in one sudden, dramatic moment, sometimes God’s Spirit whispers to us and pushes us over a long period of time.

Just like Samuel and Philip and Nathanael, we have to figure out God’s call to us. And we can’t always predict what that call will mean for our lives. Philip couldn’t have predicted on the day he met Jesus that in a few years he would be traveling and baptizing. We just have to follow and let God use us, as Philip and Nathanael and Samuel did. That God calls us can be a source of strength, and it can be scary.

Right now, we have to discern God’s call to us, as individuals and as a congregation, to what we were meant to do and be. In November we voted on whether to engage in conversations with other congregations on possible cooperation in a cluster arrangement sharing ministries together, and the Holy Spirit moved in here, and we believed that we were called to say yes to dialogue. In some other congregations people felt that the Spirit was prodding them to vote no, and that’s how they felt called. And then it was the season of Advent, and then Christmas, and then the new year. And now we are called to decide on how to move, and how soon, and who to talk with.

Some congregations have come back and said, we’re waiting for the Presbytery to tell us what to do, but this process can’t work that way. The Presbytery and ministers are just resources, helping to facilitate conversations. If this comes from the top down, instead of from the grassroots, it won’t work because it won’t be of the people. It’s up to you to settle on the way to act on your vote, how to respond to invitations to talk, how to approach others, who to ask. It’s a bit like dating; you can’t rely on your best friend to ask girls or guys out for you. Well, you might, but it’s not a recipe for success.

So it’s up to you. And as I’m not the leader in this process, I don’t know if any overtures have been received, or any talks have taken place already. A response to God’s call may be already going on.

As always, we may be tempted to ignore the call. We may be like the prosperous man Kierkegaard talked about, in his carriage with the warm lantern light, comfortable and safe, but unable to see the stars. We block them out. God may be calling our name, just as God called "Samuel, Samuel," and we can’t decide that it is God’s call. God has a purpose for us, as there was a purpose for Nathanael, but just like him who didn’t think anything good could come from Nazareth, we’re too caught up in our preconceived ideas and prejudices to acknowledge it. And even though we voted yes to talking with other congregations, we may be thinking now, well, that was then, this is now, things still seem fine, we’re good as we are, we’re going to postpone this dialogue about new ways to be church, new ways to serve God and our neighbours, new ways to live out God’s call.

We need to be less like the rich man, happy and secure but unable to see beyond a little distance around him, and more like the poor farmer who may be less at ease and taking more of a risk, yet can see the entire night sky. We need to get that big picture so we can recognize and respond to God’s call, whatever that call may be, however many times it comes, whichever way it comes, in the surprising ways God works. And as we hear, as we see, as we discern, God who called us remains with us in the Spirit, guiding, strengthening, comforting, loving. Speak, God, for your servants are listening.

The Exile on Main Street Express

2012-01-05T23:16:00.001-05:00

A couple of requests...

2011-12-27T20:31:00.000-05:00

I don't usually make these requests of readers of my blog, but perhaps these may strike a chord with you:
I'm participating in the Common English Bible blog tour. If you like the Facebook page you will be able to print beautiful calligraphy Bible verses.
I met Timothy Kurek at OP11 in Nashville in September. His first book is due to be released in September 2012, and he is asking for folks to like his Facebook page - he's hoping to get a thousand "likes" by the time he is done his second draft.

Quickly to Bethlehem: Sermon, December 24, 2011

2011-12-23T13:21:00.000-05:00

Nearby shepherds were living in the fields, guarding their sheep at night. The Lord’s angel stood before them, the Lord’s glory shone around them, and they were terrified.
The angel said, “Don’t be afraid! Look! I bring good news to you — wonderful, joyous news for all people. Your saviour is born today in David’s city. He is Christ the Lord. This is a sign for you: you will find a newborn baby wrapped snugly and lying in a manger.” Suddenly a great assembly of the heavenly forces was with the angel praising God. They said, "Glory to God in heaven, and on earth peace among those whom he favours.”
When the angels returned to heaven, the shepherds said to each other, “Let’s go right now to Bethlehem and see what’s happened. Let’s confirm what the Lord has revealed to us.” They went quickly and found Mary and Joseph, and the baby lying in the manger. When they saw this, they reported what they had been told about this child. Everyone who heard it was amazed at what the shepherds told them. Mary committed these things to memory and considered them carefully. The shepherds returned home, glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen. Everything happened just as they had been told.
Luke 2:8-20, Common English Bible

Giving all glory and honour to God.

Christmas is a time for stories. We tell the Christmas story, and other stories that build on it, about the animals and the shepherds and the littlest angel and the little drummer boy, and other stories about Frosty and Rudolph. And we tell stories about our families and the Christmases of past years, sometimes happy stories, sometimes sad, sometimes funny. My mother used to tell about a Christmas dinner at her aunt Nellie’s, and an argument broke out, and Nellie, who had had a few drinks, got angry and grabbed the turkey in the oven with her bare hands and slammed it onto the table. That was probably a lot funnier later than it was at the time, when it was probably pretty scary.

At Christmastime I think about a relative of mine, Arch Hatfield, who had been a lumberjack in Nova Scotia and became a Baptist minister. He was in the Primitive Baptist church. It’s since changed its name, as I guess no one wants to be primitive anymore. And my father’s family had several stories about him, when he was ministering in Carleton County in New Brunswick. He was called the Shepherd of Carleton. I may have told you before about one Sunday in the 1930s. Arch had come to preach the evening service in the church, and as it was the Depression Grampy had no money to put in the collection plate, so when Arch came he and Grammy gave him a meal, fed his horse, and sent him away with a bag of grain, some eggs, or maybe a roast. That was how ministers were paid then. Now we have direct deposit.

This one time Arch was with Grampy and my Dad and uncle in the barn. It was getting dark and the turkeys were getting in position to roost on the beams. One young gobbler missed its footing and crashed to the barn floor, lying there stunned. In an instant Grampy had his pocket knife out – all men carried knives then – beheaded the turkey, rubbed the feathers off, and dressed it on the spot. He handed the bird to Arch and said, “Here’s your Christmas dinner!” Arch was speechless. He couldn’t believe what he had just seen, and went away talking about how God always provides. Later it came out that he had been very anxious about Christmas dinner for his family, as money was scarce and no one had given them a turkey or ham. In my family this was the story of the Christmas turkey miracle.

Tonight I’m thinking of another of our family stories. Once, during the 1950s so Arch had a car instead of a horse, Arch was driving to a service in the country. I think it was Christmas Day, and it was a cold and snowy Christmas. The car got stuck on a lonely stretch of road. Arch decided to walk the rest of the way to church, about six miles. I should mention that he would then have been over 70 years old. So he headed through the driving snow and bitter cold. He got there, but was so late that the congregation had gone home. Yet, as I heard the story, folks came back and got the stove going and people came in to hear the Christmas message and sing the carols about Jesus being born.

This makes me think of our Christmas story, the first Christmas story. The angels don’t bring the news of Christmas to the ruler and his court, or the rich people, or the religious authorities, or even to city dwellers. They announce it to shepherds, at work with their flocks in the fields - just simple, no-nonsense, plain-spoken country people, so poor and ordinary that other people back then looked down on them. They are chosen to be the first to know what has happened. And remember what happens in the story when the angels disappear. The shepherds say to each other, “Let’s go right now to Bethlehem and see what’s happened. Let’s confirm what God has revealed to us.” Luke wrote this story down, and he writes that they went quickly. Luke wrote in Greek, and the word here means the shepherds hurried, they raced, to get to Bethlehem. Hearing about these shepherds, I can only think of Arch Hatfield, the Shepherd of Carleton, another down-to-earth, simple country person, in his 70s, slogging through the snowdrifts and struggling against the wind and blowing snow, trying to get to a Christmas church service as fast as he could, hurrying as if to Bethlehem.

What would draw these shepherds, 2000 years ago, 60 years ago, to rush like this? What is it about this night that would cause anyone to risk rushing across rocky, pitch-dark hills in Palestine or up a windswept, snow-covered road in rural New Brunswick?

What did we just sing? The second verse of Angels From the Realms of Glory – shepherds in the field abiding, watching o’er your flocks by night, God with us is now residing, yonder shines the infant light. God with us is now residing. The child born to Mary in Bethlehem is God with us. Emmanuel. The Christmas story we read is from the good news according to Luke. John doesn’t have a Christmas story, but his gospel starts by telling us, the Word became flesh and dwelt among us. We say this in the United Church’s new creed, God has come in Jesus, the Word made flesh. The Christ, the anointed one of the ancient prophecies, is God’s Word, through whom and for whom all things were created. And, somehow, mysteriously, the divine Word of God becomes human and is born as we are, and is named Jesus, which means Saviour.

God comes to be with us in a tiny, vulnerable baby. We may sing, little Lord Jesus no crying he makes, and holy infant so tender and mild, but we know that if he really is human the baby Jesus cried and spit up and made as much of a mess as we did. And he who is somehow divine and human, he who is God come to be with us, is not born in the imperial capital or even in a city, but in a little town, a remote place on the fringe of the empire, in the sticks really, and not in a palace or a temple or a mansion or even a house. My mother used to say, were you born in a barn, but Christ the Lord IS born in a barn, born amid animal smells and hay, and laid in a manger, a feeding trough.

Now, if that is the whole story, that alone would be awesome. And often we want that to be the whole story. If you saw the movie Talladega Nights, you remember that NASCAR driver Ricky Bobby likes to pray to baby Jesus. He tells his wife, "look, I like Christmas Jesus best. When you say grace, you can say it to grownup Jesus, or teenage Jesus, or bearded Jesus, or whoever you want." So he prays, "dear eight pound six ounce newborn baby Jesus, don’t even know a word yet, just a little infant and so cuddly, but still omnipotent."

Well, we can be like Ricky Bobby sometimes, staying with the Christmas Jesus, just as parents look at their sleeping babies and whisper, I wish they could just stay like this forever. Other times parents wish their babies would grow up already. And our babies do get bigger, and so does baby Jesus. He does grow up, to teach us, to challenge us, to confront us, to be with and love the people excluded from polite society, to show us what God is like, how much God loves us and accepts us, and how God wants to change us so that we are more like Jesus, more like God. Jesus came so we can be more truly human, and thus more godlike. And Jesus doesn’t wave his hand and solve the world’s problems, but is the king who comes to serve, and to suffer. We will follow the story from Christmas to Good Friday and Easter, when Jesus will die and rise again from death, to free us from death.

You know, there’s a slogan this time of year, Jesus is the reason for the season, and that’s true, although I think Jesus would be dismayed that his followers get so agitated about whether or not a store wishes customers Merry Christmas.

Jesus is the reason for the season. But not the only reason. There’s more. One of the readings from the Bible for Christmas Day is from the letter to Titus, and it says, when God our saviour’s kindness and love appeared, he saved us because of God’s mercy, not because of righteous things we had done, through the Holy Spirit which God poured out on us generously through Jesus Christ our saviour. Saved US. Poured out on US. Brothers and sisters, the whole story of salvation, Christmas, Good Friday, Easter, is all for us. WE are the reason for the season. God chose to take human form, to be the eight pound six ounce newborn baby Jesus of Christmas, for us, so that WE can be the body of Christ in the world, so that WE can help to bring God’s realm of love and justice and peace, so that WE can be transformed, so that WE can have more abundant life now, and so that WE will have eternal life as death will not hold us.

Now that IS awesome. That is good news of great joy for all people. That’s why Arch Hatfield trudged through the snow and endured the cold to worship at Christmas. That’s why folks then came back and filled the church and sang and prayed on Christmas Day. That’s why we’re here.

In our story the shepherds return home, glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen. And we will go out with the joyous songs of Christmas on our lips and the wonderful news of Christmas in our hearts, that God has come to be with us in Jesus Christ, praising God that Jesus is born for us. Born that we no more may die, born to raise us from the earth, born to give us second birth. Hark the herald angels sing, glory to the newborn King.

Christmas Eve Call to Worship

2011-12-21T09:35:00.000-05:00

Yesterday I wrote the services for Christmas Eve and New Year's Day. One advantage or disadvantage of our United Church of Canada Presbyterian/Methodist/Congregationalist/Evangelical United Brethren tradition is that we don't have a common prayer book or missal, and our worship is customized for each congregation or pastoral charge.

This doesn't mean that everything is written from scratch; I often adapt worship materials from other denominations shared through LiturgyLink or TextWeek, or supplied by our own worship leaders to Gathering, the United Church worship resource. I hadn't been able to find a suitable Call to Worship to begin the Christmas Eve service, so I wrote one from the prophecies of the Christ, found in Isaiah, and the Christmas story from Luke's Gospel, taken from the Common English Bible.

The convention in our service bulletins is that the words spoken by the worship leader are printed in the regular font; the congregation says the words in bold.

An angel comes to shepherds in the country, and tells them:
Your Saviour is born today in David’s city. He is Christ the Lord.
And a whole assembly of angels proclaims:
Glory to God in heaven, and on earth peace.
For the ancient prophecies have come true,
The people walking in darkness have seen a great light. On those living in a pitch-dark land, light has dawned.
A child is born to us, a son is given to us.
He will be named Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Eternal Father, Prince of Peace.
God has given us a sign:
A young woman will give birth to a son, and he will be called Emmanuel, God with us.
Like the shepherds,
Let’s go right now to Bethlehem and see what’s happened.
Let us worship God who comes among us tonight as a tiny baby.

Looking into small group resources: MissioLife

2011-12-10T19:42:00.001-05:00

I was sent a copy of the MissioLife resource for small church groups. I have been trying to find good group materials - I'm convinced that active small groups are important for the spiritual life of congregations. So far we have had a Christian meditation group, and a group study of the Canadian Foodgrains Bank Seven Days to Tend the Earth booklet on faith and food. In Lent we will be studying the United Church of Canada's doctrinal statements, prior to our Sesssions voting on our statements of faith. Now I'm looking for a group resource that does what MissioLife claims to do: "guide adults, youth and children on a pilgrimage through Scripture from understanding to participation in the mission of God."

The MissioLife module I received came in an attractive translucent plastic envelope, with a DVD of videos and lesson samples, and an explanatory booklet. This arrived a few days ago, but as usual in the season of Advent it's taken me a while to get to it, and I'm only just starting. But the introduction in the booklet grabbed me:

...many lifelong Christians have discovered that though they can recite well-known passages of Scripture from memory, they still do not always see how these passages fit into the story of God. For many Christians, biblical literacy - while necessary and important - has not translated into a solid understanding of God's redemptive plan as one contiguous stretch throughout history and into the future...Many of us fail to see that the story of Scripture is our story.

This echoes something I have said before, and often, about believers needing to see the history of salvation in the broad sweep of Scripture, and to understand how we are players in the story as God's plan continues to unfold.

MissioLife claims to "provide a theological framework for spiritual formation tailored to all age-groups' unique needs and cognitive abilities while allowing for the unpredictable and unexpected movement of the Holy Spirit to transform lives." I hope it does, and I'll be delving further into it.

Experimenting With Nomad

2011-12-06T10:24:00.000-05:00

I'm a beta tester for Nomad - no, not the space probe from a Star Trek episode. It's a widget from paper.li, allowing a customized digital newspaper to be embedded in a blog. My Exile on Main Street Express is built from links in my Twitter feed. You'll see the results daily - or when I get to posting!

Holy and Godly Lives: Sermon, December 4, 2011

2011-12-02T19:47:00.001-05:00

2 Peter 3:8-15a
From the Common English Bible
Don’t let it escape your notice, dear friends, that with the Lord a single day is like a thousand years and a thousand years are like a single day. The Lord isn’t slow to keep his promise, as some think of slowness, but he is patient toward you, not wanting anyone to perish but all to change their hearts and lives. But the day of the Lord will come like a thief. On that day the heavens will pass away with a dreadful noise, the elements will be consumed by fire, and the earth and all the works done on it will be exposed.
Since everything will be destroyed in this way, what sort of people ought you to be? You must live holy and godly lives, waiting for and hastening the coming day of God. Because of that day, the heavens will be destroyed by fire and the elements will melt away in the flames. But according to his promise we are waiting for a new heaven and a new earth, where righteousness is at home.

Therefore, dear friends, while you are waiting for these things to happen, make every effort to be found by him in peace—pure and faultless. Consider the patience of our Lord to be salvation.

Mark 1:1-8
From the Common English Bible

The beginning of the good news about Jesus Christ, God’s Son, happened just as it was written about in the prophecy of Isaiah:

Look, I am sending my messenger before you.He will prepare your way,a voice shouting in the wilderness:“Prepare the way for the Lord;make his paths straight.”

John was in the wilderness calling for people to be baptized to show that they were changing their hearts and lives and wanted God to forgive their sins. Everyone in Judea and all the people of Jerusalem went out to the Jordan River and were being baptized by John as they confessed their sins. John wore clothes made of camel’s hair, with a leather belt around his waist. He ate locusts and wild honey. He announced, “One stronger than I am is coming after me. I’m not even worthy to bend over and loosen the strap of his sandals. I baptize you with water, but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.”

Giving all glory and honour to God.

We talked last week about how we expect to look back in this Advent season at the first Christmas, and instead our readings are telling us to look forward to the end of time. Well, this week our Scripture does look back, but not to the Christmas story. Instead we get the story of John the Baptist, who appears when Jesus is an adult, as the prophecy comes true that a voice will cry out in the wilderness, prepare God’s way. And we get more bizarre and upsetting imagery: last week Jesus spoke about the sun and moon ceasing to shine, and the stars falling from the sky; today in our reading from the Second Letter of Peter we have more about this day of the Lord, the end of this world, coming by surprise as the heavens are destroyed and the elements melt away. This part of the Bible was written in Greek, and the Greek word for elements could mean earth, air, fire, and water, or the sun, moon, and stars, or even atomic particles – the point is, all will disintegrate and burn up. On this Advent Sunday of peace, this doesn’t seem like that peaceful a picture.

We know from science that all this will come true – in about 5 billion years our sun will become many times brighter, causing the oceans to evaporate and eventually the earth’s surface to become molten rock. In another billion years or so our planet’s orbit will decay and the earth will be destroyed as it enters the sun’s atmosphere. So the elements will indeed be consumed by fire. Although this could happen earlier if the Andromeda Galaxy collides with our galaxy, the Milky Way, 3 billion years from now and the earth’s orbit changes. All this sounds like the plot of a Star Trek episode. I remember watching Star Trek: The Next Generation, and Captain Picard is on a planet where increased radiation from its sun will eventually cause all life to become extinct.

I doubt that I will be around in 3 or 5 billion years, but that’s not so long in geologic time – I was in Ottawa this week and stopped by a booth in a mall, and they had fossils and rocks on display and I saw insects preserved in amber that is 2 million years old, and fossilized ferns and fish and dinosaur bones that are much older.

And John the Baptist gets in on all this frightening language too. We read from Mark’s Gospel, which is the shortest story about John, and he doesn’t have too much to say. In Luke’s version, John calls the crowds children of snakes, translated in some Bibles as brood of vipers, and goes on about the people listening to him being like trees that do not produce good fruit and will be chopped down and tossed into the fire.

All this just makes us uncomfortable. We’re not featuring these verses on our Christmas cards, or sending cards that say “from our brood of vipers to yours.” I said last week that all this scary stuff about the world’s end is really symbolic. The destruction of the heavens and even atoms is a symbol of how total the transformation is when God’s vision is fulfilled. I think the key part of this reading is what it says next, the earth and all the works done on it will be exposed, meaning human achievements and actions will be held up for divine judgment.

All this apocalyptic language is written from a certain perspective, that of people on the bottom of the heap, people with so little that they have nothing to lose, people who have given up hope that the systems of this world will work for them. These symbols of stars falling and elements burning up, the Bible’s language about the last shall be first and the humble exalted and the poor raised up from the garbage heap and all things will be made new – these express the only hope oppressed people have, that God will flip over the existing powers that keep them down, God will expose all human works to judgment.

Look at the stories we hear during Advent and Christmas. God doesn’t come to or with the powerful people at the centre of empire. God surprises everyone by coming where people don’t expect, on the margins, with the marginalized. Isaiah’s prophecy comes true in a weird guy shouting in a desert on the fringe of the empire, a guy eating locusts and wild honey. John the Baptist is the guy we avoid when we’re walking in the city. Joseph and Mary are forced to migrate by an official directive, to Bethlehem to be taxed to pay for the empire – which sounds pretty familiar, bureaucracy and taxes and controversy over a census, and families forced to move by a corporate decision made far away. And then later in the story they are refugees, barely escaping state violence that sounds like Syria today. The news that God has come among us is told to ordinary shepherds, country folk, who are at work, not participating in a worship service. God comes to Mary, a teenage, uneducated girl in a society in which women were powerless, when pregnancy before marriage was a dangerous state to be in, yet in the story she sings that God will pull the powerful down from their thrones and lift up the lowly, God will fill the hungry with good things and send the rich away empty-handed. Mary is not the timid figure of our nativity sets. She is preaching revolution. And God comes to humanity, not in the capital city that is the centre of the known world, not even in one of the great cities of the empire, but in an obscure, one-horse town on the border, not to a palace or temple or mansion but to a stable with its smells and dirt, not as a mighty emperor or wealthy merchant or respected priest – God is born as a baby, tiny, vulnerable, completely dependent on humans.

So this story should be good news for us, country people who know about paying taxes, being pushed around by bureaucracy, decisions made far away which change our lives as a plant is closed and people are thrown out of work or families forced to move. But the story has been taken over by the powerful, sanitizing it and making it less uncomfortable, glossing over the poverty and violence and dirt, making all the characters well-dressed and clean. Well, except for John the Baptist – he’s still a wild man. We lit a candle for angels today, and now serene angels in lovely robes are Christmas decorations, as we forget that when angels appear in the Christmas story their first words have to be, ‘Don’t be afraid,’ because a message from God is so terrifying. And all the bizarre Advent stuff about the end of time and completion of God’s rule gets left out.

Yet we still know that there is something jarring here. We know that as we’re surrounded by lights and buying and nostalgic Christmas specials, somehow the Bible story pulls at us. We hear about World AIDS Day, last Thursday, how HIV has infected 34 million people worldwide and 1.8 million people will die this year of AIDS. We know that something is wrong. We hear about the National Day of Remembrance and Action on Violence Against Women, this coming Tuesday, and we remember 14 women killed in Montreal in 1989, and all the victims of gender violence. We know that something is wrong. Today is White Gift Sunday, and many families in this county rely on food banks to eat. We know that something is wrong. And we have to wonder, what if all our works on earth are exposed? How will what we have done, what we do, be judged?

The writer of Second Peter, after describing all this cosmic drama at the end and the final judgment of human actions, asks what we ask, “Then what sort of people ought you to be? You must live holy and godly lives, waiting for and hastening the coming day of God.”

Holy and godly lives. A holy and godly life means trying to follow Jesus in his way, and so, seeking to transform both ourselves and our world. A holy and godly life means prayer, devotions, moral living, and labour for the common good of all. People often talk as if personal spirituality and work for justice and peace are completely separate, but we can’t disconnect them. Second Peter says, while you are waiting for these things to happen, make every effort to be found in peace – peace with ourselves, peace with each other, seeking peace in our world.

The planet being destroyed and elements melting are symbols of the transformation God brings. Our White Gifts are a symbol too – a symbol of our own path to transformation, as our faith changes us to dedicate ourselves to serving and loving others, particularly our neighbours who are in need.

We are to bring food to food banks and women’s shelters, but also to ask why systems perpetuate hunger and poverty and violence. We are to recognize how the characters in the Christmas story were trapped in systems that kept them poor and powerless, yet today the systems that benefit us hold us just as captive. We live a holy and godly life by waiting, praying for the completion of God’s rule of peace and love and justice – not waiting passively, but waiting actively as John the Baptist did, working within the structures of which we’re a part while waiting for these systems to end, looking with the Spirit’s help to recognize where God is coming among us today in the margins, in the cracks, to identify the prophets and angels that bring God’s message to us now and to heed their words, each of us being in our own way a voice shouting in the wilderness.

You know, there is a slogan this time of year, keep Christ in Christmas. Yes, and we are to keep Christ in our lives, Christ who tells us to love our neighbour, Christ who tells us blessed are the peacemakers, Christ who tells us that in him we can overcome the world, Christ who is coming to make all things new. Come, Lord Jesus. Amen.

Mountains flattened, elements melted, and a giveaway

2011-11-29T17:20:00.001-05:00

Loving my new Common English Bible - I've been using the New Testament for a year or so for the lectionary readings in Sunday worship, but now this translation is out with both testaments and I use it for both personal and public reading.

I'm preparing for Sunday, December 4, and am looking at the lectionary texts in the CEB.

The Call to Worship at the beginning of Sunday's service will come from Isaiah 40:1-11, specifically verses 3 to 5:

A voice is crying out,'Clear the Lord's way in the desert!Make a level highway in the wilderness for our God!Every valley will be raised up, and every mountain and hill will be flattened.Uneven ground will become level, and rough terrain a valley plain.The Lord's glory will appear, and all humanity will see it together;The Lord's mouth has commanded it.

I will be preaching on 2 Peter 3:10-13:

But the day of the Lord will come like a thief. On that day the heavens will pass away with a dreadful noise, the elements will be consumed by fire, and the earth and all the works done on it will be exposed.
Since everything will be destroyed in this way, what sort of people ought you to be? You must live holy and godly lives, waiting for and hastening the coming day of God. Because of that day, the heavens will be destroyed by fire and the elements will melt away in the flames. But according to his promise we are waiting for a new heaven and a new earth, where righteousness is at home.

