Rethinking Martha and Mary

Rethinking Martha and Mary

A Sermon by the Rev. Peter De Franco

Something in the story of Jesus visiting the home of Martha and Mary eats away at the hearts of many of us. Whenever we hear a story from the Gospels, we usually identify with one of the characters and most of us identify with Martha. Most of us lead busy lives filled with endless activities. Most of us yearn for some help in our activities so we feel Martha’s anguish when she cries out to Jesus:  "Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to do all the work by myself? Tell her then to help me." Since many of us identify with Martha we feel that Jesus’ rebuke of Martha criticizes our own life styles. Perhaps something deeper is happening in this story.

All of us know that Martha, Mary and Lazarus appear not only in Luke’s Gospel but also make an appearance in John’s Gospel. In John’s Gospel, we are presented with a very different image of Martha. She shows up twice, at the raising of her brother Lazarus from the dead and at a dinner party her family throws for Jesus after Jesus returns Lazarus to them.  In John’s telling of the story, Martha comes across as a leader in the early Christian community. Whereas Peter makes the major confession of Jesus’ identity as the Christ, the Son of God in three of the Gospels, Martha makes that profession of faith in John. 

Perhaps we might look at the ways in which Luke presents women in his gospel and discover that Luke would have women quiet and listening throughout this gospel. Could Luke, in his presentation of Martha, be offering a critique of women in ministry and saying that only men should be involved in serving others? In his second volume, the Acts of the Apostles, when the twelve select people to assist them in the work of ministry, only men are chosen.  It is clear that today’s gospel passage includes a bias against women, a bias many of us feel and bristle against.  But let’s go deeper than the intention to exclude women and find  another insight into this story.  Instead of placing service and listening to Jesus as opposites, what if we considered them as compliments?

During the Middle Ages, monks and nuns who reflected on this story brought Luke and John together and spoke of the three persons, Martha, Mary and Lazarus as three dimensions of our Christian life. Lazarus illustrates the importance of turning again and again back to God. Martha represents service to others, Mary shows us the role of prayer and listening.

If you live a deep Christian life, you will discover that you always have a need for conversion, for a change of heart. By deepening your conversion, by acknowledging where you need to change and become a better person, you are taking on the role of Lazarus. 

You will always need to look out for and serve the least of the brothers and sisters of Jesus. Service to the outcast and the forgotten, caring for the neglected and the abandoned, loving those on the margins, we Christians show our Martha side when we care for others as Christians have cared for Christ in others through the centuries.

You are always called to spend time with Jesus, quietly reading his word, listening to God speak to us in your hearts and responding to God with a heartfelt love. This deep love for Jesus, this deep desire for Jesus, this deep attachment to Jesus lies at the heart of Mary. You show your Mary side when you dwell with Jesus in this deep love.

You can allow yourself to play with today’s gospel, to move beyond the inherent conflict between Martha and Mary. You can allow your inner Lazarus, Martha and Mary to live together in harmony with each other, then you might discover a new depth to your following of Jesus. If you would continue to move ever deeper in changing your hearts, if you would pay attention to the least among us and serve them, if you would give time to discover Jesus in prayer, then your inner Lazarus, Martha and Mary will live in harmony. Part of that harmony lies in developing our Lazarus, Martha and Mary sides. You should understand which side you would prefer to develop and try to cultivate the parts that are harder to nourish.

It is easy to neglect your Lazarus side, to ever deepen your inner purification, to recognize and change those parts of yourself that need to be purified. Most of us engage our Martha side, that part of ourselves that is active and engaged with the world. Our Mary side can be underdeveloped. We find it difficult to take time away from other things and give time for God alone.

We all know the inner challenges of deepening our Christian lives. Yet as you enter more deeply into the mystery of Christ, you will venture to those places that challenge you. As you meet the challenge of developing these three sides of your Christian lives, you create a deep harmony in your heart. That deep harmony will allow you to create a home, an interior place in your heart. You will discover your interior guest, Jesus, coming to dwell within you.

