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 posts with label The World. Show all posts
Showing posts with label The World. Show all posts
Thursday, November 10, 2016
Thursday, November 3, 2016
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+
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+
Thursday, October 20, 2016
Making Ourselves at Home in the Church
Dear People of Christ Church,
First, blessings to those who were confirmed and received last Saturday! Three cheers for Mary, Susan, Jackie, Sam and David. Confirmation is the big “I do” in being an Episcopalian and symbolizes the connection of the individual with the wider church (for whom the bishop stands in) as staking our faith in the Christian faith as expressed in the worldwide Episcopal/Anglican family. It is a lovely commitment to make.
I’m grateful to God for those five, and also for the beginning of our conversations about stewardship. As you’ll read in our materials, this year the vestry is in charge of it—not one individual or household, but the whole gathered body of our parish leaders. This Sunday the Jensens will offer our stewardship reflection about belonging—we are at home at church.
Home, at its best, feels safe: that’s the gauzy Thanksgiving holiday image. The truth is, we sometimes have to work at home being home; sometimes nerves fray and tempers flare. Sometimes that deep, spiritual sense of home crumbles: we hurt each other and what is broken can’t be repaired.
I’ve been thinking about that more complicated aspect of home in preparation for Tuesday’s service of hope and healing from domestic violence. In its third year, we do this in cooperation with REACH and other interfaith partners in Waltham. It is a terrible thing that the church has, historically, been complicit in domestic violence. I’ve heard too many stories about someone’s pastor saying “But I know your spouse, they would never do that.” Or “Jesus always forgave, so you should forgive, too.” Jesus did forgive, and we also are called to that. But God never calls us to jeopardize our own safety by tolerating violence. Forgiveness doesn’t happen at the expense of personal safety. The service is a quiet one: we’ll hear survivors speak and have a chance to light candles in prayer. Alison Shea will be singing, along with Rev. Matt from Agape Christian Community, a new UCC church.
There are a lot of occasions to pray together coming up—we’ll also be offering an election eve Eucharist on November 7 at 6:30pm in cooperation with Santuario and First Lutheran. Christ Church will host, Pastor Tom Maehl of First Lutheran will preach, and Padre Angel of Santuario will celebrate communion (Angel is one of my partners in crime with Two Priests and a Rabbi). We’re also considering holding the church open all day for prayer—let me know if that would be meaningful to you (and if you’re interested in helping out—we’d need to take shifts).
Speaking of elections—this Sunday I’ll invite some conversation on the four Massachusetts ballot initiatives after church. Where does your faith have you leaning? Have you made up your mind about them all? Christians of good faith and goodwill can always learn from each other (and disagree, too). I look forward to our conversation.
Blessings,
Sara+
First, blessings to those who were confirmed and received last Saturday! Three cheers for Mary, Susan, Jackie, Sam and David. Confirmation is the big “I do” in being an Episcopalian and symbolizes the connection of the individual with the wider church (for whom the bishop stands in) as staking our faith in the Christian faith as expressed in the worldwide Episcopal/Anglican family. It is a lovely commitment to make.
I’m grateful to God for those five, and also for the beginning of our conversations about stewardship. As you’ll read in our materials, this year the vestry is in charge of it—not one individual or household, but the whole gathered body of our parish leaders. This Sunday the Jensens will offer our stewardship reflection about belonging—we are at home at church.
Home, at its best, feels safe: that’s the gauzy Thanksgiving holiday image. The truth is, we sometimes have to work at home being home; sometimes nerves fray and tempers flare. Sometimes that deep, spiritual sense of home crumbles: we hurt each other and what is broken can’t be repaired.
I’ve been thinking about that more complicated aspect of home in preparation for Tuesday’s service of hope and healing from domestic violence. In its third year, we do this in cooperation with REACH and other interfaith partners in Waltham. It is a terrible thing that the church has, historically, been complicit in domestic violence. I’ve heard too many stories about someone’s pastor saying “But I know your spouse, they would never do that.” Or “Jesus always forgave, so you should forgive, too.” Jesus did forgive, and we also are called to that. But God never calls us to jeopardize our own safety by tolerating violence. Forgiveness doesn’t happen at the expense of personal safety. The service is a quiet one: we’ll hear survivors speak and have a chance to light candles in prayer. Alison Shea will be singing, along with Rev. Matt from Agape Christian Community, a new UCC church.
There are a lot of occasions to pray together coming up—we’ll also be offering an election eve Eucharist on November 7 at 6:30pm in cooperation with Santuario and First Lutheran. Christ Church will host, Pastor Tom Maehl of First Lutheran will preach, and Padre Angel of Santuario will celebrate communion (Angel is one of my partners in crime with Two Priests and a Rabbi). We’re also considering holding the church open all day for prayer—let me know if that would be meaningful to you (and if you’re interested in helping out—we’d need to take shifts).
Speaking of elections—this Sunday I’ll invite some conversation on the four Massachusetts ballot initiatives after church. Where does your faith have you leaning? Have you made up your mind about them all? Christians of good faith and goodwill can always learn from each other (and disagree, too). I look forward to our conversation.
Blessings,
Sara+
Thursday, June 2, 2016
Finding our Moral Footing
Dear People of Christ Church,
This week, our Episcopal Church Class will take on “Contemporary Moral Issues,” and wow, there seem to be a lot of them swirling around. On Sunday in my sermon I mentioned how God had “shown up” in a powerful (and surprising to all of us, I think) way at a conference I attended in Portland, OR the week before. What was going to be a fun and creative time for a group of Millennial and Generation X clergy to hang out and talk shop became a revelatory witnessing about sexism in the church. Sexism is a moral issue.
On Sunday, I, along with many clergy across the country, will wear orange stoles to remember victims of gun violence. Why orange? It’s the color hunters wear for safety. The idea came about from friends of Hadiya Pendleton, a 15 year old high school student who was shot to death on the south side of Chicago a week after marching in President Obama's second inaugural parade in 2013. June 2 is her birthday. Gun violence is a moral issue.
Today, Charlie Baker has announced that law enforcement will be permitted to be detain undocumented immigrants on behalf of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement authority. How we treat “the alien who resides with you…as a citizen” (Leviticus 19:34) is a moral issue.
This week, the MA house and senate voted on bills to protect the right of public accommodations access for transgendered persons. How we respect the dignity of every human being, of every gender identity, is a moral issue.
The Boston anti defamation league announced today that just halfway into the year, Massachusetts has already seen almost as many anti Semitic acts (56) as in all of last year (61). Such events were reported at 23 schools and colleges. How we treat those of other faiths is a moral issue.
All of these are moral issues, yet we live in a world that so often tramples the bodies of the oppressed and seduces us into the lie that who we are is determined by how much we have. In baptism we make all kinds of promises about how we’ll engage the world and each other. We study a Bible that’s full of stories of Jesus Christ going toward the margins of society and toward people in need. What happens next?
The “next” is our whole lives. The “next” is how we go, day by day, examining how we treat others and how we create communities of care, concern, and hospitality. We are also called into lives in which we “love our neighbors as ourselves”… sometimes the “love yourself” part of the equation is the one that comes out with the shorter stick. Sometimes we internalize the false stories of our broken-yet-precious world, and oppression turns inward. I came out of last week’s conversation about discrimination against women last week with some critical questions for the wider church. I came out with some critical questions for myself, too (and will hopefully have something on my own blog about it in the next few days).
What moral issues are you struggling with these days?
How can this Christian community help you to find your footing in responding to them?
What issues aren’t we seeing?
Blessings,
Sara+
This week, our Episcopal Church Class will take on “Contemporary Moral Issues,” and wow, there seem to be a lot of them swirling around. On Sunday in my sermon I mentioned how God had “shown up” in a powerful (and surprising to all of us, I think) way at a conference I attended in Portland, OR the week before. What was going to be a fun and creative time for a group of Millennial and Generation X clergy to hang out and talk shop became a revelatory witnessing about sexism in the church. Sexism is a moral issue.
On Sunday, I, along with many clergy across the country, will wear orange stoles to remember victims of gun violence. Why orange? It’s the color hunters wear for safety. The idea came about from friends of Hadiya Pendleton, a 15 year old high school student who was shot to death on the south side of Chicago a week after marching in President Obama's second inaugural parade in 2013. June 2 is her birthday. Gun violence is a moral issue.
Today, Charlie Baker has announced that law enforcement will be permitted to be detain undocumented immigrants on behalf of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement authority. How we treat “the alien who resides with you…as a citizen” (Leviticus 19:34) is a moral issue.
This week, the MA house and senate voted on bills to protect the right of public accommodations access for transgendered persons. How we respect the dignity of every human being, of every gender identity, is a moral issue.
The Boston anti defamation league announced today that just halfway into the year, Massachusetts has already seen almost as many anti Semitic acts (56) as in all of last year (61). Such events were reported at 23 schools and colleges. How we treat those of other faiths is a moral issue.
All of these are moral issues, yet we live in a world that so often tramples the bodies of the oppressed and seduces us into the lie that who we are is determined by how much we have. In baptism we make all kinds of promises about how we’ll engage the world and each other. We study a Bible that’s full of stories of Jesus Christ going toward the margins of society and toward people in need. What happens next?
The “next” is our whole lives. The “next” is how we go, day by day, examining how we treat others and how we create communities of care, concern, and hospitality. We are also called into lives in which we “love our neighbors as ourselves”… sometimes the “love yourself” part of the equation is the one that comes out with the shorter stick. Sometimes we internalize the false stories of our broken-yet-precious world, and oppression turns inward. I came out of last week’s conversation about discrimination against women last week with some critical questions for the wider church. I came out with some critical questions for myself, too (and will hopefully have something on my own blog about it in the next few days).
What moral issues are you struggling with these days?
How can this Christian community help you to find your footing in responding to them?
What issues aren’t we seeing?