I think the CEB translators have made some good choices here in dealing with the Greek text and English equivalents: compare "the earth and all the works done on it will be exposed" with the less clear "the earth and everything that is done on it will be disclosed" in the New Revised Standard Version. I prefer the CEB's plain "since everything will be destroyed in this way" to the NRSV's murky "since all these things are to be dissolved in this way." The NRSV's verb "dissolved" may be closer to the original Greek luomenon, which means "loosened," but the CEB and New International Version translation of "destroyed" better expresses the ancient writer's meaning.

As a participant in the Common English Bible Blog Tour, I am able to give away copies of this new translation - a Bible which I am using every day. I'll be selecting someone who comments on this, or any, blog post here at Daniel in the Lions' Den to receive a CEB, for your Advent journey.

Tear open the heavens...

2011-11-22T17:17:00.001-05:00

I've been cramming what is usually a week of preparation for Advent services into one day, for various reasons, the chief one being Advent seems to have sneaked up on me! I'm now thinking about the Scriptures we're reading this coming Sunday, November 27, and what to say about them. I cobbled together a Call to Worship for our Sunday liturgy, based on the lectionary passages for the First Sunday of Advent: Isaiah 64:1-9 and Mark 13:24-37.

O that God would rip open the heavens and come down, and make the mountains shudder.
But isn’t this season about tinsel decorations and Santa?
The sun will become dark, the moon won’t give its light, the stars will fall from the sky, and the planets will be shaken.
But isn’t this season about lights twinkling in the streets?
Then you will see the Christ coming in the clouds, with great power and splendour.
That sounds more like it – the hope we’re looking for, the promise of something better to come. We can’t wait!
But now we must wait. Keep watch! Stay alert! You don’t know when the time is coming.
Come, Lord Jesus!
Come, Lord Jesus. We wait for this hope to arrive, we long for Jesus to return, we look for the signs of God coming among us. Let us wait and worship together.

In writing, I picked up on Isaiah 64:1-2: "If only you would tear open the heavens and come down! Mountains would quake before you like fire igniting brushwood or making water boil" (Common English Bible) - but went with the language used by The Message translation, "rip open" and "shudder" - and Mark 13:24-26: "In those days, after the suffering of that time, the sun will become dark, and the moon won't give its light. The stars will fall from the sky, and the planets and other heavenly bodies will be shaken. Then they will see the Human One coming in the clouds with great power and splendour"(Common English Bible). I kept much of the CEB wording for the Mark passage. I was trying to incorporate the eschatology in the readings for Advent 1, the waiting that is so countercultural for us in Advent when Christmas seems to start the day after Hallowe'en, and the consumerist trappings of the secular Christmas.

A version of this Call to Worship has now been posted by LiturgyLink, so it's available for other time-pressed pastors this coming Sunday!

For the Bible Tells Me So

2011-11-20T20:34:00.001-05:00

Since childhood you have known the holy scriptures that help you to be wise in a way that leads to salvation through faith that is in Christ Jesus. Every scripture is inspired by God and is useful for teaching, for showing mistakes, for correcting, and for training character, so that the person who belongs to God can be equipped to do everything that is good.
2 Timothy 3:15-17, Common English Bible

The Bible is the story for us of God's revelation to humanity, in the story of Israel and in Jesus Christ. As Marcus Borg says in The Heart of Christianity, to be a Christian is to be centred in the God of the Bible.

I believe what this early Christian document, the Second Letter to Timothy, says: Scripture is inspired by God. However, this does not mean, for me, that the Bible is infallible and inerrant. Much of what ancient communities wrote was inspired, but is not meant to be historically factual; this does not mean it is false, as it is true in the sense of metaphor, and witnesses to truths about God.

There are commentators who state that if any part of the Bible is held not to be literally true, then the entire edifice of faith collapses. I think this does a disservice to both the Bible and Christianity, and devalues metaphorical language. It also does not serve the Bible well to state that one translation only is valid. We do not have one definitive version of the original texts - the Common English Bible lists five different manuscripts of the Greek Septuagint for the books of Samuel alone. The 1611 Authorized Version, called the King James Bible, is now celebrating the 400th anniversary of its beautiful language which has made such an impact on English literature and speech. Yet we now have better Hebrew and Greek manuscripts than were available to the King James translators. All translators have to make choices in rendering ancient words and their underlying concepts into today's speech.

In the season of Advent we will be reading from two translations in worship at Ingleside and Newington: the King James, to end the 400th anniversary year, and the new Common English Bible. This should provide some great, and thought-provoking, contrasts between a venerable translation and a fresh version. I think we can learn from how the translators have rendered, for instance, the Isaiah 64 reading for next Sunday:

But we are all as an unclean thing, and all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags.
Isaiah 64:6a, King James Bible
We have all become like the unclean; all our righteous deeds are like a menstrual rag.
Isaiah 64:6a, Common English Bible

What do these words tell us about ourselves? About the translators? About the attitudes and taboos of the time? Does the way the CEB translates the Hebrew speak to us in a way that the King James does not (or the New Revised Standard's "filthy cloth" or The Message's "grease-stained rags")? Lots more to come.

Blog Tour is Coming!

2011-11-19T14:13:00.001-05:00

I'm participating in the three-month Common English Bible “Thank You – Come Again – I Promise” blog tour. It starts tomorrow, Sunday, November 20, the start of National Bible Week, and ends January 31.I have been using the Common English Bible in Sunday worship for the New Testament readings in the Revised Common Lectionary for the last year. In the season of Advent I'll be marking the 400th anniversary of the King James Bible by mixing the KJV and the Common English Bible - should be an interesting and thought-provoking contrast between the English of the beginning of the 17th century and today.And if you like the Facebook page http://facebook.com/LiveTheBible, you'll be able to print calligraphy Bible verses!

I got nothin'

2011-11-10T22:29:00.001-05:00

I certainly got nothin' on the blog lately. It's not like there hasn't been anything happening! I had great experiences at the Outlaw Preachers (re)Union in Nashville in September and Future of Ministry Symposium at Queen's School of Religion in Kingston in October. I welcomed a delegation from the United Church of Christ, Black River-St. Lawrence Association in New York State to our United Church of Canada Presbytery meeting, and participated in a series of gatherings of congregations in our Presbytery leading up to votes this month on whether congregations want to enter into discussions with their neighbours about sharing ministry (and possibly buildings). And my churches and the Presbytery decided to move me from three-quarter time ministry to full-time. So there's lots going on. I just got nothin' here on Daniel in the Lions' Den.

"It's Not Fair!": Sermon, September 18, 2011

2011-09-17T23:21:00.001-04:00

I'm a little hesitant about posting this sermon. Part of it comes from adapting a sermon I preached in 2008, the last time these readings came up in our lectionary cycle, and in the rush of student ministry at that time (and changing computers in the pre-Dropbox era) I didn't keep good notes on any sources I may have cited in the original. So I apologize if parts of the sermon seem too close to someone else's work.

Exodus 16:2-15
Philippians 1:21-30
Matthew 20:1-16

It’s not fair! When you hear this expression, you can almost see a child stamping a foot and reacting to some perceived injustice.

My sister thought it was very unfair that she and I had to share the back seat of the car – even though, of course, as this was the 1970s, car back seats were much wider than they are now. Since we didn’t wear seat belts, we could roam around, though.

So my parents got to hear “it’s not fair!” quite often, along with “he’s looking at me! Tell him to stop looking at me!” And my parents had all the usual parental responses: “If you don’t stop that, your face will stay that way” and “so help me, I’ll turn this car around.”

And when we hear today’s reading from the good news according to Matthew, most of us say, “it’s not fair!” Jesus tells a story about a farm estate, a vineyard, where the landowner pays all the workers the same wage, although some had been working since dawn and others had only started at five o’clock that afternoon.

Now this sounds pretty good if you place yourself in the position of the workers hired last. A full day’s pay for doing the least amount of work! But from the perspective of the workers who had laboured all day, it seems like an injustice, one that prompts cries of “It’s not fair!”

We have been raised in a society that is always ranking people and rewarding those who come out ahead, or punishing those who fail to meet a certain standard. And we buy into it. We see life as a contest for wealth, power, approval, fame. We’re always competing. Even when we’re relaxing we watch shows about other people competing and being ranked, on Survivor and The Apprentice and America’s Got Talent. It’s so much a part of our normal way of thinking and doing things that we take it for granted and don’t give it a second thought. Much of our image of ourselves involves how we compare ourselves to others.

And that is true of all of us, even though we pray the prayer of Jesus, “your kingdom come.” We’re in good company; James and John, the followers of Jesus, were competing to sit at the right and left hand side of Jesus in heaven.

We are used to the world treating and rewarding us based on our ranking. Those who work the hardest – or who work the hardest at getting the credit – receive the promotions, the plaques, and the paycheques. When the world does not function that way, we say “It’s not fair!” We’re always on the alert for unfair situations.

And sometimes we do have a point, when we say that it’s not fair that women are not paid the same as men.
We have a point when we say that it’s not fair that people are not hired or promoted for reasons based on gender or race or faith or age or ability or sexual orientation.
We have a point when we recognize that the international economic system plays a role in keeping countries and people poor in Latin America and Asia and Africa.

But Jesus was not talking about a real landowner he knew. The story isn’t really about workers and bosses. He was telling one of his stories about what the kingdom of God is like. The owner of the vineyard is God, and the workers shouting that their pay is unfair are, well, us.

Jesus tells the story to show explain that the rule of God is not like the world of rewards and punishments and rankings. God practices economics in this story that we, using the world’s standards, see as unfair.

And it was just as surprising and challenging to those listening to Jesus. Jesus contradicted contemporary thinking and action. He shocked people. In his time this story, told to peasants exploited by absentee landlords, was downright dangerous and subversive.

In this story God doesn’t seem to be committed to equality, as some are getting more than others. But God, as the landowner, says in the story, “I choose to give to this last the same as I give to you. Am I not allowed to do what I choose with what belongs to me? Or are you envious because I am generous?” And Jesus concludes, “So the last will be first, and the first will be last.”

God doesn’t share our ideas about treating people based on rankings. God isn’t bound by systems of merit and awards. God isn’t interested in our status and privileges. God may not even be a big fan of The Apprentice.

We want the people we see as less dedicated and conscientious than us to receive less than us; but that’s not the way it is in God’s kingdom. Everyone in the realm of God will be welcomed with open arms and will be equally rewarded. In the rule of love it doesn’t matter at what hour you begin or who produces most. All will be treated as God’s children, as children of equal worth. We can’t earn God’s favour. The faithful churchgoer will be equal to the prostitute and to the drug addict and to the convict.

And we think, that’s not fair! When the landowner asks, “Are you envious because I am generous?” our answer is yes, that’s exactly why we’re envious. We’re like the people Jesus talked about, who prized their rank in society and its rewards so highly. We ask, How can this be? What is up with that? What kind of God would treat everyone as being of equal value? Where’s the justice? Where’s the good news we keep talking about?

This is not the only reading today about complaints of unfairness; in the story from the book of Exodus the people of Israel, who in last week’s reading escaped from slavery in Egypt, say, “It’s not fair!” They grumble and whine that they were better off as slaves than wandering hungry in the desert, forgetting how unfair they found their old lives. Yet God sends bread and flocks of quails to feed them. Despite their ingratitude, despite their complaints – and ours – our loving God provides what they need for life. Fortunately for them, and us, God does not wait for us to earn it.

And if we stop for a moment and think about it, the story Jesus tells is good news, great news. If we can get out of our life-long habit of needing to be recognized as more worthy than others, then this is unbelievably good news.

For I know – and I think you know, too – that on any scale of worthiness, I’m not at the top. None of us are. As Paul writes to the Romans, all of us have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.

What Jesus offers is not a system of scales and measurements, but the opportunity of a new start.
What Jesus is telling us is that we are going to be treated far better than we should.
He is telling us that we don’t get what we deserve: we get what God is so generously willing to give us.
He is telling us that there is no hierarchy in the rule of God. He is telling us that the rule of God is not a zero sum game; all of God’s infinite love and mercy is poured out on everyone, and all of it is available to everyone.

He is telling us that, no matter whether we are one hour or two or four or full day workers, we will be received by our gracious and loving God with all the blessings of the kingdom. Think of the most saintly, the most deserving person you know – God will treat you the same way. There is no contest in the rule of God, “fair” isn’t even a word in the vocabulary, because each and every one of us is treated as God’s beloved child.

All of us as followers of Christ are equal in God’s eyes.
All of us are counted as God’s people.
All of us are dependent on God’s grace and mercy, just as the people of Israel in the desert were dependent on God for food.
All of us are loved equally.
It doesn’t matter how or when we came to faith; what matters is God’s call to us, and our response with the gifts God gives to us. That is good news. It’s wonderful news.

And, if this is the kind of kingdom we pray for, when we pray “your kingdom come,” then it is up to us to let God work in us and make it happen, right here, right now.
What would happen if we stopped worrying about whether we are getting our fair share, and instead recognized each of our neighbours as a child of God?
What would happen if we stopped worrying about whether or not our brothers and sisters deserve God’s love, and instead made ourselves instruments of that love to them, loving them like God loves us?
What would happen if we really forgave others, knowing how God forgives us?
What would happen if we acted in the way Paul describes to the Philippians, living lives worthy of the good news, following his words that to live is Christ and while we are alive there is good work to do?
What would happen if we prayed that God would show us how God wants to use us, and would listen, and would act? You know what?
That is what the kingdom of God is like.

Not One of Them Remained: Sermon, September 11, 2011

2011-09-10T19:41:00.000-04:00

Exodus 14:19-31, 15:1-13

Giving all glory and honour to God.

Our story today is the one that is the climax of the movies about this book of the Bible, Exodus. The book goes on for 26 more chapters, but this is the big moment in The Ten Commandments with Charlton Heston, and Prince of Egypt and others: the people of Israel are fleeing slavery in Egypt, and come to the sea, where it seems the Egyptian army chasing after them has them trapped. But the power of God is with them. Moses stretches out his hand over the sea – this is the big scene in the movies – and a wind divides the waters, and the Israelites cross the sea on the dry land between the two walls of water.

This is a good news story: God intervenes on behalf of powerless people. God makes a way out of no way. This story has been tremendously meaningful for oppressed people everywhere who have taken it as their story. And it is our story; God comes in Jesus Christ to liberate us from the oppression of sin in all forms. In our baptisms we re-enact this story, salvation through the water.

Good news. Except for the Egyptians. They are still coming in their chariots after the Israelites, and they too start crossing the sea on the dry land. But the cloud of God’s power frightens them, the chariot wheels get stuck, and the Egyptians panic and start to turn back. Then Moses stretches out his hand again over the sea, and the water covers the Egyptian army, drowning the chariot drivers and the horses. The Exodus story says, ‘Not one of them remained. Thus the Lord saved Israel that day from the Egyptians; and Israel saw the Egyptians dead on the seashore.’

Dead on the shore. This morning I can’t help but think of another story. Ten years ago today I went to work in an office building in downtown Ottawa. The woman in the cubicle next to mine heard on her radio that a plane had hit the World Trade Centre in New York City. We assumed that it was an accident, but we went and turned on the TV in the office kitchen, and then we saw another object streak across the screen and explode in the second World Trade Centre tower. It wasn’t an accident. We watched as the towers burned, and word came of a third plane hitting the Pentagon, and then another one apparently crashed in Pennsylvania, and then the towers collapsed, a shocking sight as clouds of dust and ash billowed over lower Manhattan. Later we were told by a friend that her cousin was late for work in the World Trade Centre that morning, and lived because she missed the plane’s impact. And someone else - a consultant at work - told me how he cancelled his meeting in one of the towers that day; everyone on that floor was killed.

Our reading for September 11th: Israel saw the Egyptians dead on the seashore. Our memory of September 11th: we saw thousands of people die as we watched the explosions and fires and the towers fall. Now, there seems to be a big difference between these two stories. In our 9/11 story, the people who died are innocent, victims of a terrible act of terror carried out by fanatics, and the firefighters and police officers who rushed bravely into the burning buildings, many of whom died, are the good guys. In Exodus the Egyptians who die are the bad guys, and the Israelites are the good guys. The Egyptian bad guys being drowned is a good thing. Isn’t it? Moses and the Israelites sing that it is, the song we read together, the Song of the Sea, celebrating that God has triumphed gloriously: Horse and rider are thrown into the sea, they went down into the depths like a stone, they sank like lead in the mighty waters.

There’s another story, a Jewish one that explains and expands the Exodus story, called a midrash. In this midrash the angels sing a hymn to God as the water covers the Egyptian army. And God tells the angels to stop celebrating, saying, “While my creatures are drowning in the sea you would sing a hymn?”

But, we could say, wasn’t it necessary that the Egyptians die so that the Israelites could survive? Isn’t the destruction of the enemy part of God’s plan for God’s people? Well, maybe. But this summer, during our vacation, I stood on the battlefield at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. During three days in July 1863 9800 men were killed there, the bloodiest battle of the American Civil War. I stood at the grove of trees called the High Water Mark of the Confederacy, the furthest point reached by the Confederate attack on the third day of the battle, Pickett’s Charge, when 12,500 Southern troops marched out of the woods to assault the Northern line, and only half came back. After that the Southern states were never able to take the initiative again. And a lot of people said that all this death was the price to pay to end slavery and preserve the United States. Northerners were sure that God was on their side. They were like the Israelites and the slaveholding Confederates like the Egyptians. The Union sang, “Glory, glory, hallelujah, his truth is marching on.” But Abraham Lincoln, who was President during that war, pointed out that both sides, North and South, read the same Bible and prayed to the same God, and each called on God for help against the other.

Sisters and brothers, we can’t always understand God’s reasons. Lincoln said the Almighty has his own purposes. Neither North nor South could know if the Civil War was necessary to abolish slavery. It seems that in our imperfect world, where human efforts always fall short of true peace, we cannot get away from violence no matter how hard we try; nations will turn to war as the way to make peace. We can’t agree on whether this is God’s will, or how we should respond as God’s people. But while we cannot know God’s purpose in each event in our world, we do know the themes revealed to us in the stories of Israel and the life and resurrection of Jesus – that God is loving and wise and just, that life will triumph over death, that, as the prophet Ezekiel says, God does not delight in the death of the wicked. As God tells the angels in that old Jewish story, don’t celebrate while my creatures, no matter what side they’re on, are dying.

We only read the Exodus story this morning. But, as on every other Sunday, in our cycle of readings there are two more. The Apostle Paul writes to the Romans, "Why do you judge your brother or sister? Why do you look down on your brother or sister? We will all be judged by God." And in Matthew’s Gospel, Peter asks Jesus, "How many times should I forgive? As many as seven times?" And Jesus tells him, "Not just seven times, but as many as seventy-seven times."

Don’t delight in the death of the wicked. Don’t judge. Forgive as many times as it takes. Love your enemy. All this sounds nice in the abstract, or applied to conflicts safely in the past, in the Exodus 1500 years ago or the Civil War 150 years ago. But when we think of September 11, 10 years ago, it’s hard. For some of us it will be impossible. Don’t judge the hijackers? Don’t assume that our side is in the right, when Canadians died in New York City, when innocent people were slaughtered? Forgive, when the trauma is still with us after 10 years, when we still feel vulnerable? Love our enemy when terrorists are still threatening us?

God knows that this is difficult. We are not asked to forget what was done. We are not asked to stop remembering the 3,000 people who died on 9/11. We are not asked to ignore ongoing suffering, of families who lost loved ones, of people who still have physical and mental wounds from that day, of firefighters and others who are now ill from breathing the toxic air, of the hundreds of thousands who have been killed and wounded and uprooted in wars and terror attacks since.

But we are called to recognize that terrorism attacks us not just physically, but psychologically. Terrorism doesn’t just create fear; it infects us with the same poison as the terrorists, leading us astray to embrace hate and violence as they do. Since 9/11 we have struggled against the emotions the attacks stirred up in us. One church leader has said that too often we have reached for the flag rather than the cross. During this long, sad decade people of faith have turned from God’s way to seek revenge, justify torture, demonize Muslims, and restrict religious freedom, in the name of national security and even in the name of Jesus.

Brothers and sisters, we have been called, in that moment of crisis 10 Septembers ago and in the years since, to stand and be God’s instruments of love and justice, to follow the God of love and forgiveness, the God who does not delight in death, the God who came to us in Jesus Christ who forgave his enemies from the cross. And we have tried, hard as it is, to live that call: to pray and work for peace, to create dialogue and partnerships with our sisters and brothers of other faiths, to turn away from fear and hatred, to overcome evil with good. And that does not stop after 10 years; it continues. It must continue. The Prime Minister has designated September 11 as a national day of service, so that a legacy of acts of compassion will be part of this day.

Where is God in these stories of destruction and death? As I said, we cannot know God’s purposes. But we do know this: God was with the people of Israel, struggling to freedom across the sea, and God was weeping with the mothers and wives of the Egyptians who lay dead on the shore. God was crying, looking over the Gettysburg battlefield and the thousands of dead and wounded from both sides lying there. And God’s tears flowed on September 11th, for the dead and suffering, for the twisted beliefs of the hijackers that led them to this mass murder. God was with the people who comforted and healed wounds and welcomed strangers. God was with people of faith who responded in faith. And God is with us, in the valley of the shadow of death, with us to strengthen us to move forward from this anniversary in love, trusting in God, seeking peace and justice and resisting evil, and always holding to the hope that is ours in Jesus Christ rising from death, that terror and violence can never have the victory over life and love. That is our God, the God of all people.

Man in Black

2011-08-19T22:41:00.000-04:00

I wear brighter colours during the summer, but the rest of the year I tend to rely on a black and blue wardrobe (black is supposed to be slimming, and it's easier for men who can't colour coordinate their outfits!). Hearing a bit of Johnny Cash's Man in Black today reminded me of other reasons to wear black:

Well, you wonder why I always dress in black,
Why you never see bright colors on my back,
And why does my appearance seem to have a somber tone.
Well, there's a reason for the things that I have on.

I wear the black for the poor and the beaten down,
Livin' in the hopeless, hungry side of town,
I wear it for the prisoner who has long paid for his crime,
But is there because he's a victim of the times.

I wear the black for those who never read,
Or listened to the words that Jesus said,
About the road to happiness through love and charity,
Why, you'd think He's talking straight to you and me.

Well, we're doin' mighty fine, I do suppose,
In our streak of lightnin' cars and fancy clothes,
But just so we're reminded of the ones who are held back,
Up front there ought 'a be a Man In Black.

I wear it for the sick and lonely old,
For the reckless ones whose bad trip left them cold,
I wear the black in mournin' for the lives that could have been,
Each week we lose a hundred fine young men.

And, I wear it for the thousands who have died,
Believen' that the Lord was on their side,
I wear it for another hundred thousand who have died,
Believen' that we all were on their side.

Well, there's things that never will be right I know,
And things need changin' everywhere you go,
But 'til we start to make a move to make a few things right,
You'll never see me wear a suit of white.

Ah, I'd love to wear a rainbow every day,
And tell the world that everything's OK,
But I'll try to carry off a little darkness on my back,
'Till things are brighter, I'm the Man In Black.

John Brown's Body

2011-08-17T23:07:00.000-04:00

We've been on a bit of a John Brown tour during our holidays, visiting Charles Town WV (then Charlestown VA, where he was tried and hanged - we saw the courthouse, still in use) and Harpers Ferry, where he tried to seize a federal arsenal to arm slaves in 1859. Today we visited his farm, and the graves of John Brown and his sons, near Lake Placid NY - Brown settled there to be near a colony of freed slaves and free African Americans, although the settlement eventually folded due to the poor farming conditions and harsh weather of New York's North Country. Today the ski jump towers from the 1980 Winter Olympics overlook the simple house and barn of Brown's family.

So we have seen the last resting place of 'John Brown's Body' - lying underneath the gravestone that was originally his father's, a veteran of the American Revolution.

Had I interfered in the manner which I admit, and which I admit has been fairly proved (for I admire the truthfulness and candor of the greater portion of the witnesses who have testified in this case), had I so interfered in behalf of the rich, the powerful, the intelligent, the so-called great, or in behalf of any of their friends, either father, mother, brother, sister, wife, or children, or any of that class, and suffered and sacrificed what I have in this interference, it would have been all right; and every man in this court would have deemed it an act worthy of reward rather than punishment.
This court acknowledges, as I suppose, the validity of the law of God. I see a book kissed here which I suppose to be the Bible, or at least the New Testament. That teaches me that all things whatsoever I would that men should do to me, I should do even so to them. It teaches me, further, to "remember them that are in bonds, as bound with them." I endeavored to act up to that instruction. I say, I am yet too young to understand that God is any respecter of persons. I believe that to have interfered as I have done as I have always freely admitted I have done in behalf of His despised poor, was not wrong, but right. Now, if it is deemed necessary that I should forfeit my life for the furtherance of the ends of justice, and mingle my blood further with the blood of my children and with the blood of millions in this slave country whose rights are disregarded by wicked, cruel, and unjust enactments, I submit; so let it be done!
- John Brown's last speech in court, November 2, 1859

Horn of Africa Appeal

2011-08-12T21:14:00.000-04:00

What Are We Going to Say About Labels, Supermodels, Seeds, and Pearls?: Sermon, July 24, 2011

2011-07-23T23:35:00.001-04:00

Genesis 29:15-28
Romans 8:26-39
Matthew 13:31-33, 44-52

Giving all glory and honour to God.