Dismantling Inner Walls -- A Sermon on the 4th Sunday after Pentecost

Luke 10:25-37

Just then a lawyer stood up to test Jesus. "Teacher," he said, "what must I do to inherit eternal life?" He said to him, "What is written in the law? What do you read there?" He answered, "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbor as yourself." And he said to him, "You have given the right answer; do this, and you will live." But wanting to justify himself, he asked Jesus, "And who is my neighbor?" Jesus replied, "A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and fell into the hands of robbers, who stripped him, beat him, and went away, leaving him half dead. Now by chance a priest was going down that road; and when he saw him, he passed by on the other side. So likewise a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. But a Samaritan while traveling came near him; and when he saw him, he was moved with pity. He went to him and bandaged his wounds, having poured oil and wine on them. Then he put him on his own animal, brought him to an inn, and took care of him. The next day he took out two denarii, gave them to the innkeeper, and said, 'Take care of him; and when I come back, I will repay you whatever more you spend.' Which of these three, do you think, was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of the robbers?" He said, "The one who showed him mercy." Jesus said to him, "Go and do likewise."

One of the challenges of preaching on the parable of the Good Samaritan involves knowing the members of the congregation.  If I were to preach this sermon in Westfield or Princeton, I would have to be mindful that some members of the church might be lawyers, the villain of this passage. I could never compare a lawyer to that star of Better Call Saul, a down on his luck lawyer who aligns himself with members of a drug cartel and defends some of their disreputable practices.

Many of us hold a stereotype of some lawyers who are shady characters, out to make a dollar on us, charging us outrageous prices for the simplest transactions.  The author of Luke’s gospel shares this suspicion of lawyers. If you pay attention to Jesus’ enemies, lawyers count among the fiercest of the lot. We all imagine that this lawyer respects Jesus for he addresses Jesus as “Teacher.”  Luke gives us the first clue that something is amiss with that title. In this gospel, the people who understand Jesus call him “Lord.” By calling Jesus “Teacher” this lawyer shows us he does not understand Jesus.

But we also know that he feels hostility toward Jesus since we are told he is testing Jesus. Jesus, however, turns the table and puts the lawyer to the test.

“What must I do to inherit eternal life,?” he asks Jesus. He replies with the answer any good Jew would know, the prayer every devout Jew says every morning and night: "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbor as yourself." Perhaps this lawyer practiced a habit shared by many of us. He was making a list of what he needed to do to inherit eternal life.  Check off these things and it’s all over and done. To narrow the requirements of loving neighbors, he wants to include the least number of people. With his parable Jesus turns the tables on the lawyer.

Some of us who traveled to Israel know this road from Jericho to Jerusalem.  Everyone going to the Holy City has covered this same path. At the time of Jesus, any traveler to the capital city would need to be on guard against armed bandits picking off unsuspecting trekkers. This man was assaulted, robbed, stripped of his clothing and left for dead.

Any story teller in Jesus’ day would have introduced into a story a trio of characters well know to anyone in ancient Israel. Just as we would expect Moe and Larry to be followed by Curley, so Jesus’ audience would have expected a priest and a levi to be followed by a faithful Jew.  Jesus turns the table by introducing not an expected character but an unexpected enemy.  Samaritans stood outside the realm of acceptability in Israel. Just imagine a social outsider in our own day:  a recently released criminal, a homeless person, an addict.  Imagine that person coming across the robbery victim and caring for him.

Jesus is alerting us to the boundaries we all to readily impose from our culture. Jesus shows us how, from his perspective, how porous those boundaries should be. The unexpected hero does what is needed to stabilize the man’s health, he then brings the robbery victim to the nearest Motel 6, and gets him a room and a meal. Knowing that he has to continue with his business, he enlists the help of another to care for this victim and he will return and complete the circle of care this victim needs.