Blessings,
Sara+
Thursday, November 19, 2015
A Container for Grace
Dear People of Christ Church,
Thank you, thank you, thank you to all who are making our annual stewardship and roof campaign possible. From stewardship co-chairs Heather and Chris Leonardo who have invited us into our dreaming and reflecting on our past, present and future, to Michael Mailman reminding us of how the light comes through the windows and Jonathan Duce presenting us with the shingles that had blown off the roof, to Doug telling us the story of our 2011 campaign and how his family had just joined, and how far we’ve come since then. I spoke in my sermon about how our building is a container for grace—how this is a place where transformation happens. Whether people coming for AA, or Chaplains on the Way contemplative prayer, or REACH’s trainings on elder violence or yoga for survivors, or each one of you, your imagination caught by some indescribable something that reminds you of how God is present and moving in your life—750 Main Street is a place where things happen.
This is a place where things happen for us and for our city. Where the hungry are fed at Grandma’s Pantry, the wet baby gets dry at Diaper Depot, and our Sunday School classes invite our children into times of wonder and joy at the stories of God’s living Word.
Our 2011 campaign is on track—bathrooms and carpets and parking lot are all being funded and rolling along, but to avoid jeopardizing all of that good work we need to attend to the roof. When he started working here last summer, Daniel, our music director, didn’t know that it sometimes rains over the organ! So there is much to do, and so many people passionate for the work of God who are doing it. If you weren’t in church, please check out their videos on youtube. I’m also sharing a recording of my sermon here.
Finally, I can’t let this week go without offering some words about the current moment in our country regarding Syrian refugees. The fact that a Syrian passport was found near one of the terrorist’s bodies after the attacks in Paris has led fully half of US governors, including our own Charlie Baker, to say that Syrians are not welcome in their states. Not only are the vetting processes for refugees coming to the United States among the most stringent in the world, to single out a single nation as somehow more suspect than any other is simple intolerance. You can read their whole letter here, but let me close with these words from Christian leaders across the state, including our own bishops Alan and Gayle, as well as Mass Council of Churches Executive Director Laura Everett:
Refugees do not bring terror, they are fleeing from it.
As Christians we try to live our lives in accordance with Jesus’ Great Commandment—to love our neighbors as ourselves. We want safe homes, the freedom to worship, stable governments and opportunities to thrive. Our Syrian neighbors desire the same. Our faith also teaches us to welcome the stranger. Syrians seeking refuge, as well as the Somalians, Bhutanese, Iraqis, Central Americans and others, are neighbors worthy of our welcome and in need of our care. Our nation is founded on this welcome. We must make sure that we do not allow fear to overwhelm us, crowd out our compassion, or fundamentally change our character. We refuse to live as a Commonwealth scared of those unlike us.
Amen, Amen, Amen.
Blessings,
Sara+
Thank you, thank you, thank you to all who are making our annual stewardship and roof campaign possible. From stewardship co-chairs Heather and Chris Leonardo who have invited us into our dreaming and reflecting on our past, present and future, to Michael Mailman reminding us of how the light comes through the windows and Jonathan Duce presenting us with the shingles that had blown off the roof, to Doug telling us the story of our 2011 campaign and how his family had just joined, and how far we’ve come since then. I spoke in my sermon about how our building is a container for grace—how this is a place where transformation happens. Whether people coming for AA, or Chaplains on the Way contemplative prayer, or REACH’s trainings on elder violence or yoga for survivors, or each one of you, your imagination caught by some indescribable something that reminds you of how God is present and moving in your life—750 Main Street is a place where things happen.
This is a place where things happen for us and for our city. Where the hungry are fed at Grandma’s Pantry, the wet baby gets dry at Diaper Depot, and our Sunday School classes invite our children into times of wonder and joy at the stories of God’s living Word.
Our 2011 campaign is on track—bathrooms and carpets and parking lot are all being funded and rolling along, but to avoid jeopardizing all of that good work we need to attend to the roof. When he started working here last summer, Daniel, our music director, didn’t know that it sometimes rains over the organ! So there is much to do, and so many people passionate for the work of God who are doing it. If you weren’t in church, please check out their videos on youtube. I’m also sharing a recording of my sermon here.
Finally, I can’t let this week go without offering some words about the current moment in our country regarding Syrian refugees. The fact that a Syrian passport was found near one of the terrorist’s bodies after the attacks in Paris has led fully half of US governors, including our own Charlie Baker, to say that Syrians are not welcome in their states. Not only are the vetting processes for refugees coming to the United States among the most stringent in the world, to single out a single nation as somehow more suspect than any other is simple intolerance. You can read their whole letter here, but let me close with these words from Christian leaders across the state, including our own bishops Alan and Gayle, as well as Mass Council of Churches Executive Director Laura Everett:
Refugees do not bring terror, they are fleeing from it.
As Christians we try to live our lives in accordance with Jesus’ Great Commandment—to love our neighbors as ourselves. We want safe homes, the freedom to worship, stable governments and opportunities to thrive. Our Syrian neighbors desire the same. Our faith also teaches us to welcome the stranger. Syrians seeking refuge, as well as the Somalians, Bhutanese, Iraqis, Central Americans and others, are neighbors worthy of our welcome and in need of our care. Our nation is founded on this welcome. We must make sure that we do not allow fear to overwhelm us, crowd out our compassion, or fundamentally change our character. We refuse to live as a Commonwealth scared of those unlike us.
Amen, Amen, Amen.
Blessings,
Sara+
Thursday, November 5, 2015
The Search for Justice
Dear People of Christ Church,
This week our Old Testament reading is from Ruth—we leave Job, and move into several weeks of Old Testament texts about women. Naomi and Ruth this week, Hannah in the book of Samuel next week. Then before we know it, it’s Advent! In trying to come up with something that speaks to a week of elections, though, I find myself back with Job.
Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return there; the Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord. (Job 1:21).
Job comes to mind not because I feel particularly long-suffering about any of the results of the elections this week, but more because I was looking for something to put in context both the joy and sorrow of human politics. Whether your candidate won or lost, it’s worth it to remember that as vital as these contests are, God’s presence with us is unchanging. Unfolding, yes, revelatory, yes, contextualized, yes, but still unchanging.
No matter who the mayor is, there are still hungry to be fed. No matter who the president is, there will still be peace to build. No matter who sits on city council, there will still be those for whom we must advocate. This fall, my husband’s church spent several weeks reading the beatitudes for their adult formation time. Noah and I walk together almost every morning, and our conversations would often turn to what each of us were thinking about for work. His refrain for the conversations at Grace Church during that time was always, “Not a tweak.” To dry the tears of the weeping? Not a tweak. To see how the poor are blessed? Not a tweak. To give your cloak as well as your shirt? Not a tweak. To be serious about making peace? Again. Not a tweak. You can’t just go on ahead with business as usual with a little extra sprinkling of discipleship on top. The invitation is for our faith in God to be woven throughout our lives, not an extra cherry to make things look nice.
If we are serious about being disciples of Jesus, our whole lives will require a turning toward the good news of God in Christ. It’s not about giving to the poor when you happen to have money in your pocket; it’s about making sure you don’t come up empty handed when it’s time. If you never have cash in your pocket, you can honestly and kindly say “No, I don’t have any change,” when someone asks. It’s a little like confronting a kid after Halloween who has chocolate streaked over their chin with the question of whether they have any candy. With open hands, the kid says, “No! Of course not! No candy here!” but only because he just stuffed it in his mouth.
Electoral politics are important, but will also only take you so far. As clear as it seems to me that Jesus would vote for “my” candidate, I am also aware of the caution offered by, I think, Anne Lamott: You know your faith is in trouble when you assume that God hates the same people you do.
So wherever you land this election week Thursday, here’s my prayer.
May your heart be enlarged by the compassion of Christ, your vision widened by a God who holds everyone precious in the divine sight, your mind set on fire by the Spirit’s relentless search for justice. Amen.
Blessings,
Sara+
This week our Old Testament reading is from Ruth—we leave Job, and move into several weeks of Old Testament texts about women. Naomi and Ruth this week, Hannah in the book of Samuel next week. Then before we know it, it’s Advent! In trying to come up with something that speaks to a week of elections, though, I find myself back with Job.
Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return there; the Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord. (Job 1:21).
Job comes to mind not because I feel particularly long-suffering about any of the results of the elections this week, but more because I was looking for something to put in context both the joy and sorrow of human politics. Whether your candidate won or lost, it’s worth it to remember that as vital as these contests are, God’s presence with us is unchanging. Unfolding, yes, revelatory, yes, contextualized, yes, but still unchanging.
No matter who the mayor is, there are still hungry to be fed. No matter who the president is, there will still be peace to build. No matter who sits on city council, there will still be those for whom we must advocate. This fall, my husband’s church spent several weeks reading the beatitudes for their adult formation time. Noah and I walk together almost every morning, and our conversations would often turn to what each of us were thinking about for work. His refrain for the conversations at Grace Church during that time was always, “Not a tweak.” To dry the tears of the weeping? Not a tweak. To see how the poor are blessed? Not a tweak. To give your cloak as well as your shirt? Not a tweak. To be serious about making peace? Again. Not a tweak. You can’t just go on ahead with business as usual with a little extra sprinkling of discipleship on top. The invitation is for our faith in God to be woven throughout our lives, not an extra cherry to make things look nice.
If we are serious about being disciples of Jesus, our whole lives will require a turning toward the good news of God in Christ. It’s not about giving to the poor when you happen to have money in your pocket; it’s about making sure you don’t come up empty handed when it’s time. If you never have cash in your pocket, you can honestly and kindly say “No, I don’t have any change,” when someone asks. It’s a little like confronting a kid after Halloween who has chocolate streaked over their chin with the question of whether they have any candy. With open hands, the kid says, “No! Of course not! No candy here!” but only because he just stuffed it in his mouth.
Electoral politics are important, but will also only take you so far. As clear as it seems to me that Jesus would vote for “my” candidate, I am also aware of the caution offered by, I think, Anne Lamott: You know your faith is in trouble when you assume that God hates the same people you do.
So wherever you land this election week Thursday, here’s my prayer.
May your heart be enlarged by the compassion of Christ, your vision widened by a God who holds everyone precious in the divine sight, your mind set on fire by the Spirit’s relentless search for justice. Amen.