So what are we going to say about these things? That’s the Apostle Paul, in his letter to the Roman church that is one of our readings today, but he could be talking about our three selections from the Bible. What are we going to say?

Paul continues, if God is for us, who is against us? Who will condemn us? In Paul’s letter these words are meant to be reassuring, comforting, because he answers these questions. But in our lives, when we ask, who is against us, who will condemn us, we don’t always get these calming, soothing responses. Sometimes we know who it is who is against us, and we can name them, or we know that it’s a whole society. And we feel condemned.

In our first reading, we’re continuing last week’s story of Jacob, on the run from his brother. Jacob finds his uncle, Laban, and falls in love with his cousin Rachel, and works for Laban seven years so he can marry her. But Jacob, who is on the run in the first place because he fooled his father into giving him his brother’s inheritance, is fooled himself – tricked by Laban into marrying Rachel’s older sister Leah. And he works another seven years so he can marry Rachel too. Men could have more than one wife back then.

The writer of this book of the Bible states that Rachel was graceful and beautiful. Rachel is the hot one Jacob and all the other guys fall for when they see her. Leah is pawned off by her father because she isn’t pretty; the writer says that she has lovely eyes – which sounds like the words of someone trying to be kind. The only way for her to get a husband is to trick a man into marriage. Jacob marries her because he has to, but the story makes it plain that he doesn’t love her.

Who is against Leah? Who will condemn her? The people around her who judged her by the beauty standards of her society, in a story that is set nearly 40 centuries in the past, and things haven’t changed much since then. Magazines and movies and TV shows and websites still favour the Rachels over the Leahs. And we want to be Rachels, because who wants to be a Leah, unloved and unwanted? So we go beyond just using makeup and hair styling, and turn to cosmetic surgery and even extreme dieting or steroids as we try to look like supermodels and beauty queens and muscle men. There is an epidemic of unhealthy weight loss and anorexia among teenage girls because society gives them the message that they will be unattractive unless they are thin.

I’m interested in this as I have a disability. When our society looks at disability, it focuses on what one can’t do; the idea is that the body or mind aren’t working properly. This thinking leads to labels being given to people with disabilities, descriptions like cripple, handicapped, retarded. And these labels convey with them the idea that people with disabilities are worth less than able-bodied people. It’s only a short step from saying that people with disabilities have a problem, to saying that they are a problem. Advocates for people with disabilities call this thinking ableism, a set of stereotypes like racism and sexism.

And I need to add ageism here, as beauty in our culture means youth. Just as people with disabilities are given the message that they are worth less and are a problem, society gives the same idea to seniors, that the hair and skin and ability and health of elderly people are less than ideal.

It’s hard to be labeled crip, loser, geek, ugly. We may hope that these labels stop after high school, but they last as we go through life, particularly in this Internet age when anonymous people comment viciously on anything they find online. We may be saddled with the names and insults heaped onto anyone who has a disability or whose face or hair or body type or clothing, or speech or mannerisms or sexuality, isn’t what our culture considers fashionable and good-looking and normal.

Our world judges by superficial standards just as much as, and probably more than, the world of Leah, Rachel and Jacob. Our culture may pay lip service to everyone being equal no matter what they look like, but it tends to put down authenticity and and degrade anyone who doesn’t look like the ideal. The singer Pink has a song on the radio, called Perfect, and sings about how her critics don’t like her jeans and don’t get her hair, yet she does it too to other people, all the time. We know how we make snap judgments based on appearance.

Yet, in fact, sisters and brothers, we are all Leahs. It is impossible for us to meet the criteria of our fashion and beauty-obsessed culture 100 percent of the time. We can’t all be celebrities, and they can’t measure up to their media images continually either. The perfect people we are compared to, forever young, athletic, beautiful, sexualized, exist only in the imaginations of the media and advertisers. All of us - no matter how young or old we are or what we look like - all of us know at some point in our lives, maybe most of our lives, what it is like to be labeled, criticized, degraded, unwanted, to feel that we are worth less.

Paul writes to another church, the one in Corinth, and tells them, brothers and sisters, by ordinary human standards not many of you were wise, not many were powerful, not many were from the upper class. He could have said, not many of you were Rachels. Most of you, maybe all of you, were Leahs. And Paul continues, but God chose what the world considers foolish to shame the wise. God chose what the world considers weak to shame the strong. God chose what the world considers unattractive to shame the beautiful. God chose what the world considers to be nothing to reduce what is considered to be something, to nothing.

Into this world of superficiality and unachievable standards comes Jesus with his good news. In five little stories this morning he talks about the realm of God, where God’s love and justice and peace break into our world of shallowness and selfishness. Yet God’s realm is like something that is considered like nothing, worthless: a mustard seed. Yeast. So common in the time of Jesus they weren’t worth thinking about. Or so the society of the time, and our society today, would think. But God chooses what seems insignificant, and ordinary, to shame what the world considers famous and beautiful.

Jesus talks about the mustard seed, thought in his time to be the tiniest of seeds. Yet from that miniscule seed come mustard plants that become shrubs eight to ten feet tall. The contrast would have been obvious to his listeners. Tiny seed, huge plant.

Jesus is saying that the greatest things have the least auspicious beginnings. What is ordinary, looked down upon, dismissed by society, brings God’s realm.
A little seed becomes a tree. A few grains of yeast cause a whole loaf of bread to rise. God comes in human form as a crying baby, Jesus, born in an unimportant place in a backwater of the Roman Empire. Jesus, who always identified with anyone suffering and shut out by society, is telling us that small things count, as we sang in our hymn; small things count as big things in God’s mind.

God does not judge as we and the world judge. God has different ways to measure beauty. God sees potential where we write off ugliness and disability and old age. Jesus says that the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant in search of fine pearls. When he found one very precious pearl, one pearl of great price, he went and sold all that he owned and bought it.

Brothers and sisters, God sees each one of us as unique treasures. To God we are pearls, pearls of great price. It doesn’t matter to God what we look like, whether we are graceful like Rachel or the best anyone can say of us is that we have lovely eyes like Leah. It doesn’t matter to God what labels people attach to us. We are pearls, and God will search for us, and find us, and sell everything to buy us. And God has done that, as Paul tells the Romans: God gave up Jesus, God’s Son, for us all. Pink sings in her song, if you ever, ever feel like you’re nothing, you are perfect to me, and that could be what God is whispering to us.

If God is for us, who is against us? Who will condemn us? Well, lots of people may try condemning us for our looks or our ability or our background or our beliefs. But Jesus helps us discover our value as unique creations of God. When we feel beaten down by criticism, when we feel small, then we can remember that small things count. We count in God’s mind. We may feel as Paul describes, quoting Scripture, as if we are being put to death all day long, treated like animals for slaughter. Yet Paul continues to tell the Roman church, and us: But in all these things we win a sweeping victory through the one who loved us. I’m convinced that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor present things nor future things, nor powers nor height nor depth, nor any other thing that is created, can separate us from God’s love in Christ Jesus our Lord. This is the good news. Thanks be to God.

Church for the 21st century: Family structures

2011-07-19T14:23:00.000-04:00

Carol Howard Merritt has a great, and challenging, post about family structures in the 21st century church. Looking at her questions, I admit that my congregations are falling short - most of our singles are elderly widows and widowers, and we don't have many younger singles and families (and we still won't have many unless we become more hospitable). I am trying to place a priority on broadening our programming for children, teens, and young families. The Ingleside church building is full of young parents and children when we have special family events at Christmas and Easter.

Carol asks, 'If a young couple is living together (this is often a financial necessity), do our churches welcome them?' This reminds me of a conversation we had at one of the local ministerial meetings, which brings together clergy from various denominations. We were discussing preparation for marriage, and one of the evangelical pastors stated that when he finds out that a couple is living together, he tells them that they must live separately until their wedding or he will refuse to marry them. I responded that if I didn't marry people who are living together, we would have no weddings at all. When I look at our marriage registers, the bride and groom's addresses are the same in nearly every case. And if some Christians see living together as a sin, wouldn't they want the wedding to go ahead so this state of wrongdoing can cease?

Biblical Outlaws: Sermon, July 17, 2011

2011-07-16T20:20:00.001-04:00

Genesis 28:10-19a

Giving all glory and honour to God.

Our reading this morning is from Genesis, the first book of the Bible. Long story short, twin brothers Jacob and Esau have a big falling out, and Jacob runs away, and he sleeps with a stone under his head, which sounds very uncomfortable. And Jacob dreams that he sees a ladder, or stairway, or ramp, reaching to heaven, and angels going up and down on it.

We ‘re going to sing the old spiritual “We are Climbing Jacob’s Ladder” later. I’ve sung it before in ministry, and the older folks tend to get nostalgic for their days at camp. My generation would get nostalgic thinking of another song, Stairway to Heaven by Led Zeppelin, which was always the last song at dances in high school.

There’s lots to think and talk about in this story, but one thing that stands out for me is that Jacob is on the run. His brother wants to kill him. The story takes place when there isn’t really any government or legal system, just families enforcing their own codes of honour, but Jacob is an outlaw.

Now, we have kind of a conflicted relationship with outlaws. When my mother was growing up in Aylmer, Quebec, the entertainment for teenagers was going to the movies, and for a dime or whatever it was 70 years ago you got a newsreel, a cartoon, a Western, and the movie. My mother saw all the Westerns. And in that era of Roy Rodgers and Gene Autry and Hopalong Cassidy, the outlaws were the bad guys. They wore the black hats, so you could tell who they were. The white hat guys might be falsely accused and be outlaws for a while, but they always came back to the side of law and order.

But by the time I was a kid the movies had changed. I just bought a set of spaghetti westerns on DVD, on sale for $5, Westerns that were made in the 1960s and 70s. And in this era, Clint Eastwood and Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid and The Wild Bunch, the movies were about the outlaws.

After all, the outlaws tend to be the most interesting characters, and not just in Westerns. The Pirates of the Caribbean movies are about the pirates, not about the Navy enforcing the law. We love these colourful eighteenth-century pirates, but not the 21st century ones who are capturing ships off Somalia.

I just watched a movie about Jesse James and his gang, called American Outlaws, and the viewer is intended to root for the James boys against the army and the railroad. The movie glosses over unpleasant aspects like their support for slavery in the Civil War. If you watched The Brady Bunch, you may remember the episode where the parents are very concerned that Bobby has written a school essay about his hero, and he has chosen Jesse James. So they let him stay up late and watch a movie about Jesse James, hoping that he will see his hero robbing banks and murdering people and get turned off. But the movie is edited so that Bobby sees none of this. Our outlaw stories can be like that too. We like the bad boys and the bad girls, at least in fiction, but they’re romantic and thrilling only if they’re not too bad.

Jesse James is certainly far from a perfect character, but at least a part of us still roots for him, especially when he’s played by Colin Farrell or Brad Pitt. In this story we root for Jacob, the outlaw. And he is far from perfect, too. He may not murder anyone – although later his sons kill everyone in a city - but Jacob is on the run in the first place because he fooled his father into giving him the blessing that was the right of his brother Esau. He’s a tricky guy, and his mother eggs him on.

Yet even though Jacob is a trickster and lies to his father, even though he’s an outlaw on the run, God speaks to him in this dream of the stairway to heaven, and makes a promise to protect him. And later Jacob gets a new name – Israel. And in turn the new nation of God’s people is named Israel after Jacob, for the tribes of Israel are descended from Jacob’s children. God is known in the Bible as the God of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob. Pretty good for an outlaw.

Look at the characters of the Bible. There are more than a couple of bad boys and girls in there. Moses killed a man in Egypt and was an outlaw in the desert. Rahab was a prostitute who helps the Israelites. David was an outlaw fleeing the king. Elijah fled another king and hid out. Jesus himself, although he never did anything wrong, had to escape from angry rulers and live on the run, saying 'foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.' He was put to death as a criminal. And he predicted that his followers would be dragged before rulers and courts, and they were frequently on the run too, run out of town.

I think the point here for us is what Jacob says when he wakes up from his dream, and looks around at the desolate, rocky place where he had been sleeping in his escape. He remembers how in the dream God has promised to stick by him, and he says, “Surely God is here in this place, and I didn’t know it.” God is in this place, even among outlaws. God knows that none of us is perfect. God promises to stick with us no matter what, even in our wanderings, even when we are outside the acceptable boundaries of society.

And God’s people aren’t necessarily respectable, well behaved people. The Bible tells us over and over that to follow God, as God is shown to us in Jesus, means that we have to do what Jesus did and break the rules of society from time to time. Proclaiming the good news of Jesus in our lives results in us offending comfortable people. We have to love people whom society doesn’t want us to love. We have to work for love and justice and peace at times when society prefers fear and injustice and violence. God’s people in every time and place have found that there are times when the law violates God’s justice and our faith requires us to disobey the law. And so Christians in the southern United States in the 1960s broke the laws that discriminated against black people. They were outlaws. That American Outlaws movie said sometimes the wrong side of the law is the right place to be, and that's true.

It’s not something we do lightly, it’s not something we do without a lot of prayer and questioning, but sometimes we must be outlaws too, whether pushing against the boundaries of society or going beyond them and breaking an unjust law. We won’t all agree on when God is calling us to be an outlaw. There are consequences for disobeying the law. And that’s scary.

But God is in this place and all places, even if we don’t know it. And we have God’s Spirit for guidance and strength, and we have Jesus, who knew what it was like to live on the run, and is different in one crucial way from all the outlaws of movies and books – he would rather die for us all than draw a gun on any one of us. Thanks be to God.

Fasting for Change

2011-07-13T21:55:00.000-04:00

This will be one of our activities this fall in the Ingleside and Newington United Churches. Fast for Change is an initiative of the Canadian Foodgrains Bank, supported by 15 churches and church agencies, to respond in a Christian way to global hunger. We are invited to fast and pray, fast and give, and fast and advocate.

Thinking About Methodists

2011-07-05T23:09:00.000-04:00

Our denomination, The United Church of Canada, was formed through a merger of the Methodist, Presbyterian and Congregationalist churches in Canada in 1925 (the Evangelical United Brethren came in later). We live near the living history museum at Upper Canada Village; many of the houses in the Village, moved there to escape the flooding of the St. Lawrence Seaway, were known to people in my congregations in their original locations.

Providence Chapel in the Village is meant to recreate the rough log Methodist chapels of the 19th century. I wonder about the faith and courage of those Methodist circuit riders, traveling through all weather conditions to lead worship in these simple buildings. And their simplicity reminds me that we don't need PowerPoint, photocopiers, and Twitter to worship.

A Heaping Helping of Our Hospitality: Sermon, June 26, 2011 (at Knox-St. Paul's United Church, Cornwall ON)

2011-06-26T08:42:00.000-04:00

Matthew 10:40-42

Giving all glory and honour to God.

I hadn’t thought of a title for the sermon or reflection time today when I sent in the slides for the worship service, but it’s called ‘A Heaping Helping of Our Hospitality.’ If that sounds familiar, it’s because it’s from The Beverly Hillbillies – you may remember the closing song, ‘you’re all invited back next week to this locality, to have a heaping helping of our hospitality.’

The Bible has a lot to say about hospitality, and welcoming, because it was written in a culture that placed a great value on hospitality, and a lot of honour came from how you welcomed visitors. In the book of Genesis, Abraham and Sarah receive a visit from three strangers. Abraham and Sarah don’t know that at first, but they offer their hospitality. And it turns out that the three strangers are divine visitors, for the Bible says that God appeared to Abraham in the visit. In the New Testament the Letter to the Hebrews says, do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for by doing so some have entertained angels without knowing it. Another word for ‘angel’ is ‘messenger’, so this could say that some have welcomed God’s messengers without recognizing them.

Jesus is talking about this hospitality in our reading from the Good News According to Matthew. This is part of a talk as he sends out his followers and instructs them on where to go and what to do. And he tells them, his followers who are going out as his messengers, those who welcome you are also welcoming me, and those who welcome me are welcoming the one who sent me.

So let’s think about that: When we welcome someone, a stranger, a messenger, we are also welcoming Jesus, and when we welcome Jesus we are welcoming God. This reminds me of an old Gaelic poem, which goes:
I saw a stranger yesterday;
I put food in the eating place,
Drink in the drinking place,
Music in the listening place,
And, in the sacred name of the Trinity,
He blessed myself and my house,
My cattle and my dear ones.
And the lark sang in her song,
Often, often, often,
Goes the Christ in the stranger’s guise,
Often, often, often,
Goes the Christ in the stranger’s guise.

There’s a story about hospitality, and it’s also a Celtic one, from the Iona Community in Scotland.

The guests were starting to arrive for the church’s big anniversary celebration, and the minister was standing at the door waiting to greet the new mayor. She wondered how she would recognize him.

When a chauffeur-driven car arrived at the specially cordoned-off area, she came forward and greeted the impressive-looking gentleman who emerged, and led him into the building. But after being introduced to one or two people, he tactfully informed her that he was not the new mayor! She apologized profusely, only grateful that she had not already ushered him to a VIP seat.

Meanwhile, however, she had missed the real mayor. He had passed her in the corridor, but how could she have known? Not only did he not have his chain of office around his neck, he looked so ordinary! Furthermore, he had walked to the church, and come in at the back door.

Jesus was speaking 20 centuries ago to his followers, but he is speaking to us today: in welcoming someone, we are welcoming Jesus, and in welcoming Jesus we are welcoming God. We have to believe that, just as Jesus sent his messengers out then, he is sending messengers to us now, so we can welcome him in them. The people we welcome may not look like how we think Jesus would look. Like the mayor in the story, they may be ordinary, they may come in the back way. They may be tall or short, old or young, well-dressed or casual, male or female, single or with a family, able-bodied or with a disability, white or black or Asian or aboriginal, speaking any language. They may have ideas about church that are different from ours. Often, often, often, goes the Christ in the stranger’s guise.

You know, I go to conferences on the missional church, the emergent church, the renewed church, and clergy say how much they wish their church was cooler, more hip, was in an old brick warehouse and a twenty-something congregation dressed casually with black-rimmed glasses and drinking fair trade cappuccinos and an awesome worship experience with praise and worship music performed by a band with guitars and a drum set. Rachel Held Evans, who is a blogger I follow pretty avidly, wrote about this longing for a ‘cool church.’

But there’s a story, which was in the news, about a church in North Carolina that promises that worship will be an explosive, phenomenal movement of God. That sounds like a pretty cool church. I don’t know if they have cappuccinos, but I do know that on Easter Sunday a family went to the service with their 12 year-old son, who has cerebral palsy, and when he tried to say ‘amen’ after the opening prayer a church volunteer abruptly escorted him and his mother out of the sanctuary. The church later said that their goal is to provide an environment free of distractions for their guests. The mother offered to start a ministry for special needs children, but the church staff say they offer worship, not ministries.

As Rachel points out, this cool congregation got so wrapped up in the performance part of worship that they forgot to actually be the church. They were looking for a phenomenal movement of God – and got so distracted that they failed to notice God at work - they failed to welcome God’s messenger – they failed to welcome Jesus, who was sitting there among them. In fact, they ushered him out. Jesus is a big distraction when you want a church free of distractions.

This church in North Carolina says it offers worship and not ministries. On Tuesday I was at a meeting of the executive of Montreal and Ottawa Conference of our United Church. There we talked about how, in the old days, 50 years ago, when the church had more power and influence, when attendance was higher, when you could assume that most people were Christians, we thought to a considerable extent of coming to church, being in the church, as us doing something for God. We came to worship and give God praise and honour. And that’s still important today, it’s how we express gratitude to God for all the blessings showered on us. But thinking about church has shifted quite a bit. Many people come now, come for the first time or return after a long time, not to do something for God, but to join what God is doing.

Here at Knox-St. Paul’s, brothers and sisters, and across the Seaway Valley, we are not about offering worship and not ministries. That cannot be us as the United Church. We worship and we do ministry – and in both we seek to join what God is doing. We are participants; we aren’t guests. And part of what God is doing is welcoming and accepting, showing wonderfully generous hospitality to all of God’s children. And if we try to do that, if we try to welcome as Jesus says we should, welcome extravagantly, welcome unconditionally, welcome radically and inclusively, welcome in big ways and little ways as Jesus says, if we set aside our judgments and our knee-jerk reactions and make people feel genuinely at home and delight in the new ideas brought by these folks, whether they are brand new or attend once in a while or have come back after years away from the church or have been here their whole lives – if we welcome like that, well, then I have bad news and good news.

The bad news is, we won’t have a cool church. And we won’t have a comfortable church. Everyone here won’t dress alike and like the same music and talk about the same things. Church will be messy. There will be chaos. There will be distractions. People will disagree on issues. When a diverse group of people come together, there will be preferences expressed for music I don’t listen to and TV shows I don’t watch and political parties I wouldn’t vote for and clothing I wouldn’t be caught dead wearing. But that’s what happens in God’s hospitality for everyone.

And the good news is, if we welcome as Jesus tells us to, if we live out hospitality that fosters this kind of untidy, unpredictable diversity, then we are indeed welcoming God’s messengers, we are welcoming Jesus. And Jesus will show up, unexpectedly, surprisingly.

You know, there will be a lot of disagreements in this congregation, and in this Presbytery, in the coming year. But we need to remember the words of the Letter to the Hebrews, in practicing hospitality some have been unaware that they are entertaining God’s messengers. When someone says something that we think is wrong, it may just be God’s message to us. Are we listening? Are we welcoming? Are we extending our hospitality to all of God’s children? For in doing so, we are receiving Jesus, and in receiving him, we are receiving God. And, sisters and brothers, all will be invited back next week to this locality, to have a heaping helping of our hospitality.

Love is All Around; or, God and Tim Hortons: Sermon, June 19, 2011

2011-06-18T22:45:00.000-04:00

This is my sermon for Trinity Sunday, June 19, 2011. I drew on 2006 and 2008 sermons for the Tim Hortons analogy.

Psalm 8; 2 Corinthians 13:11-13; Matthew 28:16-20

In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Many ministers try to avoid preaching today, Trinity Sunday. For whatever reason preachers seem to find it difficult to explain the idea of the Trinity, God being one God yet three persons. One minister online commented that the Trinity Sunday sermon is like delivering an academic paper rather than a message or a reflection.

There’s a famous quote from Winston Churchill, about the Soviet Union being ‘a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma.’ Many people think of God as Trinity as being like that; a riddle, a mystery, an enigma, a code we try to break but often can’t. Someone called the Trinity the Rubik’s Cube of theology.

Well, it is a mystery, how God can be one yet three, three yet one. We sang, God in three persons, blessed Trinity. The Trinity is the concept that there is indeed one God with three distinct yet equal persons: Father or Creator, Son or Saviour in Jesus Christ, and Holy Spirit. The Trinity is our way of summing up the richness and depth of our experience of God, and maybe this richness and this mystery can be best expressed as an image rather than a dry description. Preachers over the centuries have come up with different ones.

I wrote my thesis on Gregory of Nyssa, who lived in the fourth century when there was a great church council that settled the disputes among Christians over the Trinity. Gregory said that the persons of the Trinity are like three gold coins; the coins are many, but are one in sharing the same substance. The Celtic Church said that the Trinity is like one finger with its three joints. St. Patrick of Ireland used another image, holding up a shamrock and saying that just as the shamrock is one plant, so God is one; and just as the shamrock has three leaves, so God has three distinct and equal persons. And the shamrock became the symbol of Ireland. Water as ice and steam and liquid is another example of the Trinity, three with the same substance.

The Roman Catholic writer John Aurelio points out that we are each a trinity. I am a trinity. My father is in me. My nose, and much of the rest of my appearance come from his side. My mother is in me. Her height became mine. The way I blend all these together, like mixing cream and sugar and coffee together, are the unique me. I am three in one. This is just one way I am made, and each of us is made, in the image of the Trinitarian God.

Preaching on Trinity Sunday a few years ago, I used another example. The Trinity is like Tim Hortons coffee. What more Canadian idea could there be?

If you order a Tim Hortons double-double, in the cup there is coffee, cream, and sugar. Each is distinct. Each is equal, for if any one is absent the taste is completely different. Yet all are one, and cannot be separated from each other in the cup. They are in relationship. Three in One, and One in Three.

Coffee, cream, and sugar. Each is unique, yet each is present in every sip. Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Each is unique, yet each is present in everything God is. In Zen Buddhism there is a saying: seed and grain and flour are not three things, but three aspects of one thing. That’s the Trinity, too.

In a while we will say the creed that came out of that great church council in the fourth century, held at Nicea in Turkey, where the church stated that we believe in one God, the Father, the Almighty, maker of heaven and earth, of all that is, seen and unseen. That’s one person of the Trinity, the Father or Creator. And we believe in on Lord, Jesus Christ, the only Son of God. That’s another person of the Trinity, the Son, the Saviour, the Word. And we believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life. That’s another person of the Trinity, the Spirit, the Sustainer.

That was the fourth century. In 2006 the United Church of Canada produced A Song of Faith, which expresses the same belief in the Trinity, but in poetry, and we will be taking a closer look at this faith statement in an upcoming service. And the Song of Faith says that with the church through the ages, we speak of God as one and triune: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. We also speak of God as Creator, Redeemer, and Sustainer; God, Christ, and Spirit; Mother, Friend, and Comforter; Source of Life, Living Word, and Bond of Love; and in other ways that speak faithfully of the One on whom our hearts rely.