Jesus does what he always does. He dismantles the boundaries the lawyer sets up for love. Neighbors are not limited by geographic boundaries. Neighbors are only limited by our heart’s capacity to love. We make our neighbors.

If you listen carefully to this parable you will hear the social walls of first century Israel come crashing down around the lawyer.

When Jesus asks him to identify the neighbor in the story, this lawyer, who would never associate with a Samaritan, cannot even say that dreaded name and refers to the Samaritan as “The one who showed him mercy." Jesus invites the lawyer to go and do likewise.

Inside each of our hearts lies a lawyer who would want to limit the circle of our care. Inside each of our hearts exist boundaries which separate us from others. Inside each of our hearts sounds Jesus’ challenge to tear down the walls.

Tear down the walls which separate you from others, however you may configure that other as different from you. Tear down the walls which limit the capacity of your eyes to see the other as God’s beloved child. Tear down the walls which confine your heart to a safe circle of familiar friends and neighbors. God invites us to expand our hearts, to stretch ourselves beyond the capacities we impose on our love of neighbors.

Perhaps we can begin by loving that part of ourselves which we find unlovable, unacceptable, undesirable. Perhaps we can identify that inner part of ourselves which we cut off from God’s love and allow God’s love to touch us where we avoid God’s embrace. All too often we love our neighbors as ourselves, as the least lovable part of ourselves. What if we allowed God’s love to lighten that darkness, to warm that coldness, to accept that rejection?

What if we discovered that deep love which embraces us in places we dare not accept? Perhaps then we too can obey Jesus who tells us to see the Good Samaritan and go and do likewise. 

Unexpected Healing

Unexpected Healing

A Sermon by The Rev. Peter De Franco

July 3, 2022

 2 Kings 5:1-14

5Naaman, commander of the army of the king of Aram, was a great man and in high favor with his master, because by him the Lord had given victory to Aram. The man, though a mighty warrior, suffered from leprosy. 2Now the Arameans on one of their raids had taken a young girl captive from the land of Israel, and she served Naaman’s wife. 3She said to her mistress, “If only my lord were with the prophet who is in Samaria! He would cure him of his leprosy.” 4So Naaman went in and told his lord just what the girl from the land of Israel had said. 5And the king of Aram said, “Go then, and I will send along a letter to the king of Israel.” He went, taking with him ten talents of silver, six thousand shekels of gold, and ten sets of garments. 6He brought the letter to the king of Israel, which read, “When this letter reaches you, know that I have sent to you my servant Naaman, that you may cure him of his leprosy.” 7When the king of Israel read the letter, he tore his clothes and said, “Am I God, to give death or life, that this man sends word to me to cure a man of his leprosy? Just look and see how he is trying to pick a quarrel with me.” 8But when Elisha the man of God heard that the king of Israel had torn his clothes, he sent a message to the king, “Why have you torn your clothes? Let him come to me, that he may learn that there is a prophet in Israel.”  9So Naaman came with his horses and chariots, and halted at the entrance of Elisha’s house. 10Elisha sent a messenger to him, saying, “Go, wash in the Jordan seven times, and your flesh shall be restored and you shall be clean.” 11But Naaman became angry and went away, saying, “I thought that for me he would surely come out, and stand and call on the name of the Lord his God, and would wave his hand over the spot, and cure the leprosy! 12Are not Abana and Pharpar, the rivers of Damascus, better than all the waters of Israel? Could I not wash in them, and be clean?” He turned and went away in a rage. 13But his servants approached and said to him, “Father, if the prophet had commanded you to do something difficult, would you not have done it? How much more, when all he said to you was, ‘Wash, and be clean’?” 14So he went down and immersed himself seven times in the Jordan, according to the word of the man of God; his flesh was restored like the flesh of a young boy, and he was clean.15Then he returned to the man of God, he and all his company; he came and stood before him and said, “Now I know that there is no God in all the earth except in Israel; please accept a present from your servant.” 16But he said, “As the Lord lives, whom I serve, I will accept nothing!” He urged him to accept, but he refused. 17Then Naaman said, “If not, please let two mule-loads of earth be given to your servant; for your servant will no longer offer burnt offering or sacrifice to any god except the Lord. 18But may the Lord pardon your servant on one count: when my master goes into the house of Rimmon to worship there, leaning on my arm, and I bow down in the house of Rimmon, when I do bow down in the house of Rimmon, may the Lord pardon your servant on this one count.” 19He said to him, “Go in peace.”