Blessings,
Sara+
Thursday, September 17, 2015
Welcome, Discomfort
Dear People of Christ Church,
This week, as hopefully we all are, I’ve continued to be moved by the European migrant crisis. I came across a book of sermons by Walter Brueggeman, an Old Testament scholar, where in a sermon about a passage in the book of the prophet Isaiah he writes this:
There is something about [Jerusalem] that forgets the very mandate of fidelity that makes a city work. There is nothing here about removing these failed poor and making them invisible, deporting them because they are an economic inconvenience. No, because widows and orphans are not an inconvenience. They are a measure of the health of the city, to be measured in terms of justice and righteousness, and Jerusalem has failed that measure (p 50).
Jerusalem failed—our world has clearly failed, too. Refugees are not an inconvenience. Homeless people are not an inconvenience. Victims of addiction, war, environmental devastation. Not an inconvenience, but a signal of health or ill health. That’s about the world. No one is an inconvenience to the heart of God. Yes, we are failing. Yes, I falter. But it’s not hopeless.
The harsher realities of the world, a world where children are abandoned and whole swaths of people dismissed as criminals, have always been so. Whatever Jesus himself meant the time he said that the poor would always be with us, over the last two millennia, at least, so far he’s right. But economic poverty exposes spiritual poverty, and meeting economic need fulfills spiritual need. It goes both ways. The thing I love about Brueggeman’s point is that this is that it offers enough of a breather from the usual guilt/shame/despair cycle to allow for the breath of God to enter. It is only when it appears that the problems of the world and our souls rest in our own power that we get lost. If there is no hope, then that makes it awfully easy to do nothing.
I’ll share again here the prayer I offered on Sunday as part of the children’s sermon. It’s based on one from Thomas Keating, a Roman Catholic priest who has worked to return contemplative prayer and meditation into the Christian tradition.
Welcome, welcome, welcome.
I welcome everything that comes to me today
Because I know that God is with me.
I welcome the world
I welcome joy and sadness
I welcome fear and delight.
I welcome my friends
I welcome those who are difficult for me to love
I let go of my need to be in charge
I let go of my need for people to think I’m the best
I open myself to the love of God.
I open myself to the love of God.
To which, today, I would add: I welcome the discomfort of seeing those who are in pain. I welcome the feeling that I want to do more to help. I welcome the opportunity to see those here who are in need, asylum seekers to the United States who are in no less need than those across the ocean. I welcome the opportunity to ask hard questions, at how our hearts are moved and when, and what makes them blind. Welcome, welcome, welcome.
And what can you do?
Check out Refugee Immigration Ministries,
based in Malden works with local communities to marshal support, from spiritual resources to homestay. Talk with each other about whether a new ministry could be right for Christ Church.
Be informed. What’s a migrant? A refugee? Why is the difference important? Read here.
Remember you’re part of the wider church, and pray. Remember Muslim brothers and sisters who experience violence because of their faith. Ask how your Christian faith can be deepened by knowing those who are different from you. Check out this from the Archbishop of Canterbury.
Blessings,
Sara+
This week, as hopefully we all are, I’ve continued to be moved by the European migrant crisis. I came across a book of sermons by Walter Brueggeman, an Old Testament scholar, where in a sermon about a passage in the book of the prophet Isaiah he writes this:
There is something about [Jerusalem] that forgets the very mandate of fidelity that makes a city work. There is nothing here about removing these failed poor and making them invisible, deporting them because they are an economic inconvenience. No, because widows and orphans are not an inconvenience. They are a measure of the health of the city, to be measured in terms of justice and righteousness, and Jerusalem has failed that measure (p 50).
Jerusalem failed—our world has clearly failed, too. Refugees are not an inconvenience. Homeless people are not an inconvenience. Victims of addiction, war, environmental devastation. Not an inconvenience, but a signal of health or ill health. That’s about the world. No one is an inconvenience to the heart of God. Yes, we are failing. Yes, I falter. But it’s not hopeless.
The harsher realities of the world, a world where children are abandoned and whole swaths of people dismissed as criminals, have always been so. Whatever Jesus himself meant the time he said that the poor would always be with us, over the last two millennia, at least, so far he’s right. But economic poverty exposes spiritual poverty, and meeting economic need fulfills spiritual need. It goes both ways. The thing I love about Brueggeman’s point is that this is that it offers enough of a breather from the usual guilt/shame/despair cycle to allow for the breath of God to enter. It is only when it appears that the problems of the world and our souls rest in our own power that we get lost. If there is no hope, then that makes it awfully easy to do nothing.
I’ll share again here the prayer I offered on Sunday as part of the children’s sermon. It’s based on one from Thomas Keating, a Roman Catholic priest who has worked to return contemplative prayer and meditation into the Christian tradition.
Welcome, welcome, welcome.
I welcome everything that comes to me today
Because I know that God is with me.
I welcome the world
I welcome joy and sadness
I welcome fear and delight.
I welcome my friends
I welcome those who are difficult for me to love
I let go of my need to be in charge
I let go of my need for people to think I’m the best
I open myself to the love of God.
I open myself to the love of God.
To which, today, I would add: I welcome the discomfort of seeing those who are in pain. I welcome the feeling that I want to do more to help. I welcome the opportunity to see those here who are in need, asylum seekers to the United States who are in no less need than those across the ocean. I welcome the opportunity to ask hard questions, at how our hearts are moved and when, and what makes them blind. Welcome, welcome, welcome.
And what can you do?
Check out Refugee Immigration Ministries,
based in Malden works with local communities to marshal support, from spiritual resources to homestay. Talk with each other about whether a new ministry could be right for Christ Church.
Be informed. What’s a migrant? A refugee? Why is the difference important? Read here.
Remember you’re part of the wider church, and pray. Remember Muslim brothers and sisters who experience violence because of their faith. Ask how your Christian faith can be deepened by knowing those who are different from you. Check out this from the Archbishop of Canterbury.
Blessings,
Sara+
Friday, June 5, 2015
Meditation: Learning to be a Christian, Looking to Eastern Religions
Dear People of Christ Church,
Last weekend, I was blessed to join in the Sakadawa Interfaith Celebration at the Kurukulla Center in Medford. The center had invited all of Medford and beyond to join in chanting and prayer for peace in honor of the Buddha’s birthday. Leading worship I do pray in church, of course, but it was also completely delightful to have someone else do the heavy lifting.
I am not, of course, a Buddhist or a Hindu, but Eastern religions have still had a profound impact on my spirituality. When I was in college I studied in India for half of my senior year and I had the chance to stay for two weeks at the Chinmaya Ashram. When I was looking for a place for my retreat, I met a woman who had gone to this community every year for forty years. “Hinduism,” she said, “basically seeks to make people happy. Meditation," she said, "will bring you bliss. The ashram is Hindu. But we don’t want to make you a Hindu. Hinduism wants you to be a better person. It wants Muslims to be better Muslims. It wants you to be a better Christian. If you learn to cultivate this now, your life will change.”
And it did. Two years later I was in seminary, somewhat to my own surprise and even more so to those around me. I think you have to practice for a lot longer than I have to achieve bliss, but there are glimmers. The thing that Buddhism and Hinduism and Christianity all share is the knowledge that true freedom isn’t to be had in always getting your way. Whether Jesus on the cross, or Gautama Buddha under the Bodhi tree, or an 80 year old Hindu woman willing to have tea with a 21 year old American girl, the basic movement beyond ego and self-interest flows in the same direction. Many deeper minds than my own have engaged in serious interfaith dialogue on this.
Buddhism, a religious sibling to Hinduism, teaches profoundly about compassion, particularly compassion for ourselves—the wellspring of our compassion for others. The teacher Roshi Pat Enkyo O'Hara says the thing that gets us caught is the story we tell ourselves about who we are—we get caught on our former selves and forget that the “we” we are has always been an illusion, a set of ideas that props us up to face the world, but ultimately of no more weight than a breath. These stories we tell are a deep part of the suffering we create. As a Christian, I look behind the un-substance of that breath and see the image of God in which we all are made—and the detritus of sin that separates me from living into it more honestly. As a Christian, too, I know nothing can separate me from the love of God.
I’ll leave you with one of those stronger interfaith minds than my own, the monk Thomas Merton (1915-1968).
Both Christianity and Buddhism show that suffering remains inexplicable, most of all for the [one] who attempts to explain it in order to evade it, or who thinks explanation itself is an escape. Suffering is not a ‘problem’ as if it were something we could stand outside of and control. Suffering, as both Christianity and Buddhism see, each in its own way, is part of our very ego-identity and empirical existence, and the only thing to do about it is to plunge right into the middle of contradiction and confusion in order to be transformed by what Zen calls ‘the great death’ and Christianity calls ‘dying and rising with Christ’.
Blessings,
Sara+
More on Roshi Pat Enkyo O'Hara here.
More on Thomas Merton here.
Last weekend, I was blessed to join in the Sakadawa Interfaith Celebration at the Kurukulla Center in Medford. The center had invited all of Medford and beyond to join in chanting and prayer for peace in honor of the Buddha’s birthday. Leading worship I do pray in church, of course, but it was also completely delightful to have someone else do the heavy lifting.
I am not, of course, a Buddhist or a Hindu, but Eastern religions have still had a profound impact on my spirituality. When I was in college I studied in India for half of my senior year and I had the chance to stay for two weeks at the Chinmaya Ashram. When I was looking for a place for my retreat, I met a woman who had gone to this community every year for forty years. “Hinduism,” she said, “basically seeks to make people happy. Meditation," she said, "will bring you bliss. The ashram is Hindu. But we don’t want to make you a Hindu. Hinduism wants you to be a better person. It wants Muslims to be better Muslims. It wants you to be a better Christian. If you learn to cultivate this now, your life will change.”
And it did. Two years later I was in seminary, somewhat to my own surprise and even more so to those around me. I think you have to practice for a lot longer than I have to achieve bliss, but there are glimmers. The thing that Buddhism and Hinduism and Christianity all share is the knowledge that true freedom isn’t to be had in always getting your way. Whether Jesus on the cross, or Gautama Buddha under the Bodhi tree, or an 80 year old Hindu woman willing to have tea with a 21 year old American girl, the basic movement beyond ego and self-interest flows in the same direction. Many deeper minds than my own have engaged in serious interfaith dialogue on this.