Now, this Tim Hortons example of the Trinity isn’t a perfect one, because in a double-double the three parts aren’t in equal proportions. There’s more coffee than there is cream and sugar. I don’t think I could drink equal parts coffee, cream, and sugar. But maybe that’s the way a lot of us see God – we tend to emphasize on person over the others. When we say ‘God’ we often mean the Creator, the Father – we’re not thinking of Christ or the Spirit. We’re seeing the three persons of the Trinity as distinct, but not equal. But Gregory of Nyssa said that it is impossible to think of one of the three members of the Trinity without thinking of the others; they are like a chain of three links, pulling each other along.

So that’s the Trinity, summed up in a few minutes when we could spend our entire lives exploring this mystery. The church has had great debates between Christians who believed that the three persons of the Trinity are equal, and those who believed that the Creator is superior to the Son. Yet what do these really matter? How can this enigma of the Trinity have any relevance for our daily lives and our spirituality, as we try our best to love God and each other, feed the hungry, and work for God’s realm of love and justice and peace?

Well, there’s a clue for us in the Song of Faith, which in its first lines acknowledges that dealing with the idea of the Trinity is a challenge. The Song of Faith says, God is holy mystery, beyond complete knowledge, above perfect description. Yet, in love, the one eternal God seeks relationship.

And that’s why, sisters and brothers, the Trinity is relevant to us as believers. As the Trinity is in relationship, and seeks relationship with us, so we seek relationship with each other. The Trinity is the model of relationship for us.

When we discuss the Trinity, God as Trinity seems static, unmoving, abstract. Even when we think about images of the Trinity like a shamrock or three coins or a Tim Hortons double double, these can’t capture all of the mystery of the Trinity, because they seem too static and unfeeling. For the Trinity is all about movement. The Trinity is all about relationship. The Trinity is all about love. God is love, Scripture tells us. The Father loves the Son with all that God is. The Son loves the Creator in exactly the same way. The Holy Spirit is the love that moves between the two of them. There are three persons of God, but they aren’t solo, they’re made one in a perpetual state of giving and receiving. Love is always moving, always flowing, among the three persons of God.

You know, as some of us buy gifts for Father’s Day, the Father gave Christ an infinite gift to express infinite love, the gift of the universe. Billions of galaxies. Uncounted numbers of stars and planets. All created by the Father in Christ and for Christ, for all things in heaven and on earth were created through him and for him.

And the Spirit is there at the creation, as we read at the beginning of the Bible, moving over the waters. The Spirit is there, bringing Jesus into the world so that he can show us how much God loves us. And it is the power of the Spirit that raises him from the dead. All this shows that the Trinity is not an abstraction. The Trinity is action. The Trinity is events – creation; incarnation; resurrection.

Creation is not a one-time thing but is ongoing. God has created and is creating. God is the source of everything that is in every moment of time - and all because of the love that moves constantly among the Maker and the Saviour and the Spirit.

It is in God that we live and move and have our being. God is the medium in which we exist, like the air, and as God in Trinity is love, it is like we are breathing in love. All creation exists in God’s love. All creation depends on God’s love. We know God’s love because we breathe it in.

But it can’t stop there. To breathe in air and hold onto it would kill us. We have to exhale. And so we must breathe out the love we breathe in. We can’t hold onto God’s love. We have to give it away.

We love because God first loved us. We love because we have no choice; love is all around us. We can’t stop breathing - and we can’t stop loving. That’s the Trinity. And that’s why the Trinity for us is not some irrelevant and abstract doctrine. The Trinity shows us how to love like the three persons of God: continuously, without limit, bound to each other in love, always seeking relationship.

And so Jesus, who is God in human form, love made known, calls us to live in love, to serve in love, to act in love:
“Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to do everything that I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

Statements of Faith

2011-06-14T14:02:00.000-04:00

When I was growing up we said the Apostles' Creed every Sunday in worship. Then, in adult life, we said the United Church of Canada's A New Creed pretty regularly. At Ingleside and Newington we say A New Creed about once every two months on average - partially a consequence of having two services, and the Newington service MUST end on time so I can get to Ingleside! I suppose this says something about the importance of confessions of faith in modern spirituality.

But during June and July I plan to ask everyone to say a different statement of faith each week, including A New Creed and the tried-and-true Apostles' and Nicene Creeds, but also Eric Liddell's creed (which he wrote in a Japanese prison camp in China during the Second World War), our United Church of Canada's recent Song of Faith, and this statement of faith just written by my friend Connie Waters, the 'Mama Outlaw' of Outlaw Preachers. I hope this will allow us to reflect on what Christians have believed over the centuries, how these ancient words can have meaning for us today, and how we can retell the Jesus story in our own words. Maybe we'll be inspired to write our own statement!?

It's Pentecost!

2011-06-09T00:29:00.005-04:00

Can't improve on this video:

Unco11 fallout...or blowback...or whatever.

2011-06-01T22:51:00.000-04:00

A key takeaway for me from the Unco11 conference was the teaching (articulated by Brian Merritt and others) that we don't need to wait for permission from the institutional church - we just need to risk, and go for it. I've been trying to do that in small ways since May 18, and thinking about larger ways.

So, for instance, prior to Unco I got the big idea to work on a partnership between our United Church of Canada Presbytery and the United Church of Christ Association on the other side of the US border, involving a joint witness for peace during the upcoming War of 1812 Bicentennial. I've now set up a discussion of training for ministry and ordination standards between our Presbytery and the UCC Association. I'm sure our two denominations do talk at the national level, but I haven't heard much, and believe that there's much learning to be done as we both deal with putting national decisions into practice and cut denominational standards to fit our own cloth.

As another example, our Montreal and Ottawa Conference has no official Twitter presence, and last year at our annual meeting the table stewards told me not to tweet. This year I didn't wait for the Conference to get around to using Twitter - I went with my tablet and live tweeted the entire meeting, and produced a volume of tweets (and retweets) that enabled me to lobby the new president-elect (who was ordained with me in 2009) to have official tweeting next year.

And our Presbytery, of which I have the honour to be chair this year, is undertaking a major revisioning and restructuring initiative which breaks the traditional 'one minister = one pastoral charge' mould. We began this with little consultation with other levels of the denomination, and I plan to continue to do so - in fact, I am setting up consultations with other Presbyteries interested in our bottom-up process.

None of this is because I'm hostile towards, or suspicious of, The United Church of Canada I love dearly. I'm just an open source church kind of person. I'm thankful that our United Church of Canada is working within a planning framework that recognizes that much of the energy and innovation in the church comes from trying new things at the local level. However, I'm under no illusions that such thinking has support at all levels of our institution. Sometimes, if not most of the time, you have to follow the words of Barry Manilow: "You get what you get when you go for it."

Feverishly Thinking...

2011-05-24T00:00:00.002-04:00

...about how to use QR codes to proclaim the Good News through promoting church initiatives, serving members, and welcoming new folk. A QR code is a pixelated picture that, when seen by a mobile phone's camera, is translated by a QR app into a link, text, or phone number. My Twitter friend @mirgray suggests replacing printed announcements in the church bulletin with a QR code for those worshippers who can use their phones and the code to go right to an announcement page online. Or QR codes could be scattered around town as part of a scavenger hunt - perhaps a youth activity, or a 'seeker' initiative that would bring people to a welcoming service.

This QR code promotes a national survey in which my pastoral charge is participating. Just an idea.

Clear

2011-05-23T22:09:00.001-04:00

Kardinal Offishall has a song, Clear: People on the left, clear; people on the right, clear. I was thinking about clarity today, trying to follow the Church of Scotland's General Assembly on Twitter and in the British media. There were two resolutions dealing with lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgendered (LGBT) clergy in the same day: one to lift a moratorium on inducting LGBT clergy ordained before 2009 to their parishes; and another to consider lifting a ban on ordaining candidates who are in same-sex relationships. Both passed, but it was unclear to an observer, even one steeped in church polity, that the first was independent of the second, and the implications of the first in particular. This may have been clear to commissioners to the General Assembly, but it wasn't to me and others, and it was embarrassing to tweet the results of the first vote based on equally fuzzy reporting in the Guardian newspaper and have to be corrected by more knowledgeable folks.

My reflection today was that so often the resolutions presented to church courts, whether the local Session, Presbytery, Conference, or General Council (in our case in The United Church of Canada) are likely just as confusing. So often we've been about to take a vote and I can hear delegates asking each other urgently, "What are we voting on?" It's made me resolve as chair of my Presbytery in 2011-12 to ensure that resolutions are as clear as possible - because, after all, there are few bureaucracies with language as opaque as the Church.

People on the left, clear; people on the right, clear.

Living Stones: Sermon, May 22, 2011

2011-05-21T22:19:00.006-04:00

I relied quite a bit on the Lectionary commentary from the United Methodist Church General Board of Discipleship in writing this sermon!

1 Peter 2:2-10; John 14:1-14

Giving all glory and honour to God.

We have had an opportunity to talk about our identity, who we are as a congregation, with a facilitator this past week, and to think even more about it with the United Church identity survey being done online. The author of the First Letter of Peter is writing a sermon to newly baptized Christians, and this week is telling them about who they are, and who we are, and about their identity as a people. The way First Peter puts it is that we are like living stones, being built into a spiritual house.

I used to be a pretty avid rock collector as a boy. I had igneous rocks and metamorphic rocks and sedimentary rocks. I’ve lost a lot of that knowledge now, but when I was in theological college at Queen’s I would go to the geology museum and see rocks and crystals. I can see them here in Ingleside too, just near the bank where Marlene Waldroff’s father displayed some big rocks. And driving through New York State this week I went through some spectacular rock cuts in the Adirondack Mountains.

But these aren’t living rocks like the reading is talking about. This part about stones is actually a pun in the Greek the letter was written in originally. Jesus tells his friend and follower Simon, you are a rock, and on this rock I will build my church. He calls him Peter, from the Greek word for rock. It’s like nicknaming him Rocky. So this letter is like Rocky writing about living rocks.

The letter says, you are coming to God as a living stone. Even though this stone may have been rejected by humans, the way God sees it it is chosen and valuable. Whenever we feel like an outsider, whenever we’re not part of the in crowd, whenever it seems that we don’t belong, whenever we feel pushed aside and that we don’t count because of our beliefs or our appearance or our age or our gender or what town we’re from or anything else about us, this is what we must remember: from God’s perspective we are chosen, and we have value.

The ancient readers of this letter would recognize that the writer is referring to one of the Psalms, which says, the stone rejected by the builders has become the cornerstone. They saw this verse as a reference to Jesus, who was betrayed, and rejected, and put to death. Whenever we feel alienated and marginalized, God knows our hurt, our pain, for Jesus knew rejection. Yet he was raised from death to become the cornerstone of a new temple. This would be different from the Temple buildings Jesus and his friends visited in Jerusalem, constructed from physical stones. By the time this letter was written, that Temple was probably gone, because the Roman army crushed a Jewish revolt and destroyed the Temple. The huge complex that took decades to build was burned and its great stones pulled down. Only part of its stone wall survives in Jerusalem today, the Western Wall where Jews come to pray.

That Temple, the centre of religious life, disappeared. But Jesus is the cornerstone of a new, spiritual temple, one that isn’t built with human hands and earthly materials. The letter tells us, you yourselves are being built like living stones into a spiritual temple. We are like living stones no less than Jesus, for in his rising from death and our baptism, we have been made alive with him.

We are being built like living stones into a spiritual temple, which is the church – not the church in the sense of the bricks and mortar and plaster and glass around us, but the church as the community of believers, past, present and future. Jesus says, in my Father’s house there are many dwelling places, and it’s as if the church community of Newington and Ingleside is one room in this spiritual temple.

But we don’t build this spiritual structure. We don’t build the church as community. That’s hard for us to understand, because we, or at least Ontario Hydro, built this physical building with their hands and tools. But we don’t build the spiritual temple, the church: we are being built into it, incorporated into it. This is a really important part, a critical part, of what the author is trying to explain to us. We aren’t the builder. The builder is the Holy Spirit, God’s Spirit, who is at work always and everywhere. We join in the building, we participate in it, we are swept along and enlivened in and through it. But we don’t make it. God does.

God builds. And God calls. We are being built into this spiritual temple in which God’s Spirit lives, and we are given particular ways to fulfill our calling. Elsewhere in the Bible, the Apostle Paul tells the Corinthians about another way to describe the church, as the body of Christ, and all of us are members of the body, with different roles, just like feet and hands and eyes. Some of us, Paul says, are ordered ministers. Some teach. Some lead music. Some visit. Some cook. Some fix things. But no one has greater honour or wisdom than anyone else, Paul says. A modern way of putting it is the title of a book I started reading after the conference I went to, called Open Source Church. All of us contribute, all of us are called to leadership, and we all gain when all of us let the Spirit use us to feed ideas and energy into the church.

And this First Letter of Peter says that we are together a holy priesthood. That doesn’t mean we all have to wear shirts with clerical collars. But we are all priests. The writer is thinking of the priesthood in that physical Temple in Jerusalem in ancient times, as the priests sacrificed animals and birds to God. The members of the church, the living stones in this new spiritual temple, are a holy priesthood making spiritual sacrifices to God. Not physical sacrifices of meat and blood. But like those long-ago priests, we hold the world before God for God’s remaking. We hold ourselves and one another before God for God’s transformation. Just as the ancient priesthood had God’s authority, so do we – we have the authority of Jesus Christ, whom the Bible calls the chief high priest. And so we pray for the world, we pray for ourselves, we pray for one another, constantly interceding in prayer. A United Methodist Church author I was reading calls prayer “the unceasing heartbeat” of our participation as priests in God’s mission.

You are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, people who are God’s own possession. That’s what this letter says. And these words cause some of us to kind of jump back in horror. We know how language like ‘chosen race’ has been used to justify slavery and genocide. We know what nations who claim to be holy have done, as they believe they can do no wrong. We know what violence and bloodshed and oppression result from words like these.

But, of course, that’s not at all what the author is preaching. Nor is it what the early believers in Jesus who heard it would hear. For the listeners when this letter was read out, at the end of the first century or so, these Christians in the first church communities, were mostly people with almost no power. These were people who were baptized, not as babies, but only after studying long and hard and taking vows that included pledging never to kill anyone for any reason. These were people who knew what it meant not to be people, who knew what it meant to be on the outside. To be told that the living stones rejected by humans are chosen and valuable to God, that they are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people, that gave them identity, that gave them belonging, that was good news for them, these people who had been powerless and voiceless.

And so this vision of belonging to a people was not the way we would see it today. It didn’t draw on the imperial imagery of the empire in which these listeners lived - and we live - but on the Biblical images of the scattered tribal peoples of Israel, acting as a nation that was a light to the nations, a sign of God’s glory in their weakness. These hearers of the First Letter of Peter were an unlikely nation then, and now, a nation founded on communion with God in Jesus Christ and therefore with one another, a nation based on love of God and neighbour, a nation serving in the name of Jesus Christ and in the power of the Holy Spirit, a nation committed to constant lifting up of the world and humanity in prayer.

That was the nation, the people, of the early Christian church to which this letter was written. And it still is. As we process in our minds the meeting we just had, as we answer survey questions about our identity as a community of the United Church of Canada, a part of this spiritual temple, we can ask ourselves: If we are indeed like living stones, how is God building us into a temple of the Spirit? How are we carrying out our holy and royal priesthood? How can we live out the fullest possible vision of being a holy nation, God’s own people, in union with all the Christians who have gone before us in many generations? How are we speaking of God’s wonderful acts, God who called us into the light of the risen Christ? What emerges from the stories that we tell as living stones? These are questions for us as we sift through all that we have talked about in the last few days.

At the conference I was at, there was a session on science fiction and faith, and people talked about how the Christian story is reflected in Star Wars and Battlestar Galactica and other movies and TV shows and books and comics. I said that I was probably one of the few people there old enough to remember the first Star Trek TV series, and two things made it important for me: the stories, and the community it depicted. Star Trek was one of the few shows in the 1960s that had a black woman, and an Asian man, and a Russian, all working and living together. It modeled what a community should be like.

And so, sisters and brothers, as a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people, we try our best to lead Christ-like lives and model what a community - a community of love, a community of faith, a community of belonging, a community of welcome, a church - should be like, as we pray, as we care, as we act, as we tell the Christian story through our stories. And as our reading from the Good News According to John tells us, in believing in Jesus and following his way, we know and live truth, the very truth of God, and we will do the works that Jesus did, and even greater works for love and justice and peace. As the captain on Star Trek: The Next Generation used to say, make it so. Amen.

Unco11

2011-05-20T10:47:00.002-04:00

On Monday I drove - seven and a half hours in the rain - to Stony Point NY, on the Hudson River north of New York City, for Unco11, held at the Presbyterian Church (USA) conference centre there. I got to see lots of Adirondacks and Catskills scenery on the way there and back, including zipping into the US Military Academy at West Point (which was overcrowded during Graduation Week) and driving past Revolutionary War sites at Newburgh, Fort Montgomery, and Stony Point itself.

The Unco11 un-conference is intended to be an alternative to the usual church conference. The agenda is crowd-sourced: attendees write their suggested topics on a board, and then discussion leaders nominate themselves and are assigned discussion rooms. I went to sessions on bivocational ministry, moving the church forward, palliative care for dying congregations, science fiction/fantasy and faith, and requirements for ministry training and ordination - and learned lots. There were also amazing worship services. I suggested reading in different languages for the closing worship to show that we are not going out into a unilingual world; and we had the Gospel read in English, Korean, French, and Greek.

Folks were drawn from PC(USA) and a few from other American denominations like the United Methodists and Disciples of Christ - and two Canadian attendees, myself and an Anglican priest, to make Unco international for the first time. They tended to be younger, and tech-savvy - there were more iPad 2s at Unco than exist in all of the three United Counties here, I'm sure.

Unco for me: Just what I needed after an insanely busy April, with Holy Week, Easter, and my mother's death. Lots of learning. Lots of inspiration. Lots of real-life connections with people whom I had only seen in tiny pictures on Twitter. Lots of sharing. Lots of quiet, too, so I could decompress. And now back into the world, to put all that I've learned and digested into practice, knowing that I have a new network of support and prayer to draw on.

Mother's Day

2011-05-08T22:45:00.003-04:00

My mother died on April 23, so our Mother's Day included a visit to her grave. This is a portion of my prayers from the worship services for the Third Sunday of Easter - Mother's Day or Christian Family Sunday - as I try to pray for all kinds of mothers.

On this Mother’s Day, we pray to you, God, mother of our hearts, that you will hold us in your warm and encircling arms, soothing our troubled thoughts, kissing better our hurts, disciplining us with love filled with wisdom, forgiving us when we stumble and fall. We pray for mothers; and we pray particularly for all of us who are in sorrow over the deaths of our mothers, for children who do not know their mothers, for mothers who grieve for children, mothers separated from spouses and children through travel or work or broken relationships, mothers who are estranged from their children, mothers who gave up babies for adoption, adoptive mothers, foster mothers, women who made hard choices not to become mothers, and women who have not been able to bear children.

140 years ago Julia Ward Howe called for Mother’s Day to be a day of commemoration of all killed in war, and of counsel among women for peace. We pray today, God of peace, for our world, trapped in violence; we pray for our wrestling with issues of war and peace, when so often in our broken world it seems that we can only achieve a limited peace through making war; we pray for victims of war and terror, for all the lives lost and changed since, and even before, 2001; we pray for your kingdom to come, your realm where there is no more death, or pain, or grief, for the former things will have passed away and everything will be made new. And we pray for ourselves, that we will be peacemakers, making peace with every little act of peace in our families and neighbourhoods and community and country. God, make us instruments of your peace.

'The Sword of Murder is Not the Balance of Justice': Sermon, May 8, 2011

2011-05-07T16:19:00.004-04:00

Thanks to Martha Spong, of North Yarmouth Congregational Church, United Church of Christ, for her blog post that inspired this sermon.

Acts 2:14a, 36-41; Luke 24:13-35

Giving all glory and honour to God.

On this Mother’s Day, as I miss my mother, I remember that she had lots of mysterious folk wisdom. If your nose itched, it meant that you were going to kiss a fool. If you dropped a fork, a man was coming over. You could predict a baby’s gender by dangling a needle over the mother’s stomach. And a lot of the time this stuff came true. And both stories this morning have elements that are just as mysterious and unbelievable. How could the couple walking with a stranger from Jerusalem to Emmaus not recognize that he was Jesus? How could he just disappear after they recognized him as he blessed and broke the bread? How could 3000 people have their lives changed as they were baptized after Peter’s sermon?

It seems impossible. But it also seemed impossible when 3000 people had their lives changed, in New York and Washington and a field in Pennsylvania, on September 11, 2001. Their lives were taken away from them. And this week we have thought of that day, and those lives, and how our lives changed, too. On Sunday night I was using my computer, and on Twitter there was an announcement that President Obama would make an unscheduled national security announcement at 10:30. I just thought, uh oh. In movies this usually means that a meteor or comet is heading for the earth, or we have contacted aliens. But soon we knew that American commandos had killed Osama bin Laden.

And celebrations broke out in the United States. This is understandable, that people felt joy that a figure who had done such harm to Americans and so many others was dead, that they finally had a real victory in the war on terror, that this was part of healing the wounds of 9/11. And I can’t judge anyone who was celebrating. I only know what I believe our faith tells me as a follower of Jesus Christ about how I, and maybe we, can react to news like this.

Osama bin Laden was a criminal responsible for the mass murder of many innocent people, and exploiting and twisting the Islamic religion to promote hatred and division. As far as we know, he never showed any remorse for the harm he caused, and in fact bragged about it. Many Christians feel relief that he is no longer able to threaten us, and that is a legitimate reaction. But faced with the death of a person, I as a Christian cannot rejoice. That’s the way I see it. I can’t view the death of anyone, no matter how reprehensible their actions and beliefs, as an occasion for street parties like a win for a sports team.

Others have said that, hearing of bin Laden’s death, they had to rejoice in this news, and their faith justified them doing so. They could point to, among others, the song sung by the Hebrews in the book of Exodus when the Egyptian army was drowned in the sea, and the verses in Ecclesiastes, there is a time to mourn, and a time to dance, a time to love and a time to hate. And that is true. But it also says in the Old Testament, in Proverbs, ‘Do not rejoice when your enemies fall, and do not let your heart be glad when they stumble.’ The prophet Ezekiel quotes God as saying, ‘I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from their ways and live.’ And Jesus tells us, in words that we discussed here in February, ‘Love your enemies, and pray for those who persecute you.’

Let the wicked turn from their ways, and live. Osama bin Laden seemed bent on not turning from his ways. He was probably plotting the deaths of more people. So what do we do when the wicked will not turn away? Augustine, one of the great figures of the ancient church, said, yes, Jesus tells us to love our enemies, but there are times when love requires us to go to the aid of the innocent and to turn the wicked from their ways by using violence in the cause of justice. War could sometimes be a necessity to obtain peace, Augustine thought. Yet, he continued, even in war we as Christians must cherish the spirit of peacemakers. War is only a last resort in a just cause that tries to restore peace. It cannot be used for revenge and retribution on our enemies.

Although both the president and our prime minister say that justice has been done, for many people killing bin Laden is revenge. And as followers of Jesus we cannot bask in the satisfaction of vengeance. Now, refusing to embrace revenge does not mean that, even if we find it in our hearts to forgive bin Laden for his crimes, we forget his deeds, or his victims. But if we accept the unfortunate necessity of violence in our broken world, we must also recognize that all bloodshed, no matter how justified, only perpetuates the cycle of violence and counter-violence. This week, bin Laden may be dead, but there is still terrorism, there are still wars, and we know that his death will bring retaliation someday. The cycle continues.

Jesus shows us a better way. The couple who walk with him on the way to Emmaus tell him how disappointed they are, how Jesus had been a great prophet but was put to death. They had hoped he would be the one to redeem Israel. They had hoped he was the Christ, the Messiah, but the Messiah they expected, the warrior king who would expel the Roman occupiers from their land with arms and bloodshed. And so they don’t recognize Jesus, because he is not what they expect. And, so often, we don’t either, because we expect Jesus to follow us in the violent ways of the world we have made, rather than us following him in his way.

God refuses to oppose evil with evil. On the cross Jesus does not retaliate with violence against those who use violence; instead, he forgives them. And he rises from death to overcome evil and death. At Good Friday and Easter, Jesus conquers the hatred that inspires violence, and the revenge that inspires counter-violence, exposing the lie that makes this cycle of violence inevitable. He is not a warrior, but a lover, who gives himself in love rather than take life, who extends God’s healing love to all who suffer, and the forgiving love of God to all who use violence for their purposes – yes, even Osama bin Laden.

Jesus comes to bring the kingdom of God, whose story denies the story of the violent world where we live. We are trying as followers of Jesus to live in and to extend this realm of God, the realm of love and justice and peace, while living at the same time in a world of hatred and domination and brutality. We are citizens of heaven, yet with responsibilities and duties as citizens of Canada. And that is a struggle. That’s why there is no one Christian response to the death of Osama bin Laden, or the war in Afghanistan, or the war in Libya. There are many legitimate reactions as different believers interpret Scripture and their reason and experiences and tradition. The Apostle Paul tells the Philippians, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, and that is what each of us is trying to do as we are confronted with how we can respond in faith to issues of war and peace.