Summer comes as a great time to catch up on reading. We can find time at the Jersey shore under the protection of a beach umbrella, coated with sun screen, listening to the rhythm of the waves and the joyful sounds of children kicking up sand and our book in hand. Most readers ask other readers about books they enjoy. I learned not to ask church ladies that question. An older woman in another congregation where I served told me she was reading and when I asked about the book she became a bit ambivalent and avoided the question. I realized that she was a fan of romance novels, you know the ones with the handsome man on the cover with shoulder length blonde hair and his shirt wide open. She thought that priests would not appreciate those novels.

For those of us who love stories, today’s passage from the second book of Kings might be seen not as a summer romance but a bit of a strange short story filled with unusual details. Naaman is introduced to us in the first line as a general of the army of Aram, the enemy of Israel. So I wonder why it says “by him the Lord had given victory to Aram.” It seems that God focused an eye on Naaman to give him more than a decisive battle, more than a physical healing. 

Did you notice how God worked a healing not through the powerful and might but through the nameless and the lowest? In one of his exploits into Israel, Naaman kidnapped a young Jewish girl to become his wife’s slave. We realize that Naaman is no Alan Alda type of soldier. Through this abducted child God speaks to Naaman and the slave girl directs Naaman to the prophet Elisha. The child does not conceal from her abductor that a prophet lives in Israel who can heal Naaman.

Naaman works through the upper levels of power and asks the king of Aram to write to the king of Israel and request the healing.  We are not going to talk about how the kings of Israel and Aram almost mess up this healing story. We all know that from the time of ancient Israel to our own day people in politics seldom know how to work with God.

So let’s fast forward the story to Elisha’s house. Naaman finally makes his way to the prophet. Naaman seeks to amaze Elisha with his considerable caravan but Elisha is not impressed. Elisha probably knows about the ruthless Naaman just as all of us know about bloodthirsty Putin.  Naaman expects people to bow down to him, to stroke his rather delicate ego, to show him the respect he does not give to others. Elisha does not even go out to see Naaman.

Elisha sends a servant to Naaman. This lowly servant directs the powerful general to wash seven times in the Jordan River. Naaman not only suffers from leprosy. Naaman obviously experiences a far deeper illness, a sickness of the spirit, an overinflated sense of self.

Naaman is prepared to leave the scene when his insignificant servants appeal to him:   “Father, if the prophet had commanded you to do something difficult, would you not have done it? How much more, when all he said to you was, ‘Wash, and be clean’?”

Finally, the word of God breaks through the heart of this man. He obeys Elisha and washes. “His flesh was restored like the flesh of a young boy, and he was clean.”  Not only was his flesh restored but his soul regained its innocence. Naaman returns to Elisha a changed man. He expresses his gratitude with the words:  “Now I know that there is no God in all the earth except in Israel; please accept a present from your servant.” “From your servant.”

Naaman has been healed, not only the leprosy of his skin but the far deeper infection of arrogance which sickened his soul. I doubt that Naaman could have imagined the real interior healing which God had prepared for him. The arrogant general surrounded by servants is transformed into a servant, a servant of God, the role God prepared for him from the start.