Buddhism, a religious sibling to Hinduism, teaches profoundly about compassion, particularly compassion for ourselves—the wellspring of our compassion for others. The teacher Roshi Pat Enkyo O'Hara says the thing that gets us caught is the story we tell ourselves about who we are—we get caught on our former selves and forget that the “we” we are has always been an illusion, a set of ideas that props us up to face the world, but ultimately of no more weight than a breath. These stories we tell are a deep part of the suffering we create. As a Christian, I look behind the un-substance of that breath and see the image of God in which we all are made—and the detritus of sin that separates me from living into it more honestly. As a Christian, too, I know nothing can separate me from the love of God.
I’ll leave you with one of those stronger interfaith minds than my own, the monk Thomas Merton (1915-1968).
Both Christianity and Buddhism show that suffering remains inexplicable, most of all for the [one] who attempts to explain it in order to evade it, or who thinks explanation itself is an escape. Suffering is not a ‘problem’ as if it were something we could stand outside of and control. Suffering, as both Christianity and Buddhism see, each in its own way, is part of our very ego-identity and empirical existence, and the only thing to do about it is to plunge right into the middle of contradiction and confusion in order to be transformed by what Zen calls ‘the great death’ and Christianity calls ‘dying and rising with Christ’.
Blessings,
Sara+
More on Roshi Pat Enkyo O'Hara here.
More on Thomas Merton here.
Friday, January 9, 2015
On (Not) Getting Our Stories Straight
Dear People of Christ Church,
Blessings on this week of Epiphany!
This year through both Advent and Christmas I’ve continually felt drawn toward the multiplicity of our narratives—from Matthew to Mark to Luke to John, the church has long told many stories to explain our faith. To be religious is to be bound by a certain set of questions and symbols, but at the same time to hold a radical openness to truth—to stand at the doorway of Scripture and see shepherds at the manger on our left and Magi at the house with Jesus on the right and be able to extend our arms wide and say to both, “yes,” “thank you,” “Amen.” The shepherds teach me that God’s truth is revealed in some unlikely corners of society; the Magi teach me that the revelation of truth sometimes comes from far away.
There is much in the media this week over the attacks against the satirical French newspaper Charlie Hebdo, in which twelve staff members were shot this week in an attack apparently by Islamic fundamentalists. Is religion the problem? One of my favorite authors, Salman Rushdie, says it is, and calls it “a medieval form of unreason,” and says religion deserves our “fearless disrespect.” Certainly I have little sympathy for homicidal fundamentalists, but it seems unuseful to lump every impulse toward transcendence and mystery in the same category. Religious violence has endured through millennia. The Egyptians oppressed the Hebrews and the Spanish Inquisition oppressed non-Catholics. Christian fundamentalists have bombed abortion clinics and now Islamic fundamentalists attack cartoonists and school girls. The thing those all have in common is contempt and violence, not religion. Charlie Hebdo was contemptuous (and from what I’ve seen, probably racist, too)—but not violent, and not deserving of murder. It’s cruel irony that one of the police officers murdered in the attack was Muslim, risking his life to protect those on the magazine who pilloried his prophet.
So what to do? As thousands in France held up their pens in support of the writers and artists who were killed on Tuesday, as a religious person I hold out two open hands. I hold out open hands for mystery, for attentiveness and for curiosity. Open hands to say that I don’t come to Scripture—or even my own life!— with certainty, but with faith. I’ll imagine the magi in the stable and give thanks for the holy strangeness of kings in a barn. I’ll imagine the shepherds at the house and hope that their lambs don’t wander into the kitchen. I’ll get out of bed every day to meet my own chaotic life of distraction and wonder—parenting and preaching and learning and falling and getting up again—through all of it so grateful for a faith big enough to hold the pieces together.
At Epiphany, we remember the magi following a star and listening to the invitation in their dream to go home by another way. What new path are you on today? What’s the power of your faith against violence? Where do you need the stars to illuminate your road?
Blessings,
Sara+
Blessings on this week of Epiphany!
This year through both Advent and Christmas I’ve continually felt drawn toward the multiplicity of our narratives—from Matthew to Mark to Luke to John, the church has long told many stories to explain our faith. To be religious is to be bound by a certain set of questions and symbols, but at the same time to hold a radical openness to truth—to stand at the doorway of Scripture and see shepherds at the manger on our left and Magi at the house with Jesus on the right and be able to extend our arms wide and say to both, “yes,” “thank you,” “Amen.” The shepherds teach me that God’s truth is revealed in some unlikely corners of society; the Magi teach me that the revelation of truth sometimes comes from far away.
There is much in the media this week over the attacks against the satirical French newspaper Charlie Hebdo, in which twelve staff members were shot this week in an attack apparently by Islamic fundamentalists. Is religion the problem? One of my favorite authors, Salman Rushdie, says it is, and calls it “a medieval form of unreason,” and says religion deserves our “fearless disrespect.” Certainly I have little sympathy for homicidal fundamentalists, but it seems unuseful to lump every impulse toward transcendence and mystery in the same category. Religious violence has endured through millennia. The Egyptians oppressed the Hebrews and the Spanish Inquisition oppressed non-Catholics. Christian fundamentalists have bombed abortion clinics and now Islamic fundamentalists attack cartoonists and school girls. The thing those all have in common is contempt and violence, not religion. Charlie Hebdo was contemptuous (and from what I’ve seen, probably racist, too)—but not violent, and not deserving of murder. It’s cruel irony that one of the police officers murdered in the attack was Muslim, risking his life to protect those on the magazine who pilloried his prophet.
So what to do? As thousands in France held up their pens in support of the writers and artists who were killed on Tuesday, as a religious person I hold out two open hands. I hold out open hands for mystery, for attentiveness and for curiosity. Open hands to say that I don’t come to Scripture—or even my own life!— with certainty, but with faith. I’ll imagine the magi in the stable and give thanks for the holy strangeness of kings in a barn. I’ll imagine the shepherds at the house and hope that their lambs don’t wander into the kitchen. I’ll get out of bed every day to meet my own chaotic life of distraction and wonder—parenting and preaching and learning and falling and getting up again—through all of it so grateful for a faith big enough to hold the pieces together.
At Epiphany, we remember the magi following a star and listening to the invitation in their dream to go home by another way. What new path are you on today? What’s the power of your faith against violence? Where do you need the stars to illuminate your road?
Blessings,
Sara+
Thursday, July 10, 2014
Prayers for Listening
Dear people of Christ Church,
This week, I'm praying for the Middle East, for listening there and listening everywhere. Wednesday's Daily Office reading had the story of Jesus weeping for Jerusalem, which felt particularly poignant given the heightening of conflict that's erupted in the last week. Scripture tells the story of the people of Israel-those descended from Jacob, whom we're reading about in our Old Testament lessons this summer. Jacob wrestling with the angel is a far distance from rockets fired into Gaza.
As Christians, we are given a place to stand that offers us some resources. I heard a story once about someone asking Ghandi about what he thought about Christianity and he said something to the effect of "I think it's great. Christians should try it out!" The not-so-subtle critique there being that his own enacted philosophy and practice of nonviolence were more consistent with the teaching of Jesus than those who follow him. Ouch. Non violent change is slow, impractical, and expensive. But practically, it is the only thing that can actually work. Trouble is, so often in politics and global conflict it seems that violence is the only way. This is a deadly thing to be so confident about.
I heard an interview last week on my way to church on the show, On Being, about the religious founding of our country. Yes, absolutely, it was founded on Judeo Christian values-I can share that perspective with the Hobby Lobby. The difference, though, and the founding attitude I think we need more of now (notably apart from the desire to impose our beliefs on others) is humility. Steven Waldman said that the major difference between religion in public life now is that we no longer have a sense of humility about our nation. We can get this wrong. We do get this wrong. Often! In America the Beautiful, we sing our prayer for God to "mend [America's] every flaw" because there are flaws. How are we, as a country, treating the most vulnerable? How are we coming to the aid of those in need, in our own borders and out of them, and in the boundary in between? Not very well, right now.
Along for peace in Israel and Palestine, pray, pray, pray for a sense of humility to enter our conversations. In my sermon on Sunday I was thinking about how our failure to be in relationship with those whom we differ is the source of so much conflict-if you're not in relationship, you can't listen. The Hobby Lobby isn't listening to scientific research about birth control, and the Supreme Court isn't listening to women. A border patrol agent almost by definition can't listen to the child who's just turned himself in. Listen, listen, listen.
And pray:
O God, you made us in your own image and redeemed us through Jesus your Son: Look with compassion on the whole human family; take away the arrogance and hatred which infect our hearts; break down the walls that separate us; unite us in bonds of love; and work through our struggle and confusion to accomplish your purposes on earth; that, in your good time, all nations and races may serve you in harmony around your heavenly throne; through Jesus Christ our Lord.
...Prayer for the Human Family, BCP 815
Amen.
Blessings,
Sara+
PS: For some good witnessing to the power of presence, see how St John's Episcopal Church in McAllen, Texas, is aiding asylum seekers in partnership with Episcopal Relief and Development. Also for a nice rendering of Earth and All Stars, which we sing this Sunday in the praise of the Lord for boiling test tubes and knowledge and truth, see here.
This week, I'm praying for the Middle East, for listening there and listening everywhere. Wednesday's Daily Office reading had the story of Jesus weeping for Jerusalem, which felt particularly poignant given the heightening of conflict that's erupted in the last week. Scripture tells the story of the people of Israel-those descended from Jacob, whom we're reading about in our Old Testament lessons this summer. Jacob wrestling with the angel is a far distance from rockets fired into Gaza.
As Christians, we are given a place to stand that offers us some resources. I heard a story once about someone asking Ghandi about what he thought about Christianity and he said something to the effect of "I think it's great. Christians should try it out!" The not-so-subtle critique there being that his own enacted philosophy and practice of nonviolence were more consistent with the teaching of Jesus than those who follow him. Ouch. Non violent change is slow, impractical, and expensive. But practically, it is the only thing that can actually work. Trouble is, so often in politics and global conflict it seems that violence is the only way. This is a deadly thing to be so confident about.
I heard an interview last week on my way to church on the show, On Being, about the religious founding of our country. Yes, absolutely, it was founded on Judeo Christian values-I can share that perspective with the Hobby Lobby. The difference, though, and the founding attitude I think we need more of now (notably apart from the desire to impose our beliefs on others) is humility. Steven Waldman said that the major difference between religion in public life now is that we no longer have a sense of humility about our nation. We can get this wrong. We do get this wrong. Often! In America the Beautiful, we sing our prayer for God to "mend [America's] every flaw" because there are flaws. How are we, as a country, treating the most vulnerable? How are we coming to the aid of those in need, in our own borders and out of them, and in the boundary in between? Not very well, right now.