As I said, it is understandable that pent up rage and fear that has lasted nearly 10 years burst into celebration on Sunday. But I think that this could have been, and can still be, a somber time, a time for serious reflection, not a time to dance and chant slogans. A death like this should cause us to ponder the serious responsibilities each of us has before God to follow Jesus in his way of peace, and to commit ourselves to working for God’s realm of peace, and love, and justice. Osama bin Laden was about hatred, and division, and death. We cannot be.

Jesus says, all who draw the sword will die by the sword. He knew how much we love to get revenge, and how vengeance just spirals into an unending cycle of bloodshed. He knew that we are trapped in webs of violence that seem inescapable in this world. We cannot figure out ways for peoples to live together without war being a necessity to keep peace.

Yet there is hope. Look back through the story of the week before Easter, to Thursday night, when Jesus goes with his friends to the garden to pray. Peter and the others, knowing that Jesus is in danger, do what makes sense to them to protect him – they bring weapons. And when the authorities arrive to arrest Jesus, Peter draws his sword and strikes at one of them, and wounds him.

Peter, like us, is trapped in the violence of our world. He, like us, knows no other way to respond to threats. He, like us, can’t see how we can live in peace and security without threatening death and harm.

Yet Jesus tells Peter to put away his sword. And here Peter is in our reading today, preaching to the people of Jerusalem, ‘Repent every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ so that your sins may be forgiven. The promise is for you, for your children, for all who are far away, everyone whom God calls. Save yourselves from this corrupt generation.’ Peter who drew the sword in anger has been changed by the words and the resurrection of Jesus into Peter who preaches the good news of peace, Peter who brings people into the community of Jesus who died and rose again to show that love is stronger than hatred. Peter is doing what he can to extend God’s realm, for true peace does not come because an enemy has been killed, but because God’s realm is at hand.

One of the earliest calls to celebrate Mother’s Day was in 1870. Julia Ward Howe, who earlier had written the hymn Mine Eyes Have Seen the Glory, wrote her Mother’s Day Proclamation in reaction to the carnage of the American Civil War. She stated that women need to say firmly, our sons cannot be trained to injure the sons of the women of another country. And she continued, the sword of murder is not the balance of justice. Women must meet to commemorate the dead, and then solemnly decide how the human family can live in peace.

On Mother’s Day, a day originally intended to be dedicated to peace, the news is still dominated by violence fostering more violence. Bin Laden is dead but little else has changed. Yet we are called, as Peter was called, as Julia Ward Howe called to other mothers, to be peacemakers. We are called to grieve, for the thousands who were murdered on September 11 and the lives that were changed, for the thousands who have died in the wars that followed, for those who will die as these wars drag on for years to come. We are called to pray, for the world, for our leaders, for the common good, for God’s kingdom to come. And we are called to look at ourselves and the opportunities we have to make peace. We are called to let Jesus and his resurrection change us as Peter was changed, called to travel the way with Jesus like that couple on the way to Emmaus, walk with him on the way to peace, not just in the imperfect choices we must make in matters of war and national security, but especially to build peace right here in our families and our community. And maybe then we will reach out to a stranger, and in gestures of friendship we will recognize Jesus, and we will run back to the community with this good news and to embody the grace and love of Christ. May it be so.

How to Vote: Sermon, Palm Sunday, April 17, 2011

2011-04-17T13:55:00.002-04:00

Matthew 21:1-11

Giving all glory and honour to God.

My family on my father’s side has always been quite political. One of ancestors sat in the first New Brunswick Legislature in the 1780s. My grandmother’s family, the Hatfields, were all Liberals until my great-uncle Heber became a Conservative. That was youthful rebellion at the start of the 20th century, you defied your parents by being a Tory. The Liberal riding association would meet in the Hatfield general store, and Heber could hear everything through the stove pipe, and he would tell the Tories all the Liberal plans. He went on to be elected as a Member of Parliament, and his son Richard was Premier of New Brunswick. The family was still divided. In his first election Richard was the Conservative candidate and his brother-in-law was the Liberal. Richard’s sister Rheta never said whom she voted for in that election, her brother or her husband.

I’m thinking about this as last year on Palm Sunday I preached that 20 centuries ago there would in fact have been two parades. One stars Jesus, and today we have had our own version of this parade, people waving palm branches and laying their cloaks on the road and shouting Hosanna. The other parade stars the Roman governor, Pontius Pilate. For before the festivals he and his troops would march from the coast, to beef up the garrison in the fortress so that the pilgrims can be monitored and the power of the Roman empire displayed.

These two parades are such a contrast. The kingdom of God and the empire of this world. Jesus is indeed a king, but a completely different kind of king than anyone expects, the Son of God, a king who comes to bring a realm of love and peace and justice. Pilate represents the Roman emperor, who is also called the Son of God, and claims to rule with peace and justice, but with the world’s ways with armies and navies and legislation and taxes.

Today, long after and far away from Jerusalem in the year 30 or so, these two parades continue. And we participate in both at the same time. That’s right, we try to walk with Jesus on his way, where our duty is to love God and each other and seek justice and resist evil. And we live in civil society, in a country that has a military and taxes and laws just like the Roman Empire, and we are citizens here with duties and responsibilities. Just as in the time of Jesus, we have to live faithfully in empire.

We have a responsibility which didn’t exist in the time of Jesus, to elect our representatives in elections for the federal Parliament, the provincial Parliament, and the township council. We had municipal elections last year, in the fall we will vote provincially, and right now we’re in the middle of a federal election campaign. And we see lawn signs and media stories for the election in our riding, Stormont-Dundas-South Glengarry, and we’re deciding which candidate we will support on May 2nd. So today’s sermon is called How to Vote.

This doesn’t mean I’m going to say who to vote for. My family has an allergy to being told in church which party to elect, as my mother grew up in Quebec during the period when you were told in church that you must vote for the Union Nationale government of Premier Maurice Duplessis. This has horrified us ever since. And, as I said, my father’s family was split between two political loyalties, but he saw that the relatives who voted for one party were no better Christians, or no worse, than ones who voted for the other. I’m saying that a follower of Jesus can in good conscience support any party and any candidate in this election, and it will be a legitimate choice. There have been times and places where believers in Jesus could not in good faith vote for a certain party, but we are fortunate to live in Canada today where it’s not unchristian to vote a certain way.

So I don’t think, and the United Church of Canada doesn’t think, that the church should be a partisan cheerleader for a political party or candidate. As Canadian Christians we can vote for whomever we wish. But as people of faith, our beliefs impact on every aspect of our lives, including our political choices. Our faith does have something to say about voting. Our vote is an act of faith, for it is a witness to what we believe, a chance to make a difference for the common good. So this sermon is about how to vote – how to choose.

God calls us to be engaged in the world, to play a role in shaping society, to be witnesses to the good news of Jesus Christ all the time, including during elections. We have a right and a responsibility as citizens of Canada to participate in elections, and we have a responsibility as citizens of heaven to bring our values to the ballot box (with us as we go behind that cardboard screen and make our mark on the ballot paper). So here are some suggestions for how to vote.

The first thing is to vote. When my great uncle was elected in 1940, 70% of eligible Canadians voted. In 2008 it was only 59%, and among younger people it’s very low. And, with our duty to love and serve others, if we are going to vote, we need to check if our neighbours need help getting to the polls.

We have to educate ourselves about where the parties and candidates stand. Our values as followers of Jesus include pursuing the common good, overcoming poverty and injustice, and caring for the Earth, and these are benchmarks for us as we look over the party platforms. We have to evaluate the promises made during the campaign, asking about each promise if it is just, and inclusive of everyone. And we can ask questions informed by our faith as we engage in debate, at all candidates meetings and at our door and in letters and online, asking where the candidates stand on issues like criminal justice, democracy, peace, agriculture, debt and taxes, immigration, health care, poverty, justice for aboriginal peoples, the environment, and others. The United Church has an election kit that discusses these issues, and there is information in the bulletin.

And we can pray, for the party leaders, candidates, election workers, and for us as voters. The Book of Common Prayer has a prayer before an election, and as we prepare ourselves to bring our faith to how we vote, let’s pray it.

Almighty God, the fountain of all wisdom: Guide and direct, we humbly ask you, the minds of all of us who are called at this time to elect fit persons to serve in the House of Commons. Grant that in the exercise of our choice we may promote your glory, and the welfare of this country, And this we beg for the sake of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. Amen.

Quotations From the Chairman

2011-04-11T23:08:00.004-04:00

I have a little book I got at a garage sale, published in 1969, Quotations from Chairman Jesus. Its title was meant to be a play on the ubiquitous Red Book of Chairman Mao's quotations, always being brandished by Red Guards in photos from China during the Cultural Revolution. We're a lot less sentimental about the Cultural Revolution and its human toll than people were 40 years ago.

The book itself is a collection of quotes by and about Jesus from the New Testament and some other early church writings, but I have always been moved by the poetic foreword by Daniel Berrigan, whose name was prominent in Christian circles during the 1960s. Here is the first part of his poem, written for a different time of cultural unrest and war in Vietnam (and language that wasn't inclusive), but speaking with fresh words to our time of war in Libya and Afghanistan:

The gospel of Jesus is spoken in a world
intoxicated with death
mesmerized by death
convinced of the necessary rule of death
skilfully conniving with death
technologizing death
acceding to the omnipresence of death

And Jesus says No
to this omnivorous power
So his word makes the slight
all but imperceptible difference
(which is finally the only difference).
A good man, himself powerless,
stands at the side of powerless men
and says to death No
for them for himself

Can any of you
place before you a single child, smiling
squirming in your arms; and say
The death of this child is a fact of modern war; I accede
to that death. I regret it of course
but what can one do? We have to destroy
in order to save; villages, women, children.
The system traps us all...

The system; horrible word! Can the system
trap the conscience of a free man? Traps are for
animals; freedom is for men. I cannot speak
for you but I will not wait upon Caesar
to instruct me in God's word. I am a man. I can read;

If a man will save his life, let him lose it.
I say to you, love your enemies, do good to those who hate you.
Whatever you do to the least of these my brothers,
you do to me.
Blessed are you who suffer persecution for justice's sake...

Jesus had nothing to say to "systems", except to deny
their power over him.
He said in effect, violence stops here (pointing to his body)
He said in effect, it is better to die for others
than to live (live?) in a trap.

Be concrete be immediate! Imagine the world!
If you embrace a child, can you consent
to the death of a child? each human face
leads you (follow!) to every human face.

I can only tell you what I believe. I believe

I cannot be saved by foreign policies
I cannot be saved by sexual revolutions
I cannot be saved by the gross national product
I cannot be saved by nuclear deterrents
I cannot be saved by aldermen, priests, artists,
plumbers, city planners, social engineers,
nor by the Vatican, nor by the World Buddhist Association,
nor by Hitler nor by Joan of Arc
nor by angels nor archangels nor by powers and dominations

I can be saved only by Jesus Christ.

Resurrection and Life: Sermon, April 10, 2011

2011-04-09T21:00:00.002-04:00

John 11:1-45

Giving all glory and honour to God.

Lazarus is dead. Our story today is about death. In our society we try not to think too much about death, even though death is our constant companion. We see hundreds of people die fake deaths in TV crime shows and mysteries, and real deaths in the news from Libya and the Ivory Coast and Japan. All of us have experienced in some way the death of a loved one or friend, and probably quite a few deaths. We may have planned for our own death, for all of us are walking around with an expiry date on us, a date we don’t know, but at some point many of us try to get ready through wills and estate planning and funeral pre-arrangement. But death isn’t a topic we like to talk about. It’s unpleasant. It makes us uncomfortable. It scares us.

But this story allows us to reflect on death which will come to us all, and how we react to death among us. Lazarus is a close friend of Jesus, the brother of Mary and Martha, and Jesus likes to stop in at his friends’ home and rest and be entertained. And Jesus gets word that Lazarus is sick. We can all relate to this, hearing that a friend is ill. And in this conversation his followers don’t understand what Jesus means. Jesus says, ‘Our friend Lazarus is sleeping, but I am going to wake him up.’ And they say, well, if he’s only sleeping, he will get well. Once again, the words of Jesus are taken too literally – at that time, sleep was a less harsh term for death, just as we avoid the word dead and say that someone has passed away or has been called home. But then Jesus is direct; he says, ‘Lazarus is dead.’ This sounds hard. Some of us prefer less direct ways of saying this, and avoid saying ‘dead,’ referring instead to someone passing. But sometimes we need to hear plainly. Your friend is dead. Your spouse is dead. The truth may be painful and catastrophic, but hearing it is the first step in healing.

So when Jesus and his group arrive, Lazarus has been dead and buried for four days. And Martha says to Jesus, ‘Lord, if you had been here, my brother wouldn’t have died. Even now I know that whatever you ask God, God will give you.’ Mary tells Jesus too, if you had been here Lazarus wouldn’t have died. What human, honest words. We try to detect the tone of voice behind these words, and the sisters seem angry. That is one of the stages we go through in our grief when a loved one has died. The sisters can’t keep back their feelings. But they can’t escape from their faith in Jesus either, and I hear this very human mixture of anger and belief when I talk with people in sorrow. The sisters know that Jesus has a unique relationship with God. Martha confesses that Jesus is the Christ, the one promised by God.

Mary and Martha are just like us, for we say too, in hurt and in resentment, if only God had been here, if only God had healed my parent or spouse or sibling or child, if only God had prevented this happening, I would not be going through this pain.

Yet Jesus goes through pain himself, for next in the story it says, ‘When Jesus saw Mary crying and the people who had come with her crying also, he was deeply disturbed and troubled.’ Next is the answer to many trivia questions, what is the shortest sentence in the Bible? John 11:35 – ‘Jesus wept.’ It is indeed the shortest sentence in the Bible, and one of the most moving, and astonishing. Jesus, the Word of God made human, God’s child, knows weeping, knows deep grief, knows being moved by the sorrow and hurt of his friends. The word translated as ‘deeply disturbed’ is really more powerful. In Greek it could also be used to describe a horse snorting – it’s trying to convey that such strong emotions seize Jesus that he groans involuntarily.

Here Jesus, who shows us God, is indeed showing us what God is like. Jesus doesn’t show us a passionless and compassionless God who ignores our suffering. Jesus shows us God afflicted with grief as we are, God caring so much that God’s heart is racked by anguish at the agony of God’s people, God sharing our tears. Jesus wept. God weeps.

And if Jesus weeps, God weeps, we can weep too. So often we are told, stay strong, don’t give in to tears. Boys in particular are instructed, men don’t cry. And we express admiration for family and friends who don’t cry at the funeral home or the funeral service, saying, look how composed they are – when in our grief we should act as Jesus does, we should let out our tears and our anger and our upheaval rather than keep them bottled up inside.

Every death is tremendously upsetting to the family and friends of the deceased, even if it has been expected for a long time, whether it’s the only death that day or part of a natural disaster that kills thousands of people. So far this story seems to be about just another death, no matter how much sorrow Mary and Martha and Jesus experience. But now it takes a turn. Jesus is very emotional as he comes to the tomb, with its entrance covered by a large stone, and says, ‘Remove the stone.’ And Martha tells him, ‘The smell will be awful! He’s been dead four days.’ In the King James Bible, she says, ‘He stinketh.’ But resurrections happen where things are messy and smelly, not in clean, perfect surroundings. They do move the stone, Jesus prays and then shouts ‘Lazarus, come out!’ And the dead man does come out, still wrapped in the burial cloths used in those days, and Jesus says, ‘Untie him and let him go.’

Well, that’s amazing. Jesus raises Lazarus from death, after four days. Scholars argue about how much of this story is historical and how much is mythical. No one knows if things took place in the way this story is written. But it doesn’t really matter whether or not Jesus literally raised a dead man to life on a certain date in history. For John, writing this story, Lazarus being restored to physical life isn’t what matters most. What does matter, what matters a lot, is what the story tells us, that God in Jesus loves so much that tears flow and emotions become overwhelming. And it matters the most what Jesus tells Martha: ‘I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me will live, even though they die.’ That is the whole point of this story.

We often hear these words at funerals. This has been called the greatest of the ‘I am’ statements Jesus makes in John’s Gospel, perhaps the greatest saying in the whole Bible. I am the resurrection and the life. We have probably heard these words many times, but we can only grasp at their meaning. For when Jesus refers in John’s Gospel to life, or eternal life, or living forever, he doesn’t necessarily mean what we hear.

Jesus means life in this life. Resurrection and life for him mean resurrection right now, not from physical death, but from living as if we are dead, dead to sin, lost to all that is worth calling life. We may live selfishly, as if we are dead to the needs of others. We may live with insensitivity, as if we are dead to the feelings of others. We may live with hopelessness, spiritually dead. And Jesus calls us from these deaths within life, unbinds us from selfishness and insensitivity and greed and despair, and sets us free to live true lives here and now. As he said, I have come that they may have life, and more abundant life.

And that is good news. Jesus calls to us as he called to Lazarus, and frees us from spiritual death in the lives we live now. But is that all, wonderful as that is? Does this story have anything for us as we contemplate physical death? Yes, it does, and Martha realizes this as she talks about the resurrection at the last day. Jesus is the resurrection and the life in this world, and the next. In him we are certain that death is not the end. William Barclay writes in his commentary on John, in Jesus we know that we are on the way, not to the sunset, but to the sunrise, that death is a gate into a new kind of life.

When we trust in Jesus, when we accept his gift of new life, we enter into a new relationship with God, and into a new life in which life has a new beauty, a new strength, and is free from the fear and futility of life without faith in God. This life in Christ is so rich and beautiful that it cannot end in death. When we believe that God is as Jesus shows God to be, infinitely loving and forgiving and accepting, then we need not fear death, for death at the end of our lives here means going into the eternal joy of God’s loving presence. The Apostle Paul tells the Thessalonians, don’t grieve in the same way as others who have no hope, for since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, so we also believe that God will raise those who have died. And Paul says, we are more than conquerors through him who loved us, for I am convinced that neither death nor life, nor things nor things to come, can separate us from the love of God that is ours in Christ Jesus our Lord. Where, O death is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting? Death may still be disturbing to us, may still frighten us no matter how much we trust God, but we have the hope that in death we do not perish, for Jesus has defeated death and has taken away its sting. He is the resurrection and the life.

And that is what we take away from this story. That is the truth behind the questions about what may have happened in history. There is another story, about a troop ship returning across the Pacific Ocean at the end of the Second World War. And an army chaplain led a Bible study on this story of Lazarus, and after they studied it an American Marine came to him and said, “Everything in that chapter is pointing at me.” He said that he had been living in hell, the hell of war and of trouble he had been in, so that he felt that his life was ruined. He felt dead. But he told the chaplain, “After reading this I have come alive again. I know that this resurrection Jesus is talking about is real here and now, for he has raised me from death to life.” In his sin and guilt that Marine came to know Jesus as the resurrection and the life, true and abundant life in the present, and true and abundant life that death cannot bring to an end. He knew, and so can we. Thanks be to God who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.

Acts of God: Sermon, April 3, 2011

2011-04-03T23:19:00.002-04:00

I was greatly inspired by Brian McLaren's response to John Piper on theodicy in the wake of the Japanese earthquake and tsunami. Brian's article struck a chord with me, that is certainly reflected in this sermon.

Psalm 23; Ephesians 5:8-14; John 9:1-41

Giving all glory and honour to God.

Jesus heals a man who was born blind. Our reading is referred to in the hymn Amazing Grace, which quotes the blind man in the story, “I was blind but now I see.” This could also be the story Hank Williams mentions in his song I Saw the Light: “Just like the blind man who God gave back his sight, praise the Lord, I saw the light.”

And the followers of Jesus ask him, “Who sinned so that this man was born blind, him or his parents?” At that time people believed that illness was the result of sin; if you were blind or deaf or had a physical deformity, it wasn’t because of bacteria or genetics or some environmental cause, but was a punishment for something you had done wrong or your parents had done wrong. And Jesus breaks this link between sin and sickness; he says that neither this man nor his parents sinned to cause his blindness, and heals him.

In the story the Pharisees keep saying that the man was blind because of his sin. Even the followers of Jesus ask who sinned to make the man blind, him or his parents. They are trying to figure out why bad things happen to people, and their answer is that the people must be bad. And we still struggle with this. We may not think that sin causes disease or disability. But we look around the world and see natural disasters, floods and earthquakes and tsunamis and volcanoes and hurricanes. In just the last year or so we have watched flooding in Pakistan, and quakes that have devastated Haiti, and New Zealand, and Japan, and places we hear less about in China and Burma, and we are still hearing about New Orleans and Hurricane Katrina, and the Indian Ocean tsunami. And we ask for answers, just as the Pharisees and followers of Jesus did, 20 centuries ago. It’s an age-old question: why do the innocent suffer? It’s easier to come up with answers in the case of war and poverty, where sin does play a role – but it’s the reverse of the attitudes on display in this story, for it isn’t the sin of the victims causing their suffering, but the collective sin of societies and empires that perpetuates violence and injustice.

But it’s different in the case of natural disasters, because they are, after all, natural. Society doesn’t cause the earth to shake or winds to blow or volcanoes to erupt, although humanity’s impact on the earth’s climate may play a role in hurricanes and flooding. But the earthquake and tsunami that devastated part of Japan and killed 10,000 people – that was completely natural, the result of two giant plates in the planet’s crust grinding together.

So did someone sin to cause this? Some Christians have said yes, the disaster in Japan was brought about by the country’s sins in the Japanese aggression that led to World War II in the Pacific, 70 years ago. Others have laid the blame on all of us, saying that God is punishing humanity as a whole for wandering from the right path. But many Christians, the majority according to opinion polls, do not believe this.

We call these natural disasters acts of God. If you read your home insurance policy, or travelers’ insurance if you’re going anywhere, it refers to acts of God.

So there is even bigger and more difficult question for us, if human sin doesn’t cause these catastrophes. Are these truly acts of God? Did God make the earth heave in Japan and a tidal wave wash over towns and people, killing thousands and leaving millions more suffering in their grief and homelessness and under threat of nuclear radiation? Well, some pretty respected Christians say yes. A prominent theologian named John Piper points out that in the Bible earthquakes are attributed to God, because God is Lord of heaven and earth. Nature does not have a will of its own. God controls everything. Nothing is random. So, somehow, God has a good and wise purpose for this tragedy, as God has hundreds of thousands of purposes, which remain hidden to us until they are finally revealed at the end of time.

So there’s an answer. God took thousands of lives, as one step toward achieving an unknown purpose in God’s plan for good. We have probably heard this before, about deaths and cancer and all kinds of events we don’t understand: It’s God’s will. It’s God’s plan. This is a simple answer, clear cut, and it solves all our problems about why there is suffering and where God is in tragedies.

I think this is trying to get at the truth, as God’s purposes are indeed unknown, but I’m not sure this is a complete, or satisfying, or helpful, answer. I’m not sure that the explanation of evil and suffering in the world is this simple. And I’m not sure that this does solve our problems, as what seems simple can just get more complicated as we ponder whether this makes God seem, well, less loving than heartless and uncaring. We may wonder if this answer is really spiritually blind, blind to who God is.

We know that the Bible says that God is love. We know that the Bible says that Jesus came to show us what God is like. So what do we see Jesus doing, in this story and the other stories we read? Another prominent Christian thinker, Brian McLaren, and I like his work a lot, says that the scandal of God becoming human in Jesus is how Jesus acts. Jesus doesn’t take control. He doesn’t micro manage. He doesn’t eliminate all suffering and evil, yet he doesn’t cause any additional suffering and evil either. He doesn’t give in to the temptation offered to him, to take power over all the nations of the world and become an earthly ruler.

Instead, look at what Jesus is doing at the beginning of today’s story. He’s walking along. He’s on his way from one place to another. Brian McLaren points out that that’s what Jesus does, goes quietly from town to town, confronting suffering and evil, urging people to turn away from their sins that inflict suffering and evil on others, and healing and liberating people from suffering and evil so they can see spiritually, people like the man born blind. Jesus doesn’t force this healing on anyone; he allows them in faith to accept it, and to become, as the letter to the Ephesians says, children of the light. And then, at the end of this season of Lent, we will hear again how God ultimately deals with suffering and evil, in Jesus on the cross: in pain and tears, taking all of the suffering of the world into the heart of God and healing it, no through vengeance, but through forgiveness and love. Martin Luther talked about how God is made known to us, not in glory, not in control, but in the suffering of Jesus on the cross. God’s power and God’s kingdom appear in weakness.

So, if we look at our universe with spiritual eyes, eyes of faith, maybe God is not a dictator. The realm of God, the kingdom of God, is not totalitarian. Instead, perhaps God allows the universe to evolve on its own. So possibly the way God rules is not through absolute control, but through absolute commitment to be with us whatever happens, working to bring healing from suffering, good from evil, hope from despair. This is how we see God appear to us in Jesus, the king who is born as a tiny, vulnerable baby, the king who washes his friends’ feet, the king whose power is not through conquering and violence but through suffering and dying, and rising again. God is not waving an almighty hand and sweeping away homes and lives; God is wrapping us in loving arms and holding us close. God is present with us in suffering, feeling our agony, crying with us, sharing our loss, bearing our hurt, moving in the Spirit to give us courage and to empower us to offer empathy and aid to victims of catastrophe, in huge disasters like Japan, and the personal disasters we experience of sickness and fire and death.