Most of us are like Naaman, especially when we are dealing with any form of illness. I don’t like to talk about myself in sermons so I ask for your indulgence this Sunday. Most of you know that I have follicular lymphoma. There is no cure for this cancer.  It is a chronic disease which I shall have for the rest of my life. Doctors will have to continually monitor my lymphatic system for cancerous growths and then treat them. Through chemotherapy and immunotherapy, the cancerous growth in my body has been eliminated. But there was a deeper healing. I no longer let a day go by without finding some joy in the beauty of our gardens, in the company of our cats, in the comfort of my husband and family.  God heals us in ways far deeper than physical restorations. Those of us in the cancer club know this brutal and beautiful truth.

As you seek to encounter God through today’s worship, open your heart to that deeper healing which God is planning for you. Listen to the small people around you who point you to that healing.

Open your heart to God’s unexpected overturning of expected ways, of habits of seeing life, of patterns of relating to others. Expect the unexpected for the Kingdom of God has come near you.

Birthday of the Wildman Prophet A Sermon on the Nativity of John the Baptist

The New Birth of John the Baptist in Us 

Luke 1: 57-80

Now the time came for Elizabeth to give birth, and she bore a son. Her neighbors and relatives heard that the Lord had shown his great mercy to her, and they rejoiced with her. On the eighth day they came to circumcise the child, and they were going to name him Zechariah after his father. But his mother said, “No; he is to be called John.” They said to her, “None of your relatives has this name.” Then they began motioning to his father to find out what name he wanted to give him. He asked for a writing tablet and wrote, “His name is John.” And all of them were amazed. Immediately his mouth was opened and his tongue freed, and he began to speak, praising God. Fear came over all their neighbors, and all these things were talked about throughout the entire hill country of Judea. All who heard them pondered them and said, “What then will this child become?” For, indeed, the hand of the Lord was with him. Then his father Zechariah was filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke this prophecy: “Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, for he has looked favorably on his people and redeemed them. He has raised up a mighty savior for us in the house of his servant David, as he spoke through the mouth of his holy prophets from of old, that we would be saved from our enemies and from the hand of all who hate us. Thus he has shown the mercy promised to our ancestors, and has remembered his holy covenant, the oath that he swore to our ancestor Abraham, to grant us that we, being rescued from the hands of our enemies, might serve him without fear, in holiness and righteousness before him all our days. And you, child, will be called the prophet of the Most High; for you will go before the Lord to prepare his ways, to give knowledge of salvation to his people by the forgiveness of their sins. By the tender mercy of our God, the dawn from on high will break upon us, to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace.” The child grew and became strong in spirit, and he was in the wilderness until the day he appeared publicly to Israel.

Perhaps you may have seen her on Wood Avenue in Linden.

She lived in the bus shelter in front of City Hall. I ran into her one day when I stopped at a Spanish take out restaurant on Wood Ave.  

I think the owners of the store would give her a meal for free. She was no different from the many homeless persons we meet on the street or in the library or in a bus or train station. Many of them beg from us and most of us ignore them. These urban renegades are found in every city in every generation.

Don’t confuse John the Baptist with these urban renegades.

Like them, John the Baptist was uncouth, disruptive, annoying. We might imagine him living in a cave, the ancient equivalent of a homeless encampment. His diet of locusts and wild honey constituted the meal of the destitute. When he wore a camel’s skin and a belt, he was imitating the prophet Elijah. If ever there was a biblical character with questionable mental stability Elijah would rank high on the list.

There are times when a society stands in crisis and unusual characters arise to address the unusual situation. Elijah lived in Israel when the entire nation turned from the worship of the one God to the worship of pagan gods. Along with pagan worship, the king and all the people slipped into a immoral standard of behavior.  Elijah seemed to be the only believer in the one God. No wonder he felt a bit paranoid.

John the Baptist also emerges at a critical moment in the history of Israel. The religious leaders of John’s day compromised their justice tradition to get into bed with their Roman overlords. They turned their heads when crosses circled Jerusalem with crucified Jewish bodies twisted in the hot sun.  They felt comfortable in their houses of worship.