Along for peace in Israel and Palestine, pray, pray, pray for a sense of humility to enter our conversations. In my sermon on Sunday I was thinking about how our failure to be in relationship with those whom we differ is the source of so much conflict-if you're not in relationship, you can't listen. The Hobby Lobby isn't listening to scientific research about birth control, and the Supreme Court isn't listening to women. A border patrol agent almost by definition can't listen to the child who's just turned himself in. Listen, listen, listen.
And pray:
O God, you made us in your own image and redeemed us through Jesus your Son: Look with compassion on the whole human family; take away the arrogance and hatred which infect our hearts; break down the walls that separate us; unite us in bonds of love; and work through our struggle and confusion to accomplish your purposes on earth; that, in your good time, all nations and races may serve you in harmony around your heavenly throne; through Jesus Christ our Lord.
...Prayer for the Human Family, BCP 815
Amen.
Blessings,
Sara+
PS: For some good witnessing to the power of presence, see how St John's Episcopal Church in McAllen, Texas, is aiding asylum seekers in partnership with Episcopal Relief and Development. Also for a nice rendering of Earth and All Stars, which we sing this Sunday in the praise of the Lord for boiling test tubes and knowledge and truth, see here.
Thursday, May 16, 2013
From May 9: Dialogue on Faith
Dear People of Christ Church,
Last Friday, I had the wonderful opportunity of joining friends from the Massachusetts Council of Churches at Friday Prayers at the Islamic Society of Boston Cultural Center. The director of MCC, Laura Everett, has long been a friend, and she invited colleagues to join in an ecumenical witness of support for the Muslim community in the aftermath of the Boston bombings and recent Islamophobia. Hands down, it was one of the best sermons I've heard; at least with preaching, I tend to regard brevity in highest regard, but Imam Suhaib spoke for 45 minutes and I was more focused on taking notes than clock watching. From the moment we walked in the door, too, the welcome was incredibly warm, and we were invited to stay after for lunch. When there was an extra chicken curry, Loay, their director of development, sent that home with me for dinner, too!
The theme of the sermon was American Islam-which both is and isn't "a thing." How we relate to our culture is something we all grapple with-as we were mulling over in our recent Christ Church Quarterly, as Christians we've sort of forgotten how important it is to stand apart from culture. As Muslims, Imam Suhaib said, maybe they've emphasized that separation too much. As for American Islam? On the one hand, "Imam Will" shes/(who actually grew up Baptist in Oklahoma City and was a DJ before converting to Islam) said that it's wrong to talk about American Islam. God made everyone-every society. The universality of Islam is to care for everyone. At the same time, he said, we recognize that there are many cultures, and many different ways to honor God and share faith. American Muslims live differently from those who live in Bangladesh, and will express their faith differently as well. The most important thingis to challenge ourselves to be relevant to the world as it is now; don't talk about medieval conflicts, talk about contemporary narcissism. Don't define yourself by a disagreement that happened 1000 years ago, apply the reasoning that helped people of faith live through it to contemporary problems. Fundamentalism, Imam Suhaib said, is a modern problem-it comes from a modern desire to see everything in an absolutist way. The premodern view was much more flexible. This is true for Christians, too-the early church was much more committed to Scripture in terms of metaphor and allegory than those who claim the label "orthodox" do today.
The contemporary world can be a hard place to be a person of faith; so much about the world now is about instantaneous answers and incontrovertible truth. Faith, though, takes time; it takes time to nurture a relationship with God. It takes time to be in that relationship with God. It takes energy-it takes all of what you have and all of who you are. We are converted by experience, Suhaib said, not by cognition. That's pretty counter cultural, and something we all need to spend some time with. What is converting you right now? Where are you being transformed in your life, right now? Jesus said, "Come and see," not "Decide right now or else."
I left the mosque feeling not just like I'd listened in on some really good thinking, but also profoundly grateful for the diversity of so many experiences of holiness. Of course, there are some serious bedrock differences between Christianity and Islam, but (and I know it sounds trite), there really is so much that unites us in terms of how we live in the world. Being in dialogue makes us better at being who we are. And being supportive of brothers and sisters in faith-no matter what faith-makes us better, period.
Blesings,
Sara+
Last Friday, I had the wonderful opportunity of joining friends from the Massachusetts Council of Churches at Friday Prayers at the Islamic Society of Boston Cultural Center. The director of MCC, Laura Everett, has long been a friend, and she invited colleagues to join in an ecumenical witness of support for the Muslim community in the aftermath of the Boston bombings and recent Islamophobia. Hands down, it was one of the best sermons I've heard; at least with preaching, I tend to regard brevity in highest regard, but Imam Suhaib spoke for 45 minutes and I was more focused on taking notes than clock watching. From the moment we walked in the door, too, the welcome was incredibly warm, and we were invited to stay after for lunch. When there was an extra chicken curry, Loay, their director of development, sent that home with me for dinner, too!
The theme of the sermon was American Islam-which both is and isn't "a thing." How we relate to our culture is something we all grapple with-as we were mulling over in our recent Christ Church Quarterly, as Christians we've sort of forgotten how important it is to stand apart from culture. As Muslims, Imam Suhaib said, maybe they've emphasized that separation too much. As for American Islam? On the one hand, "Imam Will" shes/(who actually grew up Baptist in Oklahoma City and was a DJ before converting to Islam) said that it's wrong to talk about American Islam. God made everyone-every society. The universality of Islam is to care for everyone. At the same time, he said, we recognize that there are many cultures, and many different ways to honor God and share faith. American Muslims live differently from those who live in Bangladesh, and will express their faith differently as well. The most important thingis to challenge ourselves to be relevant to the world as it is now; don't talk about medieval conflicts, talk about contemporary narcissism. Don't define yourself by a disagreement that happened 1000 years ago, apply the reasoning that helped people of faith live through it to contemporary problems. Fundamentalism, Imam Suhaib said, is a modern problem-it comes from a modern desire to see everything in an absolutist way. The premodern view was much more flexible. This is true for Christians, too-the early church was much more committed to Scripture in terms of metaphor and allegory than those who claim the label "orthodox" do today.
The contemporary world can be a hard place to be a person of faith; so much about the world now is about instantaneous answers and incontrovertible truth. Faith, though, takes time; it takes time to nurture a relationship with God. It takes time to be in that relationship with God. It takes energy-it takes all of what you have and all of who you are. We are converted by experience, Suhaib said, not by cognition. That's pretty counter cultural, and something we all need to spend some time with. What is converting you right now? Where are you being transformed in your life, right now? Jesus said, "Come and see," not "Decide right now or else."
I left the mosque feeling not just like I'd listened in on some really good thinking, but also profoundly grateful for the diversity of so many experiences of holiness. Of course, there are some serious bedrock differences between Christianity and Islam, but (and I know it sounds trite), there really is so much that unites us in terms of how we live in the world. Being in dialogue makes us better at being who we are. And being supportive of brothers and sisters in faith-no matter what faith-makes us better, period.
Blesings,
Sara+
Thursday, March 7, 2013
From March 7: Remembering Uganda and Tanzania
Dear People of Christ Church,
Looking out at the snow, I'm getting ready for the presentation I'll share after church this Sunday about my sabbatical trip to Africa. Three months ago at this time, I was sitting in a cinderblock church in Kizara, Tanzania. I was one of about 20 at the altar-twelve other priests and two bishops, plus six altar servers-and the only woman. But what a glorious day. It took us six hours to drive up the Usambara mountains to the tiny village of Kizara, where the Massachusetts-based Friends of Tanzania had helped to fund the construction of a health center. I was there with Bishop Shaw and a constellation of other clergy and lay people from home to bless it and celebrate the new care that would be available to people in that very remote part of the world.
Our group left on December 2, all of our bags loaded down with candy, bubbles, and school supplies (many donated by YOU!) to share with the children we would meet. I felt some uneasiness in appearing suddenly as strangers with candy-on the face of it, pretty useless-but after spending some time with people I felt less angst and more... fun. After all, Jesus didn't turn water into a nutritious wheat grass soy shake-he turned it into wine. Doing the hokey pokey with our lollipops in a churchyard in Kasese, Uganda while children's parents went for HIV testing and younger siblings were vaccinated was definitely a Cana moment. Love is an international language-apparently also refined sugar.
Our trip was divided into two parts-one week in Tanzania hosted by the Anglican Diocese of Tanga and five days (not counting travel time) in Kasese, Uganda, hosted by the Bishop Masereka Christian Foundation. We landed at the airport in Mt Kilimanjaro, Tanzania, and drove to Korogwe, the home of the Diocesan offices, where our task was to visit parishes and build relationships between Tanzania and Massachusetts. The Anglican Church in Tanzania has good British Oxford Movement roots and is correspondingly high church, so Bishop Shaw and Bishop Maimbo blessed the health center that day in fine form with cope and miter on a rainy, 80 degree day. We blessed a lot of things on the trip-swing sets, a kindergarten classroom, sewing machines, hospital rooms-there was such an embodied sense of God's generosity and celebration.
Our time in Tanzania was all church. The next week, our Uganda visit was all mission. Bishop Masereka has visited our diocese several times (and has preached here and at St Peter's), so I thought I had some sense of what they do-I was wrong. It's nearly impossible to convey just with words the astonishing difference the Foundation makes in the lives of the people of Kasese.
The Foundation's work is divided between health care and education. Our diocesan collaborative campaign (to which Christ Church has so far given about $35,000 through our Together Now pledges-yay!) has supported the construction of a new and Jubilee Funds have supported the education program as well. Their health work is currently done out of their health center and mobile clinic (which reaches those who can't or won't come to their offices). With a 15% rate of HIV infection among adults in Kasese, the district is home to 15,000 to 20,000 orphans. Funding school is hard enough (the fees for primary school are about $400 a year, depending on whether in includes room and board), but for kids without a stable home situation, it's next to impossible. In the education program, sponsored students are given 360 degrees of support-from tuition and fees to books to girls' menstrual products-there is no barrier left standing between these dedicated students and their education. Students come from families where one or both parents have died from HIV, or are themselves positive or otherwise vulnerable. BMCF supports 611 children, more than 50% of whom don't live with a parent. Ann Nyangoma and her staff spare nothing in their efforts to keep kids in school, but financial barriers are another question-there are always more kids who need help.