This may not be a complete answer. But, you know, the best answers to the problem of suffering and evil in the world work better in a classroom or from a church pulpit than in a hospital room, or beneath a pile of rubble from an earthquake. When we are in pain, or see pain in our world, an intellectual answer is of little comfort. We can’t always, or ever, understand what is happening when tragedies strike and lives and land are devastated. But we can know this – when we walk through the valley of the shadow of death, God is with us.

Hell's Bells: Sermon, March 20, 2011

2011-03-19T11:11:00.001-04:00

This is the draft of the Sunday, March 20 sermon at Newington and Trinity Ingleside United Churches - but as they say in the news business, check against delivery! There's lots of time for editing, adding and subtracting before Sunday morning!

John 3:1-17

Giving all glory and honour to God.

“For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him won’t perish but will have eternal life.” This is the famous verse, John 3:16, and sometimes when you’re watching a football game or some other sporting event on TV someone will hold up a sign that says John 3:16. It’s been called everyone’s favourite text, the very essence of the Good News According to John.

And it comes in this discussion Jesus is having with Nicodemus, who is one of the Jewish leaders, a member of the chief religious court. And he comes to talk with Jesus, as he knows about the wonderful things Jesus is doing and saying, but he misunderstands what Jesus tells him. Jesus says you must be born again, meaning you must be changed so radically that it can only be described as being born all over again. But Nicodemus can’t understand this. He interprets the words of Jesus literally, and responds, “Isn’t that impossible? How can an adult reenter the womb and be born all over again?” Jesus says, “You’re a teacher of Israel and you don’t know these things?”

Well, this story takes place 20 centuries ago. But things haven’t changed a lot. We have lots of religious leaders today who misunderstand what Jesus is saying. Many take his words too literally. Nicodemus lives. This has been proven the last few weeks. There’s been some reporting in mainstream newspapers and TV on this, but it’s been a huge controversy in Christian, particularly evangelical, circles.

Rob Bell is the pastor at Mars Hill Church in Grand Rapids, Michigan. He’s a hipster guy with cool glasses, and he has a popular series of videos about faith that are used a lot in evangelical churches as teaching tools, and I’ve seen some of them and they’re very good. So just before his new book, called Love Wins, came out, Christians on the Internet suddenly went crazy. Everything Jesus talked about in what we just read in the Sermon on the Mount, everything Jesus said about not judging and not calling names – well, Christians did all that, judged Rob Bell and called him names. He was called a teacher of a false Gospel. He was called a heretic. Another well-known pastor said that Rob Bell was dead to him, said, “farewell, Rob Bell.” All of this without anyone actually reading his book. So this was not a great moment for followers of Jesus following Jesus. There wasn’t a lot of loving your neighbour.

The whole mess was about people suspecting that Rob Bell is a universalist and denies the existence of hell. Universalism is the belief that all humans will be saved through Jesus Christ. Its critics call universalism a heresy and a rejection of biblical Christianity. Well, now the book is out, and people have read it, and he says specifically that he is not a universalist, but he does raise questions about heaven and hell, so the controversy is continuing. I haven’t read his book, but these questions he poses have been asked in theology since at least the 18th century, and have probably been raised in United Church of Canada sermons and Bible studies. So this is an opportunity to look at what John is quoting Jesus as saying in this morning’s reading.

Now, it was news to me that universalism is a heresy, as I wrote my thesis on Gregory of Nyssa, who lived in the fourth century, at about the same time as Saint Patrick. Gregory is considered a saint too, in the Catholic and Orthodox churches, and he was a universalist. Gregory believed that the ultimate triumph of good would redeem everyone, even including the devil, who would be unable to resist God. So I don’t think being called a universalist is an insult.

It was also news to me that biblical Christianity requires believing that a select few Christians go to paradise while other sinners are punished in hell by burning for eternity. The Bible is actually murky about hell. The word ‘hell’ is absent from the Old Testament, and while it appears 16 times in the New Testament, it doesn’t necessarily mean what we mean by hell. Several times it’s a translation of a Greek word for the place of the dead, which didn’t distinguish between heaven and hell – it meant both. The other times hell is used to refer to a real, earthly place, Gehenna, the garbage dump outside Jerusalem. Jesus does use Gehenna as an image of punishment, but often in a context which isn’t to be taken literally. When Jesus says, “If your hand causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter life maimed than to go into Gehenna, or hell, with two hands, where the fire never goes out,” he’s using exaggerated language to make a point; he doesn’t literally mean that you should cut off your hand, so he may not be that literal about going into hell, or about fire either. And when Jesus mentions the garbage dump as hell, he’s usually addressing the religious people of his time. The idea that unbelievers will burn in hell forever is not explicit in the teachings of Jesus or the rest of the New Testament. The book of Revelation describes a lake of fire where anyone whose name is not written in the book of life is to be thrown, but this is not intended to be interpreted literally anymore than the beast with seven heads and ten horns or the other weird images that appear in Revelation.

There are statements in the Bible that can be taken as suggesting that salvation will be universal, that there will be no one in hell as we understand it. Jesus does say later in John’s Gospel, When I am lifted up from the earth, I will draw everyone to me. The Apostle Paul writes, in the second letter to the Corinthians, God was reconciling the world to himself through Christ, by not counting people’s sins against them.

But elsewhere in the Bible it suggests that there is a final judgment. Jesus talks about it, although again in stories that defy literal interpretation, and so does Paul, telling the Romans that we will all stand before God’s judgment seat. The letter to the Hebrews tells us that each person will die once, and after that will face judgment.

It’s hard to live with ambiguity. It’s a lot easier to say this is biblical Christianity, there is a clear standard for heaven and hell, and we know what it is, and this is who’s in and who’s out – and, oh, people who believe what we do, coincidentally, are the in group – for heaven, that is. But the Bible isn’t that certain.

So what do I believe? The first letter to Timothy says, God our Saviour wants all people to be saved, and I believe that is indeed what God wants. God is not out to condemn or punish us, but to love us. But because we have free will, we can make choices, and we can then make choices that separate us from God. Freedom has consequences. Some of us may choose to be so irreconcilable that we reject God forever and cut ourselves off from God’s grace. I don’t think God ever rejects us, but we can reject God. The United Church of Canada states in our Basis of Union that there will be a resurrection of the dead, and the finally impenitent shall go away into eternal punishment and the righteous into life eternal. I think that’s true. So I’m not a universalist, based on how I understand Scripture, and Church tradition, and my experience. But it would be great if my thesis subject Gregory of Nyssa was right, and everyone will be reconciled with God. And I wouldn’t underestimate the power of God’s desire that everyone be saved.

So I believe in hell, in the sense that I think we can choose to separate ourselves forever from God. Another person of faith could reach a different conclusion. I don’t think that not believing in hell means rejecting Jesus. And I don’t think that biblical Christianity requires belief in hell as a literal place of eternal fire. That’s just one biblical image of final separation from God. The writers of the Bible also speak of separation as being like falling into a bottomless pit. Maybe it’s just nothingness, non-existence. The biblical writers weren’t trying to depict a real place, but were warning us that separation from God is a choice we can make, and that choice has consequences. We can’t know what hell is like any more than we know what heaven is like. We can only guess. And our imaginations have produced very vivid images of hell in art and poetry and literature and movies, even video games, but they are all guesses. This separation from God might be fire, or nothingness, or it might be like when The Simpsons visit hell on TV, and it has German potato salad, and they’re out of hot dogs.

And we need less tossing around of labels like heretic whenever anyone asks questions about heaven, or hell, or anything else. I get the impression that a lot of Christians think that the people who go to hell are those who don’t agree with them about who goes to hell. Well, we shouldn’t make God in our image rather than the other way around, we shouldn’t presume to say that someone who doesn’t sign on to a certain set of propositions that just happen to be our beliefs will be separated from God for eternity, and we shouldn’t put limits on God’s grace. We can be as stingy about grace as God is generous. Instead, we should trust in God’s love and justice, and avoid speculating about things that God has not revealed to us.

From the amount of time and energy this debate has consumed among Christians the last while, you would think that much of the Bible and the teaching of Jesus must be about hell and punishment. And that’s not the case. Jesus talks about the poor 25 times in the Gospels. That’s twice the number of times he mentions hell. Yet it isn’t considered a heresy to refuse to support anti-poverty measures.

In fact, the idea of hell is a pretty minor part of biblical Christianity. And Jesus would probably say to all the debaters, why are you so concerned about hell in the afterlife, when you have hells on earth right here, right now? Because we can’t get a better image of what hell might look like than northeastern Japan, with buildings pulverized and ships swept right into the middle of towns by the tsunami, or the inside of a nuclear reactor with radiation rising to frightening levels. We have hells now, in Libyan cities under attack, in too many places where social and personal sin separates people from God and God’s vision of peace and justice and love. With the hells of poverty, disease, war, oppression, abuse, grief, fear, despair, addiction all around us, we should have no energy to worry about any other hell.

And so we come back to John 3:16. God so loved the world that we were given God’s only Son, so that everyone who believes in him won’t perish but will have eternal life. Everyone who believes - not everyone who believes and agrees with the following doctrinal statements. And the word ‘world’ is one Jesus uses elsewhere for what is opposed to God – he prays, ‘the world has hated my followers because they do not belong to the world, just as I do not belong to the world.’ The world hates God. The world hates Jesus. But God so loved the God-hating world that God gave the only Son of God, so that everyone who believes in him would live life abundantly now and forever. That’s how much God loves. That’s how broad and high and deep God’s grace is. So, rather than worry and argue about hell and who may go there, let’s rejoice that God loves this world so much, let’s share this wonderful good news, let’s try to love the world with even a little of the love God has, let’s try to bring that love to our neighbours here and around this planet, let’s make this world less of a hell for so many people trapped in hells on earth. That is biblical Christianity. We may not know for sure about hell, but we do know that this is true: God loves us, and calls us to love others. Amen.

Stewards of God's Mysteries: February 27, 2011 Sermon

2011-02-27T08:45:00.001-05:00

Scripture readings: Isaiah 49:8-16a
1 Corinthians 4:1-5
Matthew 6:24-34

This sermon begins a stewardship preaching series at the end of Epiphany and during Lent, as part of a stewardship project that began with a workshop given by the United Church of Canada's Montreal & Ottawa Conference stewardship consultant for the Ingleside and Newington pastoral charge. The sermon was intended to introduce the congregations to the concept of being a steward, using the Revised Common Lectionary readings for that Sunday.

The Apostle Paul is writing to the church at Corinth, telling them to think of their leaders in the church as servants of Christ and stewards of God’s mysteries, and reminding them that stewards must be considered trustworthy (1 Corinthians 4:1-2). In the time of Jesus and Paul, well-off families had large houses and estates, and the steward was the manager. In fact, that’s how some contemporary Bibles, like the Common English Bible, translate this word: manager. The steward looked after the accounting, supplies and upkeep for the whole household. The word for steward in Paul’s original Greek carried with it emphasis on great responsibility and accountability. For one important aspect of being a steward was that in that position he reported only to one person, the head of the household. He didn’t answer to the other servants, the other members of the family, or anyone else, even though his decisions would affect them all. No one other than the head of the household could praise or criticize his work.

In the same way, Paul is saying, since he and the other leaders of the Corinthian church are stewards of God’s mysteries, they, too, only report to the head of the household. Of course that means God. Only God can judge the leaders, and determine who had done well. This continues what Paul has been saying in this letter to the Corinthians, about the church there being divided into factions, each arguing that they belong to a leader, whether Paul or Apollos or Peter. Here Paul is saying again that all the Corinthians’ bickering over which one leader is the right authority, and taking sides about which leader is greatest, is completely misguided. For all the leaders are stewards, and so, as in households, stewards answer only to God. It is up to God to assess their ministry.

In many United Church congregations we have a Committee of Stewards, who do a great job looking after finances, property maintenance, and insurance: all the things needed to keep the building up and heated and lit and the bills paid. If we use the word ‘steward’ much in our church, we’re usually referring to them. But Paul is using it to refer to all the leaders of the church in Corinth, and it actually can become even broader than that, if we look at what Jesus is saying as we read his Sermon on the Mount.

Jesus says, No one can serve two masters; for a slave will either hate the one and love the other, or be devoted to the one and despise the other (Matthew 6:24). Or, to put it another way, no one can be a steward for two heads of households. You couldn’t be a steward in two houses at the same time. Stewards were in exclusive service.

Jesus goes on to say, you can’t serve God and wealth. The King James Bible expresses this as, you cannot serve God and Mammon. Mammon is an old Hebrew word for material possessions. Originally it wasn’t a bad word at all, but over time it came to mean that in which you put your trust. It came to be regarded as an idol, something that people worship and to which they feel allegiance. When we trust in material things and rely on wealth for security, then possessions indeed become idols. They become like God.

So this makes us think about what place our possessions have in our lives. I have been using the Daily Study Bible commentaries by William Barclay, which he wrote in the 1950s and are particularly good on the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew. Barclay writes that at the basis of what Jesus taught about possessions are three great principles. I would add, these are different than and counter to the way our society and systems think about wealth.

First, all things belong to God. This is crystal clear through the whole Bible. When Jesus tells stories, he often depicts God as the master of these big estates, and back then the owner had complete authority. We may be able to rearrange and alter things, but we can’t create anything on this planet or in this universe. Only God can do that, and so ultimate ownership of everything belongs to God. No matter how hard we work, we can’t point to anything and say, this is really mine. We can only say, this belongs to God, and God has given us the use of it as God would want it to be used. So we are all stewards. We manage. And we answer to God for the way we manage the creation God allows us to use.

Second, people are always more important than things. If wealth is accumulated by treating people as things, then these riches are wrong. Jesus says, what does it profit someone if they gain the world but lose their soul (Matthew 16:26)? What puts money in our bank account and makes us prosperous may be at the expense of others. Barclay uses the example of making money during the Industrial Revolution in England by putting children to work in mines and factories. If he were here today, he might point to the chocolate we eat, made from cocoa which is often harvested by child labour. And today we are often treated solely as consumers, as the sum of our purchases.

Third, wealth is always secondary. We often think that the Bible says that money is the root of all evil; but Scripture in fact states that it is the love of money that is the root of all evil (1 Timothy 6:10). This is what John Wesley, the founder of Methodism, preached: material things can be used to help your family and to benefit your neighbours and community, and that is good. But possessions can also be sought simply to heap luxury on top of luxury. Wealth can become the thing we live for and live by, and that is bad. Riches can take over the place in life that only God should occupy. Then wealth does become Mammon, an idol that replaces God.

For Barclay one more point comes out of these principles from what Jesus says about wealth: The possession of money and material things is not a sin, but it is a great responsibility. Just as the stewards of Jesus and Paul’s time had great responsibility over household finances and property, and the Committee of Stewards in United Churches today has responsibility over finances and property, we have great responsibility as stewards of all the gifts God has given us. I was amazed at how much stuff we had when we moved to Ingleside! If we own so much, then this is not a matter of congratulating ourselves: it is a matter for prayer, that we will use our possessions as God wants us to.

For we may not use our possessions at all. We may be so miserly that we may delight simply in getting, and not using. All of our stuff may actually be quite useless. All of our money may just sit there, doing no one any good.

Or we may use our wealth selfishly, piling up thing upon thing just for the sake of having things, and owning the latest and greatest of everything. We may think of possessions simply and solely in terms of what they can do for us.

We may also use our riches maliciously. The news is always full of stories of how wealth and the power it brings can corrupt. Displaying money can be a tool to dazzle others and persuade them to part with their money. There have been lots of financial advisers lately who have made enough to recruit clients who would then lose all of their savings.

Or we may use our riches foolishly, or more accurately, accumulate what seems to be wealth in foolish ways, like borrowing so much and spending so freely that we are so deep in debt that we can’t get out again.

But we may also act as good and responsible stewards, using our possessions for the happiness of others. After all, we don’t really own anything – it is all God’s, and is to be used for God’s purposes. After we provide for ourselves and our families, as stewards we are to manage our finances, property, and goods so that they can be of benefit to our neighbours, and above all our neighbours who are in need.

When my Dad was a boy in New Brunswick during the Depression, he and his brother would only get a few Christmas presents - usually a book, a barley toy, and something my great uncle made in his workshop. But Christmas of 1934 Grampy Hayward hitched the horses up to the sleigh, and they drove up the frozen St. John River to one of the neighbouring houses. The Haywards had little, and lived in the parsonage of the Advent Christian Church as there was no minister there at the time. But the nearby family had even less, and lived in a shack made out of logs covered with tarpaper. And Grampy, Dad, and my uncle gave the children of that family some of their Christmas presents and a basket of food from the pantry, and those would be the only presents that family would get.

So it doesn’t matter how wealthy we are, for we can be just as bighearted with ten dollars as ten thousand dollars if ten is what we have. Remember how Jesus talks about a poor widow who could give only two pennies to the Temple offering, and how her gift was more blessed than the offerings of the rich men who had so much more to spare (Luke 21:1-4). What is important as stewards is for us to use what we have so that giving ranks above getting. For after all, if God is so wonderfully generous to us - if God indeed, as the prophet Isaiah says, never forgets us and inscribes us on the palms of God’s hands (Isaiah 49:15-16) - how can we not be generous to others? Jesus says, it is more blessed to give than to receive (Acts 20:35).

Now, my Dad was only six years old, so he may not have been particularly happy to have to give away his Christmas gifts. Later in life he and my uncle did think that Christmas did give them some sense of what Christmas, and giving, should be all about. But we can be pretty grudging in our giving, too. Paul addresses this when he writes to the Corinthians and reminds them that, if you sow a small number of seeds, you will reap a small crop, and if you sow a generous number of seeds, you will harvest a large crop. Everyone should give whatever they have decided in their heart, but not with hesitation or because of pressure. God loves a cheerful giver (2 Corinthians 9:6-7).

Paul goes on to tell the Corinthians that if they are made rich in every way, it is so that they can be generous in every way and their generosity can produce thanksgiving to God (2 Corinthians 9:11-13). That is stewardship, managing what God has given us in God’s gifts of the talents we have and the money and material things we own. We are stewards with great responsibility, the duty to give willingly and lovingly from all that we have for the work of the church to extend God’s realm. We are stewards with accountability, answering like the stewards of ancient times to the head of the household. We serve one master exclusively: our God who created all things and to whom all things belong, and who calls us to look after what we have with trustworthiness, compassion, and joy.

Blogging on the Wane?

2011-02-21T10:24:00.002-05:00

Well, my blog seems to be. This article in The New York Times finds that blogs are being eclipsed by social media like Twitter, Facebook and Tumblr. After all, a blog post requires a lot more time and thought than a 140-character tweet or a Facebook status update. During the current crisis across the Arab world, I'm spending a lot of time on Twitter to get updates from folks on site (although a lot of the updates are just rehashes of what Al Jazeera is broadcasting).

Church Words

2011-01-05T21:44:00.003-05:00

Do clergy ever listen to themselves? Seriously, I found the phrase "erection of the Ordinariate" in a Roman Catholic Church article for public consumption. How could the average person not find that...well, dirty?

Don't Be Afraid

2010-12-25T09:26:00.001-05:00

Christmas Eve sermon, Trinity United Church, Ingleside

Giving all glory and honour to God.

Tonight we have sung and read the Christmas story, the one we love from carols and Sunday school pageants and Christmas services and A Charlie Brown Christmas. We know all the parts of the story from hearing it and singing it, and we can put the story together from our carols: once in royal David’s city, Mary and Joseph arrive in O little town of Bethlehem, and Gentle Mary laid her child, away in a manger, no crib for his bed. While shepherds watched their flocks by night, angels from the realms of glory came upon the midnight clear, sweetly singing o’er the plains glory to the newborn king, and the shepherds come and adore him, Christ the Lord. Nowell, nowell, born is the king of Israel.

That is indeed the story. And there’s a lot here in this story, behind the words of the carols and the figures of our nativity sets. It’s like an onion, with lots of layers. Think of that tomorrow if you’re peeling an onion for Christmas dinner. Now I know you’re probably not going to be thinking of that, because on Christmas Day you’re more likely to be thinking of how you’re going to lose it if you hear Gramma Got Run Over by a Reindeer one more time, so we’ll explore this now. Not all the layers we could find, as we want to leave time for lots more singing, but maybe a couple.

Here’s one layer. Who gets told the news about the Christ being born? Not religious or political leaders or celebrities. Shepherds. We imagine shepherds to be the respectable folks in nice clean robes we see in pageants, but in the time of Jesus people looked down on shepherds as dirt poor, smelly outsiders who couldn’t keep up their religious obligations as they were away a lot, just not the right sort of people at all, at the bottom of the economic and social ladder, like homeless people today. Yet they are the first ones told of this good news for all people.

Here’s another layer. You know, a lot of us have heard the word bedlam, which means a place full of noise, frenzied activity, and confusion. But we don’t know where the word comes from. Well, 500 years ago in England there was a group of monks called the Order of the Star of Bethlehem, devoted to the care of those who were mentally ill. They established an institution called the Bethlehem Hospital, which eventually got shortened to Bedlam. So bedlam comes from Bethlehem. And we can imagine as the story takes place that there really was bedlam in Bethlehem at that first Christmas, the village packed with people for the census, no room in the crowded inns, tired, cranky travelers shouting, Mary and Joseph finding a place with the musty hay and noisy and smelly animals, nothing quite as tidy and antiseptic as our nativity scenes or the old paintings where no animals go to the bathroom and Mary is always shown as very calm, kneeling beside the manger. One female minister commented that this shows that men painted all these pictures, as there was no way she was kneeling after childbirth. And we may make the story very sentimental as we sing little Lord Jesus, no crying he makes, and sleep in heavenly peace, but the story must really be bedlam, the baby wailing as all babies do, animals crying out, mess and filth and darkness, a sore and tired mother, Joseph dealing with these shepherds who rush in, falling over each other, dirty and enthusiastic.

Bedlam in the Christmas story. And Bedlam in our Christmas, today and tomorrow, excitement and shouts of joy as relatives arrive and gifts are opened, music and TV blaring, exhaustion – does this bedlam sound like anyone’s house here? – and perhaps tears of disappointment as a brand new toy breaks, maybe anger as too many drinks cause family tensions to boil over, weeping as sorrow over the death of a loved one or a relationship comes to the surface. Bedlam in our Christmas, and bedlam in our lives, our busy, busy lives of crises and stress that leave us as sleepless and weary and grumpy as the travelers in the original Bethlehem bedlam, lives where we are overwhelmed by noise and cries for attention, lives of worry and anxiety and fear, fear about health and marriage and finances and jobs and crime, fear about an accident or diagnosis or a layoff changing everything in a moment, fear of being alone, fear for ourselves, fear for our loved ones, fear for our world. So many of us, I think all of us, are afraid, and often we don’t know what it is we’re afraid of.

The shepherds in the story were afraid, too. After all, they’re sitting in the dark, minding their own business, and suddenly an angel appears. Yet what is the first thing the angel says to them? Don’t be afraid. These words resound throughout the Christmas story. Just read Luke. The angel comes to Zechariah, the father of John the Baptist, and says, don’t be afraid. The angel comes to Mary to tell her that she will have a son named Jesus, and says, don’t be afraid. The angel comes to Joseph, who is engaged to Mary, and says, don’t be afraid. The angel comes to the shepherds on Christmas night, and says, don’t be afraid. All of these lives turned around unexpectedly, Zechariah, Mary, Joseph, the shepherds – and they are reassured, don’t be afraid. And so we are reassured when our lives change suddenly. Don’t be afraid.

The angel says, don’t be afraid, I bring you good news of great joy, for all people. And these words, don’t be afraid, are good news for us, people living in the darkness of bedlam and fear, for on us God’s light has shined. Good news for all – well, nearly all. For another layer in this story is that we think of it as the most unthreatening, status quo story imaginable. After all, it’s usually acted out by kids in bathrobes with tea towels on their heads. But it is really a subversive, radical story, so much so that in the 1980s in Guatemala the government banned public readings of part of the Christmas story because it was too dangerous, it could incite rebellion.

In the story the angel comes and says, Your Saviour is born today. He is Christ, the Lord. Well, 20 centuries ago only one person in Palestine, one person in the entire Roman empire, was called Saviour and Lord, even Prince of Peace – and it wasn’t a baby. It was the emperor, Augustus Caesar, considered to be divine, who had ordered the census in the story – the Bible doesn’t say if it was the short form or long form census, but the census is why Joseph and Mary were in Bethlehem, this one-horse town in a remote backwater of the empire. Born is the king of Israel are nice lyrics to The First Nowell for us, but when this story was written down these words were threatening to the power of the Emperor and the empire. These words frightened the powers that be – the Bible says about the Emperor’s puppet ruler in Palestine, King Herod was afraid, and all Jerusalem with him. These words threatened the authorities so much that as the story continued Joseph and Mary and Jesus had to flee for their lives and become refugees.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer was a Lutheran minister in Germany and one of the greatest theologians of the 20th century. He was executed by the Nazis for opposing the ideology of Hitler with the good news of Jesus Christ. And he wrote about this Christmas message, don’t be afraid, saying: “For the great and powerful of this world, there are only two places in which their courage fails them, of which they are afraid deep down in their souls, from which they shy away. These are the manger and the cross of Jesus Christ. No powerful person dares to approach the manger. For this is where thrones shake, the mighty fall, the prominent perish, because God is with the lowly.”