John scorns their well established patterns of getting their sins forgiven. Generations of Jews would sacrifice animals to blot out their sins. John went at it in a new way. He told the people to head back to the River Jordan and walk through the water just as their ancestors did. Just as their ancestors did when they, a ramshackle bunch of refugees from Egypt crossed that same River Jordan and stepped onto the other shore as a new nation. John dared to reenact this ritual of birthing a nation under the very eyes of those Roman overlords, the same overlords with whom the religious authorities shared the same bed.

John attracted the attention of the political leaders of his day. What did he expect? He was a pain in their neck, or perhaps some had a lower opinion of him. John ended up in prison and was just another victim of a political authority who placed little value on life. 

Jesus shuttered when he heard the news of John’s death. Jesus knew that those same Roman overlords were looking at him and Jesus figured out rather quickly the end of his story.

When he was born, John’s father proclaimed that God would bring knowledge of salvation by the forgiveness of the people’s sin.

John lived up to that legacy and opened a door for a people to discover themselves as a new nation, a holy nation, a just nation.

If you are not uncomfortable with having John the Baptist as the Patron of our church, perhaps you should open the Gospel and read how disruptive a person John could be. We all love sweet and gentle Jesus but most of us would stay clear of that Wildman of a prophet John the Baptist. On the one hand, he opens up a door which allows us access to a forgiving God who forgets our sins as quickly as we sixty plus folks forget the last thing we ate. We all love that John with the forgiving God. How many of us are comfortable with that renegade of a firebrand disrupting the social order, overturning established religious ways, intruding on our gracious life styles.

Perhaps we need to take on John’s disruptive behaviors and witness to an alternate vision of religious people who boldly stand up for the rights of women, persons of color and LGBTQ people. Perhaps the nation needs prophets who challenge the so called ethics of the religious right who would deprive women of control over their bodies and who knows what others rights will be taken from us? I don’t think many of us will leave our homes for a homeless encampment or trade our clothing for second hand items from a thrift store.

Even so, inside each one of us there is a John the Baptist yearning to be born. Inside each of us the Spirit raises us a holy anger at the injustices of our day. I hope all of us take on that prophetic call to stand up for women, to stand up for our siblings of color, to stand up for our LGBTQ spiritual family members in the face of threats they will face.

Pray that God gives you the strength to be a bold prophet. Pray that God opens a door for you. Then boldly act for God’s reign.

We need John the Baptist in our day.

As we celebrate the birth of that child who would be a pain in the neck for the High Priests and Roman procurators, ask God to give birth to John in your heart. That disruptive John who screams at the injustices of our day. That uncouth John who challenges the religious establishments which would take away justice from the marginalized. That holy John who lead the people to discover a God who forgives, who no longer exacts punishment, who shines like the daystar warming our hearts.

The Moral Solidarity of the Beloved Community -- A Juneteenth Sermon

A Juneteenth Celebration Sermon

Isaiah 65:1-9

65I was ready to be sought out by those who did not ask, to be found by those who did not seek me. I said, “Here I am, here I am,” to a nation that did not call on my name. 2I held out my hands all day long to a rebellious people, who walk in a way that is not good, following their own devices; 3a people who provoke me to my face continually, sacrificing in gardens and offering incense on bricks; 4who sit inside tombs, and spend the night in secret places; who eat swine’s flesh, with broth of abominable things in their vessels; 5who say, “Keep to yourself, do not come near me, for I am too holy for you.” These are a smoke in my nostrils, a fire that burns all day long. 6See, it is written before me: I will not keep silent, but I will repay; I will indeed repay into their laps 7their iniquities and their ancestors’ iniquities together, says the Lord; because they offered incense on the mountains and reviled me on the hills, I will measure into their laps full payment for their actions. 8Thus says the Lord: As the wine is found in the cluster, and they say, “Do not destroy it, for there is a blessing in it,” so I will do for my servants’ sake, and not destroy them all. 9I will bring forth descendants from Jacob, and from Judah inheritors of my mountains; my chosen shall inherit it, and my servants shall settle there.

