Still a King, Still Vulnerable and Dying

Dear People of Christ Church,
This week, I’ve been fortunate enough to take some retreat days at the convent at the Sisters of St Anne in Arlington. Rather than fill this space with words, I wanted to invite you to take a minute of prayer with an image of Jesus the sisters have in their garden. Jesus, here, is pictured as a king: crown and jewels and the whole nine yards. But he’s still on the cross.

He’s not the quarterback, not the class president, not the tycoon. There is nothing victorious about this king. That’s the point.

Where do you meet Christ on the cross, still a king, still vulnerable and dying? What ministry does he make possible in you? How can you find ways to serve that Christ in the world?

Blessings,
Sara+

Midwives of the Love of God

Dear People of Christ Church,
This morning I’m writing in gratitude for the community we share, and in hope for our God who works wonders. Last night we gathered for Eucharist in the choir, about twenty of us, praying for the vulnerable and the afraid, reminding ourselves of God’s great providence and grace. The gospel text I chose for the day was of the beginning of Jesus’ public ministry as told in the Gospel of Luke:

The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,
because he has anointed me
to bring good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives
and recovery of sight to the blind,
to let the oppressed go free,
to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.

Jesus announces that that prophecy is fulfilled in him, that as the people gather there they are seeing the good news brought to the poor and release proclaimed to captives.The oppressed are free and the blind are given sight. Jesus goes on to do those things—healing, saving, transforming. The love of God in his life was so strong, so brave, that nothing could stop it, not even death.

Hearing those words, we remembered together that the mission of the church is that same mission. Like Jesus, we occupy the place between the truth of God’s power and love and the truth of our broken and fragile world. In God’s dream of transcendent peace, Muslim women aren’t afraid to wear their veils while walking down the street. Immigrant kids don’t worry that their parents will get deported. LGBTQ people don’t worry their marriages will be dissolved. White supremacists don’t get air time next to legitimate political actors. We rest in that dream, at the same time as we live in a world where all of those things happen. One particular heartbreak and inspiration yesterday was reading the letter superintendent Echelson sent to faculty and staff of Waltham schools. Immigrant students are wondering if they should drop out of school, he said, to start making much money as they can, worried they’ll get deported. Arabic speakers are afraid for their safety. Echelson wrote, “Our students, particularly those students who might not feel safe right now because of their immigration status, perceived religion or any other variable, need us to show up for them.”

This is the transcendent, im/possible place: the place of the cross before the resurrection. The love of God is already showing up on the cross. The love of God is with the gay kid getting beat up and the woman being sexually assaulted. The love of God is incarnate in the mosque on Moody Street, at Temple Beth Israel, at St Mary’s and Sacred Heart. The love of God is showing up in Chaplains on the Way, at AA, at the Community Day Center. The love of God has always been there and will continue to be there. There are places where it hasn’t yet been born, but it is there. Our task as people of faith is to be midwives, to stand in support and accompany God’s love into the world.

We can do this: to bring that love to the desolate places, to have the courage to speak love to the dark abyss. To show up. That is our mission no matter who is president, no matter what prejudice seems to become acceptable. That is our mission, too, to those who disagree, to whom we are still bound in faith and love, who no less need the gift of God’s love.

Blessings,
Sara+

Showing Up, in North Dakota and the Voting Booth

Dear People of Christ Church,
This week, so much on my mind. My husband, Noah Evans, left with a group of 12 Episcopal clergy and lay people for North Dakota yesterday morning to be part of an action to be held tomorrow to stand in solidarity with the Standing Rock Sioux tribe over an oil pipeline that is slated to be built through sacred lands and that would jeopardize the safety of their water. (Theirs, and everyone else who lives below them on the Missouri River.) Approved by the Army Corps of Engineers without due consultation with the tribe, the pipeline is troubling for lots of reasons—it’s not just the climate change question of pipeline vs not-pipeline. Standing Rock has a long relationship to the Episcopal Church; rather than “evangelizing” from the outside as though Native people could be forcibly claimed for the church, the Episcopal Church was actually invited to be part of the reservation by Chief Gall. So their call to Episcopal clergy has some deeper resonance. A mentor of ours in seminary worked on the reservation for a number of years and we visited several times—it’s one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever been. They’ll pray and listen and support. More about their trip is on Noah’s blog. So there’s that, not to mention the presidential election and 4 important ballot questions. I voted early last night and was pleasantly surprised to see the diversity of the city and patience of those gathered—it took about an hour, possibly even more than if I’d waited for Tuesday! But I’m grateful.

Fortunately, the All Saints jazz mass is on Sunday so we remember that we are not in charge over everything. As we celebrate and sing with drums and saxophone, God’s sovereignty over life and death invites us to center in the fact that even as the stakes are high, God can still work through whatever cataclysms we bring about ourselves. Whether political or environmental or otherwise, it will work itself out. My friend David from our “Two Priests and a Rabbi” interfaith open office hours had this phrase from Mishnah Avot posted on his facebook page yesterday after he voted: “It is not on you to complete the work, but neither are you free to desist from it.”

In my sermon on Sunday I was thinking in a similar vein, about how we don’t have to have everything completely figured out in order for Jesus to come and be with us. He called Zacchaeus the tax collector out of a tree and told him he was coming to his house before Zacchaeus set himself straight, before promises were made to repay extorted funds and commitments made to give half what he owned to the poor. The point is this: we don’t have to have it all figured out before Jesus will have anything to do with us. God wants our open hearts, not perfectly balanced moral checkbooks.

Blessings,
Sara+