Sisters and brothers, Bethlehem was bedlam, and it seems that our Christmas is bedlam, our lives are bedlam, and our world is bedlam, just as the world into which Jesus was born was bedlam, a world dominated by empire and power then and now, a world of violence and hunger and poverty, a world with no solutions in sight, just in our world a bedlam of competing voices screaming out opinions on every issue from the census to whether you should say Merry Christmas or Happy Holidays.

And into bedlam comes God, in this mystery of God somehow born among humanity as a tiny, vulnerable baby. God is with us as God identifies completely with us, born as we were. And into our bedlam today God comes just as God came in the Christmas story of bedlam in Bethlehem, this revolutionary story of God coming in and with the lowly, the humble, the poor, the defenceless, the voiceless. That is the deep, eternal truth of this story of Christmas, that we are not alone, for Jesus is Emmanuel, God with us, God come to be with us in our vulnerability, our weakness, our helplessness, our fear. And that message of Christmas is not just for poor outsiders on a hillside 20 centuries ago; it’s for us: Don’t be afraid. God is with us. And that message of calm and comfort cuts through the bedlam of our Christmas, the bedlam of our lives, and brings peace, the real silent night, holy night.

Don’t be afraid. And so we are not to be afraid of what is happening to us and around us and in our world, and of what may happen in the future. We have hope, brothers and sisters, for Jesus came at Christmas and comes to us always and will come again - to save us, and to show us what our loving God is like, and to show us how to be fully human – unafraid, and loving, for the opposite of love isn’t hate, it’s fear. And when we are not afraid, we can act, act out this story that turns expectations upside down, we can work to make God’s vision of peace on earth and goodwill to all a reality in our world.

Don’t be afraid. That’s what God’s messengers say in the story. If we live our lives in hope and love, free of fear, we too will be God’s messengers, telling and showing the world that we are not afraid because we have been given the good news of Christmas, And so I say to you on this Christmas Eve, the old message, the true message, the amazing message, “Don’t be afraid. Look, I bring you good news to you, wonderful, joyous news for all people. Your Saviour is born today in David’s city. He is Christ, the Lord. This is a sign for you: You will find a newborn baby wrapped snugly and lying in a manger. Glory to God in heaven, and on earth, peace and goodwill to all.”

A Christmas Post: Santa and Christ

2010-12-23T20:58:00.002-05:00

Thoughtful piece by Patricia Paddey in today's National Post, The Nice Road to Santa and the Difficult Path to Christ. Here's an excerpt:

Think about it: today’s Santa is the perfect deity for our day; he’s a god-man who is eternal, omnipotent, omniscient and omnipresent, who judges and rewards good and bad behaviour. He is a vehicle of undeserved love, forgiveness and grace. Children are taught to adore him and to please him with sacrificial offerings of milk and cookies. He dwells far off in another realm but promises to return regularly to the benefit of those who believe in him. The fact that he’s also one of the great underpinnings of the world industrial economy doesn’t hurt his appeal.

But the story of Jesus? Well that’s a far different matter and one that could never be described in half-measures. The sweet infant sleeping on the hay in the Christmas crèche grows up to be the man who angers local religious authorities, is betrayed, abandoned and handed over for torture by disappointed friends, and dies a traitor’s cruel death. In the days and weeks after his death, hundreds of people are convinced of the reality of his resurrection – including his scared and scattered friends who ultimately hear him victoriously proclaim, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.”

KJV Turns 400!

2010-12-16T19:57:00.002-05:00

It's the 400th anniversary of the King James Bible in 2011. I used to hold out for calling it the Authorized Version, but have now given up. We'll have a special Bible Sunday sometime during the year to celebrate this translation and its immense impact on the English language and the Christian faith. After all, what would Christmas be without Linus reciting Luke's nativity story from the KJV in A Charlie Brown Christmas?

Common English Bible

2010-12-13T21:33:00.001-05:00

I've been using the Common English Bible for the New Testament readings on Sundays in Advent. It's a brand-new translation, and I like it - contemporary in feel but takes fewer liberties with the text than The Message (although I still like The Message too). Here's a lookup tool for any New Testament passage.

Reign of Christ

2010-11-20T00:01:00.003-05:00

Sermon for Reign of Christ Sunday, November 21, 2010 (this is the draft! lots of rewording and polishing still to do)

Colossians 1:11-20; Luke 23:33-43

There’s no denying that winter will soon be here: This week I put out 14 bags of leaves for the final collection of yard waste, had my snow tires put on, and watched semi-final and final games in university and CFL football. And the Official Board met and set dates for our congregational annual meetings in February, which doesn’t seem that far off now.

In the calendar of the church, we’re at the end of the year. That’s right, the last Sunday of the church year is November 21, which is called Reign of Christ Sunday. Some churches name it Christ the King. And so our readings this morning have been about Christ as ruler: the Colossians passage, which is probably an early Christian hymn, and Luke, the description of Jesus being put to death on the cross as the King of the Jews, a title given to him to make fun of him but which is truer than the Roman Empire could ever have known, for Jesus is indeed King of the Jews, the Christ, the Messiah sent to bring God’s reign not just to Israel or to the empire but to the whole world.

So today is kind of like the church’s New Year’s Eve. The church will begin a new year with the first Sunday in the season of Advent, November 28. But in our society there is no longer a season of Advent. For retailers and consumers, we’re already at Christmas; stores had Christmas decorations up on the day after Hallowe’en. And those decorations will disappear after Boxing Day, when the church is celebrating the real season of Christmas. The first Christmas special I have noticed in the TV listings actually aired last night. And some radio stations have already switched over to 24-hour Christmas music. Majic 100 starts tomorrow. A writer I was reading the other day commented that he was invited on a talk show to talk about the so-called war on Christmas; he said if there is a war, Christmas seems to be winning, as it’s now colonizing November. A Jesuit priest said that eventually Christmas will start around Labour Day. Now I’m not sure Jesuits are the ones to talk, as I was at United Church meetings in Montreal, and we rented a lovely Jesuit facility in Pierrefonds, and they were putting up Christmas wreaths – the week before Hallowe’en. I thought, just because Jesuits are the Society of Jesus, they don’t have to start celebrating his birthday two months early.

Now, I like that Christmas is the only time of the year you’re going to hear Jesus mentioned in a song playing at the mall, but I also know that this isn’t the true Christmas - Jesus is very much secondary in this version of Christmas, this essentially Christless Christmas, in which the birth of Jesus and its meaning are buried way, way down under the message of buy, buy, buy. If a war on Christmas exists, it’s being waged by retailers and advertisers.

As I think about Reign of Christ Sunday, with its imagery of Christ as ruler that we heard in our Scripture readings, I wonder who really is ruler where we are? Jesus Christ, or the empire of shopping? Jesus Christ, or our earthly empires, ruled by prime ministers and premiers and company presidents? We talked last week about the persecution the church faces in many countries today. Reign of Christ Sunday was placed in the church calendar in the 1920s as a response to that kind of persecution, which at that time came from governments in Mexico and Russia. Perhaps Reign of Christ Sunday has fresh meaning for us as followers of Christ today, as a response not just to governments but to the materialist consumer “Christmas” whose power will dominate all that we hear and see for the next month.

Now, if the connection isn’t obvious between our theme for Reign of Christ, and our spend like Santa and save like Scrooge shopping spree at Christmas, as Canadian Tire used to put it, or between Reign of Christ and what governments and companies do, we need to look back at when Reign of Christ Sunday was placed in the church calendar. This day wasn’t created to praise Christ’s majesty or to talk about how nice things will be when he rules forever and ever. The Pope who put this Sunday in the Roman Catholic church calendar, and from there it has come to us, said that the Feast of Christ the King will call to this world’s leaders. They are the thrones and powers and rulers and authorities the letter to the Colossians talks about in our reading this morning, which were created through Christ and for Christ, and are subject to him. But they have cast Christ not just out of Christmas, but out of public life, and despised, and neglected, and ignored him. Christ’s kingly dignity, Pope Pius XI wrote, demands that the state should take account of God’s commandments and Christian principles in making laws and administering justice.

This year ministers have been following a new initiative, called the Proper 29 Project because in the calendar Reign of Christ is the 29th, or proper, Sunday in Ordinary Time. The project began after thousands of pages of documents were released about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. You may have read about those in the paper, or about the debate in Canada over turning detainees in Afghanistan over to Afghan authorities for possible torture. Coalition forces have been responsible for the deaths of 66,000 Iraqi and Afghan civilians, and have ignored the torture of prisoners. The sponsors of Proper 29 wanted to speak out against this when preaching on Reign of Christ Sunday – but also did not want to point fingers at the military, for that’s too easy to do. All of us are morally responsible for the actions carried out in our name, and all of us are subject to the Reign of Christ.

I thought of this watching George W. Bush talking to Jay Leno on the Tonight Show, far too late on Thursday night. President Bush has a new book out, so he’s on all the talk shows. And he admits – well, he doesn’t admit, he puts it out there because he’s proud of it – that he personally approved torturing al-Qaeda prisoners. Even though waterboarding, which is the technique the CIA used, is considered torture under United Nations conventions which were signed into law in the United States, it’s torture under the terms the Allies used to prosecute Japanese officers after World War II, and it’s torture under any application of common sense. American law says that every act of torture is a criminal offence, and no public official may authorize anyone else to commit torture. There is no wiggle room here. Churches hold that torture is immoral and unjustified under any conditions. Yet President Bush shows no shame and says that he would do it again, and here he is, being applauded by the Tonight Show audience. He tells us that he is a man of faith, that Jesus is his personal Saviour, and I believe him. We are all people of faith, yet we are all sinners, and we are all under Christ’s reign.

Proper 29 organizers specifically did not want to blame the military for what has happened in Iraq and Afghanistan, as the soldiers and aircrew and sailors are ordinary people, many of them people of deep faith, making life-changing decisions in split seconds and following difficult orders. When the Director of the CIA asked President Bush whether to use torture to get information out of captured al-Qaeda leaders, he had to make a difficult decision too. I believe, and most churches believe, that his decision to torture was the wrong one. But all of us have to make decisions in our lives, and they need to be guided by Christ as the ruler of our lives.

When Reign of Christ or Christ the King Sunday was created, the Pope did not just talk about earthly rulers ignoring Christ’s reign. He went on to say that this day addresses not just governments but all Christians, for Christ must reign in our minds, all our minds, which should assent to his teachings; Christ must reign in our wills, which should obey the commandments of God; Christ must reign in our bodies, which should serve as instruments for God’s justice.

You may remember a few weeks ago, on Hallowe’en, Reformation Sunday, when I talked about Martin Luther, who contrasted the theology of glory with the theology of the cross. Well, Reign of Christ was not created to celebrate or promote a theology of glory, dressing Christ up like a king or emperor on earth and making him act like that – what the old Anglican catechism called the ‘vain pomp and glory of the world.’ Next year there will be a royal wedding, with lots of pomp and circumstance, and it will be great to watch, but that’s not how Christ reigns as king.

Christ as ruler does not follow the world’s idea of glory. Soren Kierkegaard, who lived in Denmark about 170 years ago and is one of my favourite theologians, had a little story about Christ the king to illustrate this.

Once upon a time a king fell in love with a humble maiden, but wished to avoid embarrassing or offending her. If he went to her in his kingly glory, with royal garments and a retinue of courtiers, he would overwhelm her. And if she should respond to his love, he could never be sure that she loved him or his majesty. He could disguise himself as a beggar and go to her; but then she would not really love him – he is really a king, but she would love a beggar. The reverse solution, elevating the girl instead of lowering the king, wouldn’t work either; this would imply that as a humble maid she was not good enough to be loved, when it was in fact in this state that the king loved her. The only possible answer was for the king to become a beggar in reality, not just to pretend to be one, and to win the maiden’s love as a beggar.

The king in the story is Jesus Christ – and the maiden he loves, the one he loves the way she is, - that’s us. Christ the King did not come to us in glory, but became a beggar, one of us, to win our love. He is not pretending to be humble like us, he really is like us, even though we heard from Colossians that he is the image of God and all things were created by and for him. The letter to the Philippians in the New Testament talks about this, that Christ was in the form of God, but goes on to say that Christ did not consider being equal with God something to exploit. He emptied himself, taking the form of a slave and becoming like humans, and in that human form he humbled himself, becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.

And our Luke reading is a description of this, how as king, as ruler, Jesus Christ does humble himself, turning all expectations of how a king should act on their head as he goes to death on a cross. Kings are supposed to be in charge, not obedient. Kings are supposed to be powerful, not humble. Kings are supposed to lead armies into battle, not be put to death alone as a criminal. Kings wear crowns and sit on thrones. But this is the theology of the cross, a theology of suffering, not the theology of glory. The only crown Jesus has is a crown of thorns. His throne is the rough wood of the cross, with two thieves on either side. Christ does not follow the ways of the world. He refuses to use violence when it is used against him. He forgives his persecutors. He is indeed King of the Jews, and the king of creation, but a different kind of king, a servant king, a king who will not take up the sword, a king who says he did not come to judge the world but to save it.

Brothers and sisters, it's as if our world is in darkness. We struggle to learn how to move beyond the violence embedded in our culture. We look with dismay at the war and poverty and environmental destruction that afflicts our world, at the way in which human life is made a commodity or even considered worthless. We try the solutions the rulers and authorities of this world tell us to adopt, embracing violence abroad and consumption at home, and find out that these solve nothing at all. We can’t afford either one.

So who can help us? Who can be found to lift us out of this sorrow and fear we have created for ourselves? We are not so lost that we don't realize that we need a saviour. But our saviour isn’t any of the ones we seize on as who or what can make us happy and fulfilled. We won’t be saved by a political party or leader, or a celebrity, or a corporation. Salvation won’t come from a political or economic or social empire. No, the Bible says, God so loved the world that we were given God’s only Son: Jesus Christ, the image of God, the head of the church, the one who created all rulers and authorities on earth, the king who turned away from glory to become a beggar to love and save us and who brought peace through the blood of his cross. And so he alone is sovereign, he alone deserves our loyalty, he alone must reign in our wills, our minds, our bodies. And when we say to him, Jesus, remember me, he says to us as he brings us into his royal dominion as God’s people, you shall be with me in paradise.

Yet More Online Nuttiness

2010-11-12T22:21:00.002-05:00

So I retweeted several articles (like this one on the anti-Semitic overtones in Glenn Beck's current obsession with George Soros, and am now on several Twitter lists like 'hate-mongers-claiming-2b-christian,' 'list-of-mentally-ill-people,' 'listofpeoplementallyill,' 'list-GLBT-hate-mongers-of-Glenn-Beck.' I'm sure that I'm in great company. George Soros is not immune to criticism, but Glenn Beck's depiction of him as the 'Puppet Master' pulling the strings of international finance resurrects a dangerous anti-Semitic image, and Beck spreads what seem to me to be outright lies about how Soros survived the Shoah. So, as a straight Christian, I'm proud to be listed with other Christians and with GLBT opponents of Beck's close encounter with anti-Semitism.

Updating the Blog...

2010-10-11T18:59:00.002-04:00

Thoroughly identifying with Queen's University Principal Daniel Woolf as he launches his own blog, and writes: "This will probably not be very frequent, but sometimes one needs more than 140 characters to say something." So, now that I spend three-quarters of my online time on Twitter rather than the blog or Facebook, I will likely be the same.

Thanksgiving Day! In-laws visiting for the holiday and their 63rd wedding anniversary. Have driven to the St. Lawrence Seaway locks at Iroquois to see the leaves, served Great Lakes Brewery's Pumpkin Ale and Hex from Magic Hat Brewery (Burlington VT), and about to tuck into the turkey and ham. Grateful for the harvest, the farmers who grew our food, and all the blessings God showers on us.

Polkaroo!

2010-10-08T15:07:00.003-04:00

I mentioned the Polkaroo on Twitter and received a tweet from the Polkaroo - my life is complete:) If you're unfamiliar with the Polkaroo, he is a children's TV character on Ontario's TVO network who looks somewhat like a large green giraffe and can only say his own name: Polkaroo! See http://polkaroo.com.

Must be a Protestant...

2010-09-28T17:17:00.002-04:00

So I'm in the local Foodland supermarket and run into the Roman Catholic priest, who is nicely dressed in a dark blue clerical shirt (I own the same one). I, on the other hand, am wearing a black MMA Elite T-shirt with a large cross, a camouflage hunting jacket, Levi's, and a International Ice Hockey Federation ball cap. Oh, and I haven't shaved, either (but, in my defence, neither do the actors on Hawaii Five-Oh). The parishioners he is chatting with must be silently comparing Catholic and Protestant clergy.

Stop Fox News North?

2010-09-01T20:08:00.002-04:00

I've been asked to sign, and know a number of United Church folk who have done so, the Avaaz petition to "stop Fox News North" - that is, Sun TV's proposed all news network. I'm not sure that branding the channel as "hate media" is actually getting us anywhere, and would seem to generate a bonanza of free publicity for Quebecor and its Sun minions (who own, among other things, all of the newspapers along the St. Lawrence River, and then complain about "liberal" dominance of the media).

Like Margaret Atwood, I have problems with the process of getting a Category 1 TV licence, but don't think we need to shut down Fox News-style speech.

"Ground Zero Mosque"

2010-08-05T10:09:00.004-04:00

I've been twittering constantly the last few days about the controversy over the proposal to build an Islamic cultural centre (termed the "Ground Zero mosque" as it will include a prayer space) two blocks from the World Trade Centre site. There's way too much material, pro and con, to summarize here - see my Twitter feed! - but let me examine a statement by Allen West, who is running for Congress in Florida, and opposes the cultural centre project:

The individuals who hijacked two airplanes and flew them into the World Trade Center towers shouted, “Allahu Akhbar”. The individuals who will attend the mosque would offer up like praise of “Allahu Akhbar”. The individuals who detonate suicide vests, behead school teachers and headmasters, throw acid on little girls trying to attend school, and fire rockets into Israel shout, “Allahu Akhbar”.

That's true. And the school teachers, headmasters, and schoolgirls, being Muslims, would also say, "Allahu Akbar" (God is great). It's part of the prayers Muslims say five times a day. It's like saying that the Crusaders, who massacred Muslim civilians, Jews, and even Orthodox Christians, said the Lord's Prayer, so it's somehow a bad thing for Christians to pray the same prayer.

Now a Chautauquan

2010-08-01T20:32:00.002-04:00

Back from a great week at the Chautauqua Institution in New York State. Chautauqua was founded in 1874 as a retreat for Methodist Sunday School teachers, and became the centre of the Chautauqua movement of lectures, performances and worship services - "art, religion, music, and knowledge" ("recreation" has now been added as Chautauqua is rife with opportunities for boating, sailing, swimming and biking). There are other "Chautauquas" still operating in the summer elsewhere in the US.

Clergy Renewal Week is organized by the Christian service organization The King's Daughters and Sons and brings ministers from across the US and Canada to Chautauqua. Our group had United Church of Canada, Anglican Church of Canada, United Methodist, Presbyterian Church of the USA, and United Church of Christ clergy. Gate passes were provided by the Chautauqua Institution's Department of Religion and accommodation is provided by the IOKDS in the two houses they own.

Chautauqua is a beautiful town of Victorian cottages, many of which have been in the same family for generations. Its winter population of 300 mushrooms to 10,000 people a day in the summer. It's certainly a bastion of liberal Protestantism, with the mainline American Protestant denominations maintaining houses in the village, although there are two Jewish congregations, and a Roman Catholic presence in facilities borrowed from Protestants. I attended worship services with the Episcopal priest and renowned preacher Rev. Dr. Barbara Brown Taylor preaching (and she signed two books for me!), lectures on the week's theme of photography - the inventor of the digital camera, Steve Sasson, photographers Steve McCurry and Ed Kashi, former US poet laureate Billy Collins, and George Eastman House director Tony Bannon were among the speakers - and symphony, ballet and opera performances. It was indeed a renewal week.

"Church" in an app

2010-07-23T22:24:00.003-04:00

Fascinating Huffington Post article by Paul Lamb on the potential for religious communities (including creating new kinds of communities) of location-based, social networking apps for mobile phones. He concludes:

There is no question that the mobile experience will redefine how and when people engage with their spiritual and religious communities. Just as we have Web-only worshippers, we may soon be seeing mobile-only congregations which organize and disband on the fly. Nobody knows exactly where things will end up, but next-generation mobile apps could offer a powerful and extended community experience unlike anything that exists today outside of institutional walls and on the Internet.

In a world where it is getting harder and harder to bring people to church, mobile apps might lead the way in bringing church to the people.

I'll be thinking about this one for a while.

Farewell to Prison Farms

2010-07-21T23:20:00.003-04:00

The fight to save the prison farms around Kingston, Ontario, was lost in a recent court decision that gave Correctional Services Canada the go-ahead to close the farms and auction off the livestock. I've worked with ex-offenders and with food banks, and I support prison farms: the work gives prisoners confidence and skills (the government says that farm skills aren't useful in the "real world" but I wouldn't say that to the farmers around here, or to the government's rural base!), the output of the farms feeds prisoners and goes to local food banks, and closing the farms will not actually save the government money as there will have to be new skills training programs and replacement purchases for the farm produce. It's rumoured that the hidden agenda at work is using the farmland for expansion of the prisons. Father Raymond de Souza has an excellent piece in The National Post on the issue.

"Jerusalem"

2010-07-16T16:32:00.003-04:00

Although I'm in what at one time would be called a "Dissenting" denomination, I always love William Blake's lyrics to Jerusalem, listed by its first line in hymn books as And Did Those Feet in Ancient Time. Chariots of fire, arrows of desire, the Holy Lamb of God walking on England's pleasant pastures green. See the blog Ghost of a Flea on controversies over singing the hymn (which was in our 1971 joint Anglican-United Church of Canada red hymnal, and whose tune is in our present hymn book as O Day of Peace) in the modern Church of England.

Tea Party Jesus

2010-07-07T23:26:00.002-04:00

The Huffington Post has excerpts from Tea Party Jesus, putting quotes from key Tea Party and Republican figures into the mouth of Jesus. It makes a great point about how the language of people who call themselves Christians so often isn't, well, Christian. What would Jesus do?

Just a few lines on the G20 Summit

2010-06-28T17:38:00.001-04:00

The Muskoka G8 and Toronto G20 summits have been analyzed from here to back online, but here are just a few lines from John Doyle in today's Globe & Mail:

Nobody on TV was prepared, or indeed intellectually equipped, one suspects, to see the enormous fences and the extreme disruption of downtown life and business, as a symbolic act of hostility against a population, and as symbolic examples of the remoteness of the powerful from ordinary people.

Fox in the Henhouse

2010-06-16T12:10:00.002-04:00

Much hand-wringing, name-calling, glee, and angst from commentators of various political stripes over the prospect of a "Fox News North" as Quebecor plans to expand Sun TV - which I get on my TV, and seems to broadcast mostly The Casino Rama Grill Room sports talk show - into a conservative news network. Publicity that Quebecor couldn't buy otherwise. I do find the trumped-up indignation of both Fox News and Sun TV amusing, as they protest that a conservative voice is absent from the "lamestream media." In Canada English-speaking conservatives have The National Post, the entire Sun newspaper chain (which in turn owns virtually all of the local papers in my area), talk radio, and Maclean's magazine. As well, conservative talking heads are part of CBC and CTV news coverage. But, of course, it plays well to the base if one is constantly foaming at the mouth about how there is a media conspiracy against one's point of view. The left does the same thing.

Rare Bibles

2010-06-12T20:05:00.003-04:00

I'm home from the Medieval Festival at Upper Canada Village - a very sanitized version of the Middle Ages. Many visitors were there from Quebec, where medieval re-creations are very popular. The all-pervasive influence of the Church was left out of this version of medieval times - nary a cross or friar in sight, although a couple of Roman Catholic priests were among the spectators (I was incognito).

But further on ancient times, and my last blog posting about the Lowy Council, this article is about amassing a collection of old Bibles. The Lowy Collection has a first edition of the Authorized Version, the King James Bible, as well as editions of the Torah and the Tanakh, the complete Hebrew Bible.

Judaica and Hebraica

2010-06-07T23:32:00.002-04:00

I'm on the Council of the Jacob M. Lowy Collection at Library and Archives Canada - the Lowy donation is Canada's national collection of Judaica and Hebraica, meaning Jewish and Hebrew literature. We had a meeting tonight with Library and Archives officials to discuss how the collection will fit into modernization of the agency, while adhering to the terms of the deed of Mr. Lowy's gift in 1977 (pre-public Internet). But I do need to pay tribute to our retiring curator, Cheryl Jaffee, and welcome the incoming part-time curatorial team led by Leah Cohen. It's a privilege to be part of the Lowy Council and to be surrounded by books that speak of heritage and survival.

Church is good for something...

2010-06-02T16:00:00.003-04:00

According to the Tamil rapper Maya (aka M.I.A.). In this profile in the New York Times Magazine, Maya is driving by a church in East London and says:

“That church saved my life. Christ Church! That’s the last time I got to be a high-school dropout: I should have been in school, and a youth worker at the church, who had been in prison, grabbed me and slammed me against the wall one day and said: ‘What is the matter with you? If you stay around here, you’ll end up living in one of these apartments with six babies before you’re 20.’ I used to be hanging about, getting into trouble. He changed my life.”