Most of us pay attention to the words we hear in church. Or at least that is my hope. But how frequently do we attune our hearts to the feeling behind the words? This morning’s first reading from Isaiah floods our hearts with the urgency of a God who is searching us out but we close our ears to this God.

Such an empathic reading of the prophets comes from Abraham Heschel, a Jewish biblical scholar. He examined the inner emotional connection between God and Prophets. He describes the relationship as one of pathos.  The prophets feel the inner life of God. They are attuned to the ups and downs of God’s heart. Their voice becomes the voice of God crying out to a people who closed their ears and their hearts to this deeply sensitive God. “I was ready to be sought out by those who did not ask, to be found by those who did not seek me. I said, “Here I am, here I am,” to a nation that did not call on my name.”

Can you hear it? Can you feel the urgency in God’s desire, a desire that is not reciprocated? We all know those feelings of unrequited love, unreturned affection.  That urgency, that desire finds a home in the heart of God. “I said, “Here I am, here I am,” to a nation that did not call on my name.”

As we listen to the prophets we too might attune our hearts to the heartbeat of God. God feels an urgency not only to communicate with God’s chosen people. God feels an urgency to bring justice to the earth.

“But let justice roll on like a river, righteousness like a never-failing stream!”  (Amos 5: 24)  If ever a prophet sensed the need for justice, Amos was that prophet.  He burned with an urgency that God felt to right the wrongs of ancient Israel. The foremost prophet of our generation, the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. echoed that message of the Amos.  Like the prophets of old, Dr. King felt that same holy urgency, that identical blessed justice. 

We gather today and celebrate Juneteenth. For some of us, Juneteenth comes as a new celebration. For others of us who kept the day for years, Juneteenth has finally become a national holiday. 

We all know that on June 19, 1865 Major General Gordon Granger, landed at Galveston, Texas with news that the war had ended and that the enslaved were now free. We remember that this event happened two and a half years after President Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation – which had become official January 1, 1863. Only when the Northern troops enforced the Emancipation Proclamation in the Southern states were slaves actually freed.

Freedom from slavery marks a significant moment in our country’s history. I am reading Robert Jones’ novel, The Prophets which tells the graphic story of life on a Mississippi plantation before the Civil War.  I did not imagine the indignities which white slave owners inflicted on black slaves, the brutality which undermined their personal worth, the forced rape of women by other slaves and by white men to increase the number of slaves, the violence of whipping, beatings and humiliations which suppressed their human dignity. 

When I read these pages, I am imagining the tears which fell from God’s eyes as God beheld beloved children tortured. The words from Isaiah came to mind:   I was ready to be sought out by those who did not ask, to be found by those who did not seek me.

From 1619 through 1865, our nation was guilty of the most grievous sin through the institution of slavery.  God was ready to be sought by people of justice but economic accumulation made people deaf to God’s presence.  For almost 250 years, we shut God out from our country. We as a nation need to repair the wrongs white persons committed against persons of color.  

In parts of our country people are engaged in conversations on reparations and restorative justice.  We all know that after slaves were liberated nothing was done to repair the wrongs they endured; no justice made right the evils they suffered.  We are well aware of the systemic injustices perpetrated by Jim Crow Laws, lynchings, segregation, an incarceration system targeting persons of color, and the disparity between black and whites in wealth, education, health care and civil rights. 

I invite us to look at this situation in our nation as God does:  through tears of lamentation and years of injustice.  Even as prophets felt a deep sense of God’s intolerance of injustice, I invite us to develop that sense of moral solidarity with one another so we can feel that the injustices suffered by some of our siblings are suffered by all of us. We all form one community, God’s beloved community, we are all knitted one to another as members of God’s beloved family. May our celebration of Juneteenth deepen our awareness of how interconnected we are with one another. From that deep sense of interconnection may God fan in our hearts the flame of justice that we may not only celebrate this Freedom Day but actively work for freedom in our nation. 