What was most amazing-and there were a lot of amazing things on that trip-was how much confidence I came out of it in the work that's being done. I really believe that the Diocese of Tanga is going to follow through on their "Vision 2025" plan to expand accountability in their organizations and clergy support through their parishes. I really believe that fewer kids will drop out of school, that fewer mothers will pass HIV on to their babies. We saw a lot of struggle, but also a lot of hope.
This Sunday after our 10 am service, I'll share more about our trip. For our international Easter collection this year, the Vestry has decided to send our support to the Masereka Foundation's Children's Program, so I hope you'll choose to give generously. Last year's "Creole Pig" collection for Haiti gathered about $800-about enough for two kids to attend school for a year. Do you think we could go for $1200 and get three kids enrolled?
Hear more on Sunday.
blessings,
Sara+
p.s. I blogged all the steamy (literally steamy-hot and rainy season steamy) details at my blog --click on "Tanzania and Uganda." You can also read more about the ministries in Tanzania at Friends of Tanzania/Tanga
See also:
The Bishop Masereka Christian Foundation
The Anglican Diocese of Tanga
Looking out at the snow, I'm getting ready for the presentation I'll share after church this Sunday about my sabbatical trip to Africa. Three months ago at this time, I was sitting in a cinderblock church in Kizara, Tanzania. I was one of about 20 at the altar-twelve other priests and two bishops, plus six altar servers-and the only woman. But what a glorious day. It took us six hours to drive up the Usambara mountains to the tiny village of Kizara, where the Massachusetts-based Friends of Tanzania had helped to fund the construction of a health center. I was there with Bishop Shaw and a constellation of other clergy and lay people from home to bless it and celebrate the new care that would be available to people in that very remote part of the world.
Our group left on December 2, all of our bags loaded down with candy, bubbles, and school supplies (many donated by YOU!) to share with the children we would meet. I felt some uneasiness in appearing suddenly as strangers with candy-on the face of it, pretty useless-but after spending some time with people I felt less angst and more... fun. After all, Jesus didn't turn water into a nutritious wheat grass soy shake-he turned it into wine. Doing the hokey pokey with our lollipops in a churchyard in Kasese, Uganda while children's parents went for HIV testing and younger siblings were vaccinated was definitely a Cana moment. Love is an international language-apparently also refined sugar.
Our trip was divided into two parts-one week in Tanzania hosted by the Anglican Diocese of Tanga and five days (not counting travel time) in Kasese, Uganda, hosted by the Bishop Masereka Christian Foundation. We landed at the airport in Mt Kilimanjaro, Tanzania, and drove to Korogwe, the home of the Diocesan offices, where our task was to visit parishes and build relationships between Tanzania and Massachusetts. The Anglican Church in Tanzania has good British Oxford Movement roots and is correspondingly high church, so Bishop Shaw and Bishop Maimbo blessed the health center that day in fine form with cope and miter on a rainy, 80 degree day. We blessed a lot of things on the trip-swing sets, a kindergarten classroom, sewing machines, hospital rooms-there was such an embodied sense of God's generosity and celebration.
Our time in Tanzania was all church. The next week, our Uganda visit was all mission. Bishop Masereka has visited our diocese several times (and has preached here and at St Peter's), so I thought I had some sense of what they do-I was wrong. It's nearly impossible to convey just with words the astonishing difference the Foundation makes in the lives of the people of Kasese.
The Foundation's work is divided between health care and education. Our diocesan collaborative campaign (to which Christ Church has so far given about $35,000 through our Together Now pledges-yay!) has supported the construction of a new and Jubilee Funds have supported the education program as well. Their health work is currently done out of their health center and mobile clinic (which reaches those who can't or won't come to their offices). With a 15% rate of HIV infection among adults in Kasese, the district is home to 15,000 to 20,000 orphans. Funding school is hard enough (the fees for primary school are about $400 a year, depending on whether in includes room and board), but for kids without a stable home situation, it's next to impossible. In the education program, sponsored students are given 360 degrees of support-from tuition and fees to books to girls' menstrual products-there is no barrier left standing between these dedicated students and their education. Students come from families where one or both parents have died from HIV, or are themselves positive or otherwise vulnerable. BMCF supports 611 children, more than 50% of whom don't live with a parent. Ann Nyangoma and her staff spare nothing in their efforts to keep kids in school, but financial barriers are another question-there are always more kids who need help.
What was most amazing-and there were a lot of amazing things on that trip-was how much confidence I came out of it in the work that's being done. I really believe that the Diocese of Tanga is going to follow through on their "Vision 2025" plan to expand accountability in their organizations and clergy support through their parishes. I really believe that fewer kids will drop out of school, that fewer mothers will pass HIV on to their babies. We saw a lot of struggle, but also a lot of hope.
This Sunday after our 10 am service, I'll share more about our trip. For our international Easter collection this year, the Vestry has decided to send our support to the Masereka Foundation's Children's Program, so I hope you'll choose to give generously. Last year's "Creole Pig" collection for Haiti gathered about $800-about enough for two kids to attend school for a year. Do you think we could go for $1200 and get three kids enrolled?
Hear more on Sunday.
blessings,
Sara+
p.s. I blogged all the steamy (literally steamy-hot and rainy season steamy) details at my blog --click on "Tanzania and Uganda." You can also read more about the ministries in Tanzania at Friends of Tanzania/Tanga
See also:
The Bishop Masereka Christian Foundation
The Anglican Diocese of Tanga
Wednesday, January 9, 2013
From 12 20: The Christmas Moment
Dear People of Christ Church,
It's so nice to be back writing to you, particularly knowing how well things have gone in my absence! I am so thankful to Rev. Norm Faramelli for holding down the fort, and to Sharon in the office for managing everything so smoothly behind the scenes. And there are not enough thanks and blessings for Jonathan, your senior warden, Victoria, and all the vestry! At the root of it all is my gratitude to God for all the ways God has made this such a strong church and to each of you who make it what it is. Since it's the end of the year, I also offer thanks to those who have made financial pledges for 2013-get those cards in!
So what have I been up to?
My initial goals were writing poetry and singing, and for September, November, and December, I was immersed in those projects. I met with teachers affiliated with Bethany House of Prayer (for poetry) and Episcopal Divinity School (for singing), and have collected a few things I've written which hopefully soon will reach the light of day and into a readable form. I attended church on Sundays with my family at Grace Church, Medford, where Noah is the rector, and sang in the choir there, which was so much fun. So. Much. Fun. I was happy to see many of you when I came to church on December 2 before taking off for Africa. My trip to Tanzania and Uganda was amazing-beautiful, heartbreaking, fascinating-the adjectives continue. I wrote and posted pictures whenever I had internet access at my personal blog- www.saraiwrites.blogspot.com -and you're welcome to take a look.
Finally, Christmas. Throughout my time in Africa, my thoughts returned often to all the hustle and bustle that must have been taking place at home, none of which was evident where I was. I did, however, see Christmas everywhere. Why Christmas? Because Christmas is the time when we look to God, most ultimate power of the universe, born in powerlessness.
In this Christmas moment, God has chosen the weakest possible place to show us who God is. At Christmas we learn that God will always go to the place of the least power. God will go to the kids we met in Tanzania who have no access to health care within 100 miles. God will go to the Ugandan teenager whose parents have died of AIDS and whose grandmother is dying too and can't take care of her. To the twelve year old who doesn't have enough food and gets dizzy from his HIV medicine. To the fifteen year old who has become the head of her household and goes out to sell charcoal before school.
To Newtown, and to all victims of gun violence. To the new immigrant struggling to learn English and the elder who stretches to make ends meet by the end of the month. To the gay teenager coming out to his parents, unsure of how they will react. All of those places of weakness and struggle are where God will be born. All of those people will not be abandoned. God will be born, too, in places of justice-making. Where Ann Nyangoma, the director of the education program we visited offers comprehensive family support and school tuition to sponsored students. Where Bishop Maimbo of the Anglican Diocese of Tanzania helps his parishes start microcredit programs and build capacity for local hospitals. Where the Community Day Center of Waltham offers a refuge from the street. All of these are images of Christmas, where a different vision of power comes to be. Not the power of wealth or influence, but the power of vulnerability and love.
There is nothing wrong with presents at Christmas. But that version of giving isn't the whole story. Christmas isn't just about giving. It's about being changed, top to bottom, and bringing that change into the streets. Celebrating the birth of God born in a truly marginal place-among people who are oppressed, who society turns away from-how will we be moved? How will we turn away from imaginary conflicts over public displays of religion and look at where God can actually be found?
How will we hear what God asks of us, and how will we respond?
Blessings,
Sara+
p.s. Visit www.maserekafoundation.org for more on the group we spent time with in Uganda; my
blog is at www.saraiwrites.blogspot.com
It's so nice to be back writing to you, particularly knowing how well things have gone in my absence! I am so thankful to Rev. Norm Faramelli for holding down the fort, and to Sharon in the office for managing everything so smoothly behind the scenes. And there are not enough thanks and blessings for Jonathan, your senior warden, Victoria, and all the vestry! At the root of it all is my gratitude to God for all the ways God has made this such a strong church and to each of you who make it what it is. Since it's the end of the year, I also offer thanks to those who have made financial pledges for 2013-get those cards in!
So what have I been up to?
My initial goals were writing poetry and singing, and for September, November, and December, I was immersed in those projects. I met with teachers affiliated with Bethany House of Prayer (for poetry) and Episcopal Divinity School (for singing), and have collected a few things I've written which hopefully soon will reach the light of day and into a readable form. I attended church on Sundays with my family at Grace Church, Medford, where Noah is the rector, and sang in the choir there, which was so much fun. So. Much. Fun. I was happy to see many of you when I came to church on December 2 before taking off for Africa. My trip to Tanzania and Uganda was amazing-beautiful, heartbreaking, fascinating-the adjectives continue. I wrote and posted pictures whenever I had internet access at my personal blog- www.saraiwrites.blogspot.com -and you're welcome to take a look.