I haven't blogged for so long! Been relying on Twitter and Facebook. I'm just back from the annual meeting of the United Church of Canada's Montreal & Ottawa Conference in Sainte-Anne-de-Bellevue, Quebec, and the annual meeting of the Canadian Theological Society at the Congress of the Humanities and Social Sciences, held at Concordia University. Montreal was great as always - smoked meat, distractions like the boutique at the Musée des beaux-arts and the Apple Store, hundreds of people around Concordia and on Crescent Street on a Monday night, driving up and down the Main and St. Urbain.

And I'm mourning the death of the Rev. Rod Carter, who taught restorative justice at Queen's Theological College. Rod had been in prison and received a pardon, going on to serve in the military and as a Correctional Services of Canada chaplain, making a difference in the lives of many, many offenders and students - his story is a good counter to the portrayal of pardons by the federal government and media. A gentle man who had a quiet passion for justice.

Beck surrogate responds

2010-04-16T09:31:00.002-04:00

There's an ongoing debate about churches and social justice, prompted by Glenn Beck of Fox News commenting that Christians should "flee" churches which talk about social justice. He sees "social justice" as a code phrase for both communist and fascist extremism. This brought a predictable backlash from a wide range of Christians, from the Sojourners' Rev. Jim Wallis to Biblical scholars pointing out that the early church was effectively socialist (see Acts 4:32-35).

The Washington Post's religion pages have been filled with this debate, with the latest being a response from a producer of Glenn Beck's show. He cites one example of "social justice" extremism and says that Beck has nothing against Christian charity, only against advocacy of societal change. But can churches stop at charity? One Brazilian bishop said in the days of the dictatorship in that country, "When I feed the poor, they say I am a Christian. When I ask why they are poor, they say that I am a Communist." Can churches ask these questions?

Revolution by Latrine?

2010-04-09T15:16:00.000-04:00

See this article in The New York Review of Books.

30th Anniversary of the Martyrdom of Oscar Romero

2010-03-24T21:05:00.003-04:00

"The poor have shown the church the true way to go. A church that does not speak out from the side of the poor is not the true church of Jesus." - Monsignor Oscar Romero, assassinated in San Salvador, March 24, 1980

World Water Day

2010-03-22T16:57:00.001-04:00

The UN reports that polluted water accounts for more deaths than all forms of violence in the world.

A Kindle in Every Pot

2010-03-08T19:36:00.002-05:00

A talk radio host in Ottawa is going on in amazement about how his wife can sit in their living room and access 270,000 books on her Kindle - so why do we need to spend money on libraries? Well, for one thing none of the recent books on the Kindle are free - only Project Gutenburg and other similar public domain works are. And not only can many families not afford to buy ebooks for the Kindle, they can't afford the Kindle in the first place. I shudder to think how I would have bankrupted my parents if they had had to pay for the stacks of books I would bring back from the bookmobile. Yes, libraries will change - but they're still needed. And talk radio hosts with vacation homes in the Bahamas, and $500 to buy a Kindle, should not assume that everyone has the same standard of living.

Rock and Roll!!!

2010-02-22T17:05:00.003-05:00

I'm quoted in a Carleton University Magazine article on the glory years of on-campus concerts in Porter Hall. This will likely be one of the few times that "United Church minister" and "sex-club scene" appear together in the same article and the subject is NOT a scandal involving the clergy - the 1984 concert by Frankie Goes to Hollywood is the topic here.

Haiti in Mourning

2010-02-22T10:06:00.000-05:00

Very powerful slide show of Haitians at prayer.

Separatism of the Rich

2010-02-16T09:19:00.003-05:00

Having been opposed to Quebec separatism my whole life, I now share Brian Topp's concerns about another kind of separatism, that of the rich: see today's Globe & Mail, as he discusses Newfoundland & Labrador Premier Danny Williams' surgery in the US:

Kind of like how governments in the industrialized West can pull together trillions of dollars in a matter of weeks to prop up and bail out speculators and profiteers who played computer games just a little too recklessly with our pensions and savings. While the same governments cannot find tiny fractions of those sums to end child poverty, illiteracy, or homelessness (this can't be done, a young soldier for the separatism of the rich explained to me during last year's coalition negotiations, because addressing those issues would be "fixed costs").

Kind of like how a rich man whose titanic ego (and remarkable energy) led him into the premiership of a Canadian province will not give two seconds' thought to the implications of buying himself care in an American health system tailor-made for wealthy people like himself. Even though he is himself the lead administrator of a public system built on fundamentally different -- and far better -- principles.

Twittering

2010-02-15T15:27:00.001-05:00

Twitter proving its utility for anyone interested in travel - announcements about seat sales, train discounts, contests. So it's good for something other than celebrity musings and sightings.

Jesus, Jobs and Justice

2010-02-06T09:37:00.002-05:00

New York Times review today of Bettye Collier-Thomas' authoritative Jesus, Jobs, and Justice: African-American Women and Religion. Reviewer Richard Thompson Ford states that:

Unfortunately, the civil rights movement has often lagged on the question of women’s equality even as it has led the nation on matters of race. Much of the blame for this must be borne by the religious institutions that have played a predominant role in the struggle for racial justice. Until recently, most black churches refused to grant women leadership roles, depriving them of the platform that so many black men have used to rally followers and challenge injustice. Despite these affronts, black women have remained the most faithful and abiding servants of the church, and they have been among the most diligent and effective activists for racial justice.

According to The Onion

2010-02-04T08:40:00.001-05:00

It's meant to be tongue in cheek, but not too distant from reality: Court allows corporations to run for office.

In Haiti There is Anguish

2010-01-30T09:53:00.002-05:00

This hymn was written by Carolyn Winfrey Gillette, Presbyterian Church of the USA, to the tune St. Christopher ("Beneath the Cross of Jesus"). It has been circulating among pastors as one way to express some of the thoughts and feelings we have had over the last two weeks since the earthquake in Haiti.

In Haiti, there is anguish that seems too much to bear;
A land so used to sorrow now knows even more despair.
From city streets, the cries of grief rise up to hills above;
In all the sorrow, pain and death, where are you, God of love?

A woman sifts through rubble, a man has lost his home,
A hungry, orphaned toddler sobs, for she is now alone.
Where are you, God, when thousands die – the rich, the poorest poor?
Were you the very first to cry for all that is no more?

O God, You love your children; you hear each lifted prayer!
May all who suffer in that land know you are present there.
In moments of compassion shown, in simple acts of grace,
May those in pain find healing balm, and know your love's embrace.

Where are you in the anguish? God, may we hear anew
That anywhere your world cries out, you're there – and suffering too.
And may we see, in others' pain, the cross we're called to bear;
Send out your church in Jesus' name, to pray, to serve, to share.

Port-au-Prince: Destruction Up Close

2010-01-30T09:44:00.001-05:00

An amazing panorama in The New York Times of the destroyed cathedral in Port-au-Prince. Haiti's Roman Catholic archbishop was killed in the earthquake.

Show Haiti the Money

2010-01-20T23:35:00.002-05:00

Good article in The New York Times reminding Americans (and it applies to Canadian and other Western readers, too) that well-meant donations of blankets, water, shoes, etc. are not always helpful. For once I agree with George W. Bush when he says, "I know a lot of people want to send blankets or water. Just send your cash.” In Nicaragua I heard about overwhelming a town with containers of supplies, as there was no transportation or distribution infrastructure to get the goods out of the port.

Haitians Seek Solace in Prayer

2010-01-17T13:11:00.001-05:00

From The New York Times today:

"With their churches flattened, their priests killed and their Bibles lost amid the rubble of their homes, desperate Haitians prayed in the streets on Sunday, raising their arms in the air and asking God to ease their grief.

Outside the city’s main cathedral, built in 1750 but now a giant pile of twisted metal, shattered stained glass and cracked concrete, parishioners held a makeshift service at the curb outside, not far from where scores of homeless people were camping out in a public park. The bishop’s sermon of hope was a hard sell, though, as many listening had lost their relatives, their homes and their possessions.

'We have to keep hoping,' said Bishop Marie Eric Toussant, although he acknowledged that he had no resources to help his many suffering parishioners and did not know whether the historic cathedral would ever be rebuilt. He said the quake had toppled the residences where priests stayed, crushing many of them.

Baptized at the cathedral, Jean Viejina, 68, said she had visited the church every Sunday morning for as long as she can remember, using it to help her endure what she described as a challenging life raising six children. Now, even this place of refuge, like so much in Port-au-Prince, was gone...

(Episcopal Bishop Zache) Duracin said organization and survival were still the priorities for both people and institutions.

'Most of the churches are down,' he said, estimating that more than 100 of the 140 Episcopal churches here had collapsed. 'There is almost no place for worship or prayer.'

People are afraid to go into buildings, including churches, that did not collapse, he said, including himself. His home was completely destroyed, so he was sleeping one of the red Coleman tents that he distributed to about 40 families.

He said that since the earthquake, he had not given a single sermon and was still trying to figure out what to say. When asked what parts of the Bible he had been contemplating lately, he answered quickly: 'Job,' he said.

Like Job, who persevered through death and destruction, Bishop Duracin said he hoped that Haiti would soon find a way to continue living.

'We have to look for opportunities from the disaster,' he said. 'We have to mourn. We have to suffer. But we have to get up because life has to continue.'"

The Underlying Tragedy

2010-01-16T23:05:00.001-05:00

David Brooks in The New York Times:
"On Oct. 17, 1989, a major earthquake with a magnitude of 7.0 struck the Bay Area in Northern California. Sixty-three people were killed. This week, a major earthquake, also measuring a magnitude of 7.0, struck near Port-au-Prince, Haiti. The Red Cross estimates that between 45,000 and 50,000 people have died.

"This is not a natural disaster story. This is a poverty story. It’s a story about poorly constructed buildings, bad infrastructure and terrible public services. On Thursday, President Obama told the people of Haiti: “You will not be forsaken; you will not be forgotten.” If he is going to remain faithful to that vow then he is going to have to use this tragedy as an occasion to rethink our approach to global poverty. He’s going to have to acknowledge a few difficult truths."

More on those truths in his column.

I'm not saying that this is one of my churches...

2010-01-16T10:29:00.002-05:00

Haiti

2010-01-14T18:38:00.001-05:00

Photos and reports available on every news site - the New York Times has had very good photographic coverage of the earthquake devastation, to people and buildings. Canadian customers of Rogers and Bell Mobility (Telus any time now) can text haiti to 45678 to donate $5 per text to the Salvation Army's relief efforts (I've done it, and it works!). The United Church of Canada's updated appeal for emergency funds can be found here.

Standing up for Liu Xiaobo

2010-01-09T23:04:00.002-05:00

Vaclav Havel and other figures from the Czech Republic and Slovakia have written this letter to Chinese President Hu Jintao, although officials at the Chinese Embassy in Prague refused to accept it. It's published in The Washington Post today but I'm reprinting it.

Prague, Jan. 6, 2010

Your Excellency,

On Dec. 23, the Beijing Municipal No. 1 Intermediate People's Court -- after holding him for over a year without trial -- sentenced respected intellectual and human rights activist Liu Xiaobo to 11 years in prison for "inciting subversion of state power."

Mr. President, we would like you to know that we do not consider this trial an independent judicial process in which neither you nor your government can interfere. In fact, it is just the opposite. Mr. Liu's trial was the result of a political order for which you carry ultimate political responsibility. We are convinced that this trial and harsh sentence meted out to a respected, well-known and prominent citizen of your country merely for thinking and speaking critically about various political and social issues was chiefly meant as a stern warning to others not to follow his path.

Thirty-three years ago, on Jan. 6, 1977, we, playwright Vaclav Havel; actor Pavel Landovsky; and writer Ludvik Vaculik, were arrested by the police in our own country, then a one-party Communist state, for "committing" exactly the same "crime": the drafting of Charter 77 and collection of signatures with the intent to call on our own government to respect our country's constitution, its international obligations and basic civic and human rights. Later, some of us were also sentenced to long prison terms in politically ordained judicial proceedings, just as the court in Beijing shamefully sentenced Mr. Liu Xiaobo in December 2009.

We strongly believe, and we dare to remind you and your Government, that there is nothing subversive to state security when intellectuals, artists, writers and academics exercise their core vocation: to think, re-think, ask questions, criticize, act creatively, and try to initiate open dialogue. On the contrary, the present and future well-being of a society is undermined when governments suppress intellectual debate.

There is nothing subversive to state security or damaging to future prosperity when citizens act guided by their own will and according to their best knowledge and conscience, when they associate among themselves to discuss and express peacefully their concerns and visions about the future development of their society.

On the contrary, a country's material and spiritual future is undermined when its citizens are not allowed to act, associate, think and speak freely.

This is why we call upon you and your Government to secure a fair and genuinely open trial for Liu Xiaobo when the court hears his appeal.

We are also asking you and your Government to end the house arrests and police surveillance which have been imposed on other Charter 08 signatories. We call upon you and your Government to end the criminalization of free speech and to release all prisoners of conscience.

Mr. President, we would like you to know that we will continue to watch carefully the treatment of Mr. Liu Xiaobo and other signatories of Charter 08. We will, together with many of our colleagues from the Czech Republic and Slovakia who signed the original Charter 77, make continued and sustained efforts to draw international attention to their plight.

With regards,

Vaclav Havel, playwright

Pavel Landovsky, author

Vaclav Maly, bishop of Prague

A Couple of Saturday Quotes

2010-01-09T10:43:00.003-05:00

George Jonas in The National Post:
"Western-style democracies can survive terrorists. Whether we can survive our own security bureaucracies is a different question. We’re stuck in the groove of an obsolete mindset that isn’t helping us in the age of asymmetric warfare. Many security measures, far from defeating terrorism, are doing the terrorists’ job for them."

Nicholas Thompson, reviewing Michael Gordin's Red Cloud at Dawn in The New York Times, on the beginning of the nuclear arms race between the USA and USSR in the 1940s:
"Somehow, rational decision was piled upon rational decision to create something utterly irrational. Four decades later, two countries with few disputes over land had lavished trillions of dollars and rubles on world-destroying weapons."

Five - count 'em, five - newly discovered "exoplanets"!

2010-01-04T12:32:00.003-05:00

I like the "fluffy" planet - could be made of Styrofoam that has escaped Earth's orbit...Maybe there's another planet made out of socks from the Earth's dryers. Here's the Washington Post article. What an amazing universe (see John 1:3).

This reminds me that I saw Avatar - absolutely awesome CGI, although the story was basically Pocahontas in space. I'm not sure that a completely alien race would show emotion in the same way as humans - smiling, laughing, crying. But, like all good science fiction, movies such as Avatar and District 9 make us think hard about our behaviour and attitudes on this planet.

Ataque de Pánico!

2010-01-04T10:25:00.003-05:00

This short film from Uruguay has had five million views on YouTube, and brought director Fede Alvarez a $30 million movie contract. So giant robots don't always invade the United States or Japan, apparently.

Jesus as Census Poster Boy

2010-01-03T08:38:00.003-05:00

Interesting bit I finally got around to reading in The Washington Post - posters being distributed to Latino church congregations in the US, fostering participation in the upcoming census by pointing out that in Luke's story Jesus was born as the result of a census.

New Year, New Post

2010-01-02T23:11:00.002-05:00

New Year's resolution: post more often. Here is U2 singer Bono's New York Times column, with "10 for the next 10." I'm particularly interested in the Abrahamic festival, non-violent revolution, and the African decade.

Charter for Compassion

2009-12-01T13:42:00.003-05:00

I've signed the Charter for Compassion, an initiative which is attracting a fair amount of multifaith attention.

Interfaith Road Show

2009-11-23T18:42:00.002-05:00

A minister, a rabbi and a sheik get together...and this is what happens. Yes, it's true that in interfaith dialogue many of us try to avoid the difficult topics unless they're raised - I was on an interfaith panel that included my Ahmaddiya Muslim colleague devoting his entire presentation to the crucifixion of Jesus being a falsehood. Would I have spoken about the difference between Muslims and Christians on this issue if he hadn't raised it?

Pollution in China

2009-11-14T21:30:00.001-05:00

Chinese industrial pollution - in sickening colour. Reminds me of Edward Burtynsky's photos in Manufactured Landscapes.

Central American Thoughts

2009-11-14T10:13:00.002-05:00

Nicholas Kristof, the New York Times columnist who writes about international affairs (his latest book is about the importance of lifting women out of poverty) asked for suggestions on where and who to visit in Central America for development stories. I typed out a few thoughts in the comments section of his blog:
"When I was visiting the United Church of Canada’s Mission and Service Fund projects in Nicaragua’s northern Atlantic region, I was impressed by the work of the Moravian Church in Puerto Cabezas. The church operates schools (including a university campus with a seminary) and a water-bottling operation that provides clean drinking water for the entire town. There is a Moravian women’s community centre which was built with funds provided by the Presbyterian Church of the USA, with a coordinator paid by the United Church of Canada. Miskito women at the centre make quilts and pillow cases for sale to feed their families in Puerto Cabezas and the interior. When I was there in 2007 they were asking for funds for classes to teach the women how to use sewing machines. Two other aspects of the story of this area: it is near the Honduran border, so many of the men were Contra fighters during the 1980s, although there seems to be a spirit of cooperation between former Contras and the Sandinista government that was newly elected when I visited; and two hurricanes have hit the region hard in the last two years."

He's receiving a lot of excellent advice from people with experience on the ground in Central America - looking forward to his columns from the region.

Baaack!

2009-11-13T22:22:00.002-05:00

Well, I am seriously out of the blogging loop - so far out that I had forgotten that there was a loop. Graduating, being ordained, moving, moving again, getting broken in at the new churches, finding it easier to post links and thoughts to Facebook than to the blog...all added up to no blogging for quite some time. But I promise to be a more conscientious blogger from now on.

Just back from the American Academy of Religion annual meeting in Montreal, where I presented a paper on French-language evangelism in the United Church of Canada, 1925-1975. Great conference - heard Tariq Ramadan (one of the world's leading Muslim intellectuals) twice, the Black Liberation theologian James Cone, a panel on multifaith understandings of death and dying in hospice care, a panel on the "death of God" theme, a presentation on Iroquois spirituality and culture with Ellen Gabriel (familiar to many Canadians from the Oka crisis 19 years ago), and saw the Bill Maher anti-religion documentary Religulous. Best line heard during the conference goes to James Cone: "Anyone who does not address the liberation of the poor and weak does not have the gospel. Maybe another gospel, but not the Christian gospel." He went on to say, "It's hard to preach the gospel and not be offensive. They just don't go together." Inspiring, enlightening, thought-provoking.

Theatre of the Oppressed

2009-03-05T14:53:00.003-05:00

I've been very impressed with the two leaders of Jana Sanskriti, a theatre movement in West Bengal, who have been visiting North America for the first time. Their group, which performs in villages throughout the state, is part of the Theatre of the Oppressed movement which originated with Augusto Boal in Brazil 35 years ago. Their observations on people's theatre, oppression, religion and politics, and activism in a state with an officially leftist government have given me much to think about.

Back in the Glare!

2009-02-12T08:25:00.002-05:00

Well, not me personally this time...The review panel for the intergroup dialogue program has reported, and the University accepted its recommendation to terminate the program (while recognizing that there were never any complaints about the work of the facilitators). The misrepresentation of the program made the atmosphere too poisonous to continue the pilot in its present form, although there will certainly be a continued focus on diversity in residences.

Queen's University statement
Review panel report
The Queen's Journal
Op-ed in The Queen's Journal
The National Post
The Globe & Mail

I haven't been blogging lately - it seems easier to post to Facebook!

Richard J. Neuhaus

2009-01-09T14:27:00.003-05:00

The Rev. Richard J. Neuhaus died yesterday. I didn't agree with him on everything - reading the journal First Things, often it seemed that I didn't agree with him on much - but I was always interested in what he wrote. Here is his obituary from the New York Times.

January 9, 2009
Rev. R. J. Neuhaus, Political Theologian, Dies at 72

By LAURIE GOODSTEIN
The Rev. Richard John Neuhaus, a theologian who transformed himself from a liberal Lutheran leader of the civil rights and antiwar struggles in the 1960s to a Roman Catholic beacon of the neoconservative movement of today, died on Thursday in Manhattan. He was 72 and lived in Manhattan.

He learned that he had cancer in November and recently developed a systemic infection that doctors at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center say led to his death, said Joseph Bottum, editor of First Things: A Monthly Journal of Religion, Culture and Public Life. Father Neuhaus founded the journal and served as editor in chief.

Father Neuhaus’s best-known book, “The Naked Public Square,” argued that American democracy must not be stripped of religious morality. Published in 1984, it provoked a debate about the role of religion in affairs of state and was embraced by the growing Christian conservative movement.

In the last 20 years, Father Neuhaus helped give evangelical Protestants and Catholics a theological framework for joining forces in the nation’s culture wars.

With Charles Colson, the former Watergate felon who became a born-again leader of American evangelicals, Father Neuhaus convened a group that in 1994 produced “Evangelicals and Catholics Together.” It was a widely distributed manifesto that initially came under fire by critics, who accused the two men of diluting theological differences for political expediency. But the document was ultimately credited with helping to cement the alliance, which has reshaped American politics.

“Richard’s Protestant background gave him a unique brokerage position,” George Weigel, a Catholic commentator and a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center in Washington, said in an interview on Wednesday.

Mr. Weigel likened Father Neuhaus to the Rev. John Courtney Murray, the Jesuit theologian who was often called on to navigate the relationship between religion and American government in the 1940s, ’50s and ’60s.

Mr. Weigel said of Father Neuhaus, “He was a philosopher and theologian of American democracy, and that is the bright line that links all” the stages of his life.

Father Neuhaus underwent several conversions in his life. He was born in Pembroke, Ontario, and emigrated to the United States, which he came to love fervently. He was a Lutheran minister, like his father, but at the age of 54 was ordained a Roman Catholic priest. Politically, he evolved from a liberal Democrat and admirer of Senator Eugene J. McCarthy to a conservative and occasional adviser to President Bush.

No matter which side he was on, Father Neuhaus was always a leader. The Rev. Max L. Stackhouse, a professor emeritus at Princeton Theological Seminary, said he first glimpsed Pastor Neuhaus marching in Selma, Ala., in a row of clergy members flanking the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

“He thought that somebody ought to be out front carrying the ball, and he designated himself, and he was pretty good at it,” Dr. Stackhouse said. “He was not poverty-stricken when it came to confidence, and he did a lot of his homework and made judgments and felt very secure in them. He did enjoy controversy.”

In the 1960s, he was pastor of St. John the Evangelist Church, a predominantly black and Hispanic Lutheran congregation in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. He was arrested at a sit-in at the New York City Board of Education headquarters, demanding integration of the public schools.

With the war in Vietnam raging, he and other prominent members of the clergy, like Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel, founded Clergy and Laity Concerned About Vietnam, an advocacy group. This contact with Jewish and Catholic leaders seeded his passion for interfaith dialogue.

In 1968, Pastor Neuhaus was a delegate for Senator McCarthy to the Democratic National Convention in Chicago. When the Chicago police clashed with demonstrators, he was among those arrested and tried for disorderly conduct.

Two years later, he made an unsuccessful bid to become the Democratic candidate for the Congressional seat representing the 14th District, in Brooklyn.

By the mid-1970s his ideas about the relationship between religion and politics were evolving. He helped write a theological statement criticizing churches for speaking out on secular social issues without sufficient attention to faith and spirituality.

He joined conservative clergy members in a campaign against the National Council of Churches and the World Council of Churches, accusing the organizations of a taking a leftist approach to international affairs and cozying up to Marxist governments. He wrote the founding manifesto for the Institute on Religion and Democracy, a group that challenges mainline Protestant denominations it considers too liberal.

In 1990, after years of uneasiness in the Lutheran church, Father Neuhaus was accepted into the Catholic Church by Cardinal John O’Connor of New York in the chapel of the cardinal’s residence on Madison Avenue. A year later the cardinal ordained him a priest. Father Neuhaus insisted that his conversion was not so much political as theological. He said the goal of Martin Luther’s Reformation had always been a united Christian church.

“I have long believed that the Roman Catholic Church is the fullest expression of the church of Christ through time,” he said in an interview then.

His survivors include his sisters, Mildred Schwich of East Wenatchee, Wash., and Johanna Speckhard of Valparaiso, Ind.; and his brothers, Clemens, of Redlands, Calif.; George, of Seeshaupt, Germany; Joseph, of Stone Mountain, Ga.; and Thomas, of St. Hippolyte, Quebec.

Father Neuhaus wrote and edited nearly 30 books, among them “The Catholic Moment: The Paradox of the Church in the Postmodern World,” “Death on a Friday Afternoon: Meditations on the Last Words of Jesus From the Cross,” and “As I Lay Dying: Meditations Upon Returning,” about his near-death experience during an early bout with colon cancer.

He advised President Bush and the White House on issues like stem cell research and gay marriage. On Thursday, President and Mrs. Bush issued a statement praising “his wise counsel and guidance.” When Time magazine published a list of the 25 most influential evangelicals in America in 2005, Father Neuhaus, despite his Roman Catholic affiliation, was on it.

In First Things, the journal he founded, he maintained a column of caustic commentary on political, social and religious developments until he fell ill last year.

Father Neuhaus’s last book was “American Babylon,” to be published in March by Basic Books. In it, he depicts America as a nation defined by consumerism and decadence and argues that Christians must learn to live there as if they are in exile from the promised land.