Finally, Christmas. Throughout my time in Africa, my thoughts returned often to all the hustle and bustle that must have been taking place at home, none of which was evident where I was. I did, however, see Christmas everywhere. Why Christmas? Because Christmas is the time when we look to God, most ultimate power of the universe, born in powerlessness.
In this Christmas moment, God has chosen the weakest possible place to show us who God is. At Christmas we learn that God will always go to the place of the least power. God will go to the kids we met in Tanzania who have no access to health care within 100 miles. God will go to the Ugandan teenager whose parents have died of AIDS and whose grandmother is dying too and can't take care of her. To the twelve year old who doesn't have enough food and gets dizzy from his HIV medicine. To the fifteen year old who has become the head of her household and goes out to sell charcoal before school.
To Newtown, and to all victims of gun violence. To the new immigrant struggling to learn English and the elder who stretches to make ends meet by the end of the month. To the gay teenager coming out to his parents, unsure of how they will react. All of those places of weakness and struggle are where God will be born. All of those people will not be abandoned. God will be born, too, in places of justice-making. Where Ann Nyangoma, the director of the education program we visited offers comprehensive family support and school tuition to sponsored students. Where Bishop Maimbo of the Anglican Diocese of Tanzania helps his parishes start microcredit programs and build capacity for local hospitals. Where the Community Day Center of Waltham offers a refuge from the street. All of these are images of Christmas, where a different vision of power comes to be. Not the power of wealth or influence, but the power of vulnerability and love.
There is nothing wrong with presents at Christmas. But that version of giving isn't the whole story. Christmas isn't just about giving. It's about being changed, top to bottom, and bringing that change into the streets. Celebrating the birth of God born in a truly marginal place-among people who are oppressed, who society turns away from-how will we be moved? How will we turn away from imaginary conflicts over public displays of religion and look at where God can actually be found?
How will we hear what God asks of us, and how will we respond?
Blessings,
Sara+
p.s. Visit www.maserekafoundation.org for more on the group we spent time with in Uganda; my
blog is at www.saraiwrites.blogspot.com
Wednesday, April 11, 2012
From March 29: Easter Pigs
I'm writing late this week, having scrambled today to put the finishing touches on our Quarterly (beautiful, as always, thanks to our dedicated contributors and visionary editor Kristin!) and our Palm Sunday liturgies for this week. Palm Sunday is emphatically not visionary-we do nearly the same thing every year, needing each year to read again, hear again, absorb again to try to encompass the Gospel story of the heights of Christ's triumphant entry into Jerusalem and the low of his crucifixion and Passion. What a blessing to be part of a church community that values both!
In other news, this Easter we will again focus on pigs for Haiti in a project organized by Boston-based Grassroots International. After having partnered with Heifer international for "Easter cows" for several years, in 2010 this Easter collection shifted its focus to Haiti in the aftermath of the devastating earthquake in January of that year, and we're glad to continue our support for their Creole Pig Repopulation project.
I'm passing on some words offered by Gene Burkart in the Quarterly that year:
...There is a sad story behind the pigs. Called the Creole pig, it once was a mainstay for rural Haitian families. A hearty, indigenous breed, it could tolerate the climate and feed off local vegetation. Its manure fertilized farm land and its meat added protein to diets. When a family needed extra cash for an emergency or special event, the pig could easily be sold at the market. It was "Haiti's Piggy Bank."
In the 1980's international development experts pressured the Haitian government to eradicate the pigs claiming that they threatened to spread swine flu to the big pig farms of the US. Although some disputed the claim, all the pigs were killed off. People who lost pigs were given a replacement pig from Iowa that was supposed to be newer and better. It didn't turn out that way, though. The new pigs needed to be shaded from the sun, could only eat expensive imported feed, and could not drink local water. The meat didn't taste as good either. Soon the Haitians began calling the pigs the "four-footed princes".
Grassroots International has been working with a Haitian group (National Peasant Movement of the Papaye Congress) since the 1980's to restore the Creole pigs to Haiti. One pig costs about $55.00. To make your donation (of any amount!), just write "Easter pigs" in the memo line of your check.
In other news, this Easter we will again focus on pigs for Haiti in a project organized by Boston-based Grassroots International. After having partnered with Heifer international for "Easter cows" for several years, in 2010 this Easter collection shifted its focus to Haiti in the aftermath of the devastating earthquake in January of that year, and we're glad to continue our support for their Creole Pig Repopulation project.
I'm passing on some words offered by Gene Burkart in the Quarterly that year:
...There is a sad story behind the pigs. Called the Creole pig, it once was a mainstay for rural Haitian families. A hearty, indigenous breed, it could tolerate the climate and feed off local vegetation. Its manure fertilized farm land and its meat added protein to diets. When a family needed extra cash for an emergency or special event, the pig could easily be sold at the market. It was "Haiti's Piggy Bank."
In the 1980's international development experts pressured the Haitian government to eradicate the pigs claiming that they threatened to spread swine flu to the big pig farms of the US. Although some disputed the claim, all the pigs were killed off. People who lost pigs were given a replacement pig from Iowa that was supposed to be newer and better. It didn't turn out that way, though. The new pigs needed to be shaded from the sun, could only eat expensive imported feed, and could not drink local water. The meat didn't taste as good either. Soon the Haitians began calling the pigs the "four-footed princes".
Grassroots International has been working with a Haitian group (National Peasant Movement of the Papaye Congress) since the 1980's to restore the Creole pigs to Haiti. One pig costs about $55.00. To make your donation (of any amount!), just write "Easter pigs" in the memo line of your check.
Tuesday, March 9, 2010
One Step
This week, our Tuesday daytime book group concluded our conversations about The Lemon Tree, by Sandy Tolan. I mentioned the book in my sermon on Sunday; our Gospel told the story of Jesus weeping for Jerusalem, and Bashir and Dalia are the contemporary face of what Jesus is talking about, a Jerusalem that "kills its prophets." The title comes from a lemon tree, planted at the home of an Arab family in Palestine. When they are driven out during the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, Dalia's family, having escaped the holocaust, occupy the house. Dalia grows up being told that the Arabs who had lived there before simply fled. Why would they leave such a nice house, she wonders as she grows up, but doesn't pursue the line of thought until Bashir appears at her doorstep, wanting to see the house his own family had been forced to leave years before, when he was a child.
The book chronicles many long years of relationship which continue, even now. Dalia says they are not quite friends: "It is something beyond friendship; friends choose each other, and we have each other whether we choose one another or not." They see one another periodically, discussing their intractable positions; the house-the land-is home for both of them, but neither has peace and neither has what they truly want. Bashir is convicted and imprisoned for 15 years for a supermarket bombing; he does not say whether he has engaged in terrorism, only that the armed struggle of the Palestinians is a legitimate response. Even with the honesty and love that Bashir and Dalia clearly have for one another, their disagreement continues. Bashir is exiled-again-for his work in the intifada. Dalia comes to visit him, but he can never go back to see his house, or even the city of Jerusalem.
Ramle, Ramla; it's the same place, in a different language. Somehow, Dalia and Bashir begin to understand each other. When Dalia's parents die, she does not want to sell the house and keep the money for herself. She feels strongly that it was her home, but also Bashir's-she offers him payment for it, but he won't accept. Rather than take money, Bashir suggests that something be done for the Arab children of Ramle "because I lost my childhood there." Before exile, his left hand was blown off when he picked up an Israeli grenade. Today, Open House has a nursery school for Arab children and supports Peace Camps for Israeli and Palestinian children. (see www.friendsofopenhouse.org).
Even in this deep conflict God's grace opens a tiny window. Bashir and Dalia still disagree. Dalia sees giving up the place she'd grown up as a personal decision; politically, she doesn't advocate for reparations for all Palestinians, or the right of return. Bashir still believes in armed struggle. But it's one step, for them, that ripples out to each child who meets another child who is different from them. One thing that Dalia and Bashir share is the deep sense of exile; what we all have to pray for is that they can find a place where they can both come home.
To hear the original radio documentary that gave rise to the book, click here:
www.thirdcoastfestival.org/audio_library_2001.asp
To read Dalia's 1988 account of their relationship, published in the Jerusalem Post as "Letter to a Deportee" click here: www.friendsofopenhouse.org
Blessings,
Sara+
The book chronicles many long years of relationship which continue, even now. Dalia says they are not quite friends: "It is something beyond friendship; friends choose each other, and we have each other whether we choose one another or not." They see one another periodically, discussing their intractable positions; the house-the land-is home for both of them, but neither has peace and neither has what they truly want. Bashir is convicted and imprisoned for 15 years for a supermarket bombing; he does not say whether he has engaged in terrorism, only that the armed struggle of the Palestinians is a legitimate response. Even with the honesty and love that Bashir and Dalia clearly have for one another, their disagreement continues. Bashir is exiled-again-for his work in the intifada. Dalia comes to visit him, but he can never go back to see his house, or even the city of Jerusalem.
Ramle, Ramla; it's the same place, in a different language. Somehow, Dalia and Bashir begin to understand each other. When Dalia's parents die, she does not want to sell the house and keep the money for herself. She feels strongly that it was her home, but also Bashir's-she offers him payment for it, but he won't accept. Rather than take money, Bashir suggests that something be done for the Arab children of Ramle "because I lost my childhood there." Before exile, his left hand was blown off when he picked up an Israeli grenade. Today, Open House has a nursery school for Arab children and supports Peace Camps for Israeli and Palestinian children. (see www.friendsofopenhouse.org).
Even in this deep conflict God's grace opens a tiny window. Bashir and Dalia still disagree. Dalia sees giving up the place she'd grown up as a personal decision; politically, she doesn't advocate for reparations for all Palestinians, or the right of return. Bashir still believes in armed struggle. But it's one step, for them, that ripples out to each child who meets another child who is different from them. One thing that Dalia and Bashir share is the deep sense of exile; what we all have to pray for is that they can find a place where they can both come home.
To hear the original radio documentary that gave rise to the book, click here:
www.thirdcoastfestival.org/audio_library_2001.asp
To read Dalia's 1988 account of their relationship, published in the Jerusalem Post as "Letter to a Deportee" click here: www.friendsofopenhouse.org
Blessings,
Sara+
Saturday, January 16, 2010
Disaster in Haiti
Today, pray for Haiti.
Already the poorest nation in the western hemisphere, the recent earthquake has created devastation we cannot now even imagine. The diocese of Haiti is one of the largest dioceses (they're part of the American Episcopal Church), serving more than 100,000 members. A friend of mine worked at the Cathedral there some years ago, and they have already heard that the daughter of one of Haiti's deputies to General Convention was killed. Lisa Mbele-Mbong was a human rights worker for the UN and did not survive the collapse of the human-rights section of the building that housed the United Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti.
In addition to its 168 congregations, the diocese of Haiti's ministry includes 254 schools, medical clinics, and other development projects like micro-financing and reforestation programs. We have heard so far that the cathedral and the bishop's home have been destroyed-reports are still coming in at what other ministries have been damaged. The bishop and his family are safe, as is a Massachusetts member of the Episcopal Young Adult Service Corps who is teaching at the seminary there. Another young adult volunteer, Mallory Holding, is also fine, but the convent of the Sisters of Saint Margaret (who also have a convent in Boston) has been destroyed. Unconfirmed reports indicate the sisters are safe (there is a link to the Sisters' Haiti page below).
Our own Episcopal Relief and Development (er-d.org) is already contributing to the relief effort. Since the diocese of Haiti is so strong, they have been doing disaster preparedness work for some time. With the biggest earthquake in 200 years, though, this is not something you can really prepare for--and it certainly doesn't feel as though we here can do very much.
In his statement on the disaster, Bishop Shaw wrote,
Please know how much our prayers are needed. An unfathomable catastrophe like this in a place that has already known so much hardship really does have us questioning God at the deepest levels of our faith. Yet we must know that God is more present to suffering than any of us could ever possibly be, and that as we are willing to take on the suffering of others, whether through our prayer, our donations or our service, we join God in God's compassionate presence.
Give prayers, and, even if it's just a small amount, give money. On a gut level, I am inclined to ransack my cupboards for spare blankets, but at this point material goods are less needed than the freedom for relief organizations to buy the supplies they need. We'll have bulletin inserts from Episcopal Relief and Development on Sunday, or you can make out a check to Christ Church with "Haiti Donation" in the memo line and we can send them as a group.
Blessings,
Sara+
Episcopal Relief and Development: www.er-d.org
Mallory Holding's blog: www.holdinghaiti.blogspot.com
The Sisters of Saint Margaret: www.ssmbos.com
More on the response from parishes in our diocese: www.diomass.org
Already the poorest nation in the western hemisphere, the recent earthquake has created devastation we cannot now even imagine. The diocese of Haiti is one of the largest dioceses (they're part of the American Episcopal Church), serving more than 100,000 members. A friend of mine worked at the Cathedral there some years ago, and they have already heard that the daughter of one of Haiti's deputies to General Convention was killed. Lisa Mbele-Mbong was a human rights worker for the UN and did not survive the collapse of the human-rights section of the building that housed the United Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti.
In addition to its 168 congregations, the diocese of Haiti's ministry includes 254 schools, medical clinics, and other development projects like micro-financing and reforestation programs. We have heard so far that the cathedral and the bishop's home have been destroyed-reports are still coming in at what other ministries have been damaged. The bishop and his family are safe, as is a Massachusetts member of the Episcopal Young Adult Service Corps who is teaching at the seminary there. Another young adult volunteer, Mallory Holding, is also fine, but the convent of the Sisters of Saint Margaret (who also have a convent in Boston) has been destroyed. Unconfirmed reports indicate the sisters are safe (there is a link to the Sisters' Haiti page below).
Our own Episcopal Relief and Development (er-d.org) is already contributing to the relief effort. Since the diocese of Haiti is so strong, they have been doing disaster preparedness work for some time. With the biggest earthquake in 200 years, though, this is not something you can really prepare for--and it certainly doesn't feel as though we here can do very much.
In his statement on the disaster, Bishop Shaw wrote,
Please know how much our prayers are needed. An unfathomable catastrophe like this in a place that has already known so much hardship really does have us questioning God at the deepest levels of our faith. Yet we must know that God is more present to suffering than any of us could ever possibly be, and that as we are willing to take on the suffering of others, whether through our prayer, our donations or our service, we join God in God's compassionate presence.
Give prayers, and, even if it's just a small amount, give money. On a gut level, I am inclined to ransack my cupboards for spare blankets, but at this point material goods are less needed than the freedom for relief organizations to buy the supplies they need. We'll have bulletin inserts from Episcopal Relief and Development on Sunday, or you can make out a check to Christ Church with "Haiti Donation" in the memo line and we can send them as a group.
Blessings,
Sara+
Episcopal Relief and Development: www.er-d.org
Mallory Holding's blog: www.holdinghaiti.blogspot.com
The Sisters of Saint Margaret: www.ssmbos.com
More on the response from parishes in our diocese: www.diomass.org
Tuesday, June 10, 2008
Prayers for the Church in Zimbabwe
This week, I wanted to share some news of our bishop, The Rt. Rev M. Thomas Shaw, SSJE. The SSJE means that he’s a monk—a brother in the Society of St John the Evangelist, a monastery in Cambridge (SSJE is a great resource—see www.ssje.org for more on their ministries). Bishop Shaw is our diocesan bishop, and his work is supported by two suffragan (assisting) bishops, The Rt. Revs Gayle Harris and Bud Cederholm. Gayle will be visiting us next fall, in September (she was also here in the spring of 2006), and Bud was here in March of 2007.
We’ll hear more about the international church in the coming weeks as Anglican bishops across the globe prepare to travel to the Lambeth Conference, a meeting of all the bishops that happens every ten years (the conference is from July 16 to August 3). Please take a moment now to pray for Christians everywhere, especially the church in Zimbabwe, and for fair elections there later this month.
For more background on the situation for the Anglican Church in Zimbabwe, see
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/16/world/africa/16zimbabwe.html?sq=zimbabwe%20anglican&st=cse&scp=1&pagewanted=all
Tom just came back from a trip to Zimbabwe, taken at the request of our Presiding Bishop, Katharine Jefferts Schori and with the invitation of Sebastian Bakare of the Diocese of Harare. This is from his statement about the trip:
I was asked to travel to Harare to express the church’s solidarity with our Anglican brothers and sisters in the Diocese of Harare who are under profound oppression and to gather information for the presiding bishop about the political situation there. I interviewed some 50 priests, lay people and human rights lawyers in Harare over the course of my one week stay. I can report that the situation in Zimbabwe is indeed grave. There are widespread violations of human rights, daily reports of murder and torture and an economic and humanitarian crisis of enormous proportions. The inflation rate is one million percent and unemployment ranges between 80-90%. There are long lines for gas and at banks, limited electricity and clean water and virtually empty shelves in supermarkets. . . . Thousands of Anglican worshipers have been locked out of their churches, their church properties have been occupied by government-backed allies and their personal automobiles have been confiscated. A local priest must move from house to house every night to avoid possible arrest. A nine-year-old boy and a widowed mother of five children were beaten by police for failing to leave the church site.
I was asked to travel to Harare to express the church’s solidarity with our Anglican brothers and sisters in the Diocese of Harare who are under profound oppression and to gather information for the presiding bishop about the political situation there. I interviewed some 50 priests, lay people and human rights lawyers in Harare over the course of my one week stay. I can report that the situation in Zimbabwe is indeed grave. There are widespread violations of human rights, daily reports of murder and torture and an economic and humanitarian crisis of enormous proportions. The inflation rate is one million percent and unemployment ranges between 80-90%. There are long lines for gas and at banks, limited electricity and clean water and virtually empty shelves in supermarkets. . . . Thousands of Anglican worshipers have been locked out of their churches, their church properties have been occupied by government-backed allies and their personal automobiles have been confiscated. A local priest must move from house to house every night to avoid possible arrest. A nine-year-old boy and a widowed mother of five children were beaten by police for failing to leave the church site.
In an article in the Boston Globe about his trip, Bishop Shaw talked about the inspirational faith of the Church there:
Sunday I went to this really poor township, and over 400 people were worshiping in this yard of this person's house, spilling out into the road. It was an unbelievable experience. The enthusiasm, the joy that these people have is pretty profound. . . I preached about the fact that they are not isolated in the Anglican Communion, and that there were literally millions of people around the globe that . . . are praying for them…. And I preached about that they were a real model for the rest of us around the world, in the way that they are standing up against oppression, and not letting it get in the way of their worship for God.
Sunday I went to this really poor township, and over 400 people were worshiping in this yard of this person's house, spilling out into the road. It was an unbelievable experience. The enthusiasm, the joy that these people have is pretty profound. . . I preached about the fact that they are not isolated in the Anglican Communion, and that there were literally millions of people around the globe that . . . are praying for them…. And I preached about that they were a real model for the rest of us around the world, in the way that they are standing up against oppression, and not letting it get in the way of their worship for God.
For a short video and the Boston Globe article, visit http://www.boston.com/news/world/africa/articles/2008/06/06/bishop_finds_flock_tormented_in_zimbabwe/?page=full
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/16/world/africa/16zimbabwe.html?sq=zimbabwe%20anglican&st=cse&scp=1&pagewanted=all
Wednesday, May 21, 2008
From May 15: Presence and Pain
Again, this week, I find myself in a place of lament.
As I picked my son, Isaiah, up at daycare yesterday NPR broadcast a story of a family finding out that their 2 year old and elderly parents had died in the collapse of their apartment building. (see link below) The story began by introducing us to the couple, and told of the woman leaving for work at a department store leaving her son with his grandparents. The baby cried and wanted to come along, but she left him, and minutes later the earthquake struck. It’s every parent’s nightmare—“I should have brought him with me!”—come vividly and terribly true. The NPR host spoke with them as the excavation equipment began working, and they hoped against hope to find the boy. Finally, a rescue worker brought the news that they had found the bodies of an elderly man cradling a small boy, with an older woman right beside. The couple dissolved in tears, and as I drove, Isaiah staring contently out the window, I did, too—all of the frustration of the day dissolved away. I was with that woman who had lost her child.
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