Th Sweet Sound of the Spirit -- a Pentecost Sermon

The Sweet Sound of the Spirit

Romans 8:14-17

14For all who are led by the Spirit of God are children of God. 15For you did not receive a spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received a spirit of adoption. When we cry, “Abba! Father!” 16it is that very Spirit bearing witness with our spirit that we are children of God, 17and if children, then heirs, heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ—if, in fact, we suffer with him so that we may also be glorified with him.

John 14:8-17 [25-27]

8Philip said to him, “Lord, show us the Father, and we will be satisfied.” 9Jesus said to him, “Have I been with you all this time, Philip, and you still do not know me? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? 10Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words that I say to you I do not speak on my own; but the Father who dwells in me does his works. 11Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father is in me; but if you do not, then believe me because of the works themselves. 12Very truly, I tell you, the one who believes in me will also do the works that I do and, in fact, will do greater works than these, because I am going to the Father. 13I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son. 14If in my name you ask me for anything, I will do it. 15”If you love me, you will keep my commandments. 16And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate, to be with you forever. 17This is the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, because he abides with you, and he will be in you.[25”I have said these things to you while I am still with you. 26But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you everything, and remind you of all that I have said to you. 27Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled, and do not let them be afraid.]

Pentecost comes to us as a day of celebration. For 50 days, we celebrated the presence of the Risen Christ among us. Pentecost brings that celebration to a joyful conclusion. Our Baptist sisters and brothers, resonate with the first reading, a scene from that first Pentecost, filled with fire and wind and speaking in tongues. We Episcopalians feel a bit embarrassed by such emotional displays of prayer and religious enthusiasm.  We prefer our church to be silently joyful with soul stirring music but not too much. After all we are Episcopalians.A solemn procession we prefer to dancing down the aisles.

Perhaps we are more comfortable with the second reading about being God’s adopted children or with the more mystical language from the Gospel according to John. Both of those passages direct us to look for the Spirit deep within us, dwelling in our hearts, resonating with our spirits. Paul assures us that the Spirit not only dwells in us but links us with God so we are God’s beloved daughters and sons. Jesus directs us to look into our hearts and there we will discover the Holy Spirit:  You know the Spirit, because the Spirit abides with you, and the Spirit will be in you. (Jn 14: 24) Paul similarly tells us:  The Spirit bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God. (Romans 8: 16)

Jesus and Paul invite us to look deep into our hearts for the Spirit who dwells within each of us. Just think of the great mystery – the Spirit dwells with us. God creates us so that we can receive this gift of the Spirit. The Spirit resonates with our own spirits affirming this holy presence within us.

Outside the rectory we have a large set of wind chimes. Whenever the wind blows through the maple tree home of the chimes, they resound with a deep harmonic melody and delight all who hear them. Many of us have lived our Christian lives and have seen the Spirit at work in the lives of those whom we love.  Our hearts hear that same resonance of the Spirit in the lives of faithful women and men in the church. Deeply faithful Christians are like those wind chimes, blown by the wind of the Spirit, resonating with the melody of the Spirit.

Two weeks ago in Buffalo, Pearl Young ended her morning at church with Gloria, her sister-in-law.  They both attended a Prayer Breakfast after which Gloria dropped Pearl off at Topps Markets to pick up some chicken for Sunday dinner.  Pearl was walking into the store talking on her phone with her son when she stopped speaking. His phone began buzzing with alerts about the shooting. 

People have an enduring memory of Pearl as a mother, grandmother, Sunday School teacher, substitute teacher in the public school system, the administrator of a bi-weekly soup kitchen, the person to whom people would go for a word of wisdom.  The Spirit dwelt in her heart, danced through her in prayer, and acted with her in her ministry.  Deep within her soul, an abiding presence of the Spirit sang through her whenever she would pray at church and then show that presence through good works.

Paul not only speaks of the Sprit’s presence in our joy.  He affirms that same presence in our pain:  if we suffer with him we will also be glorified with him.  Paul clearly understood the challenges of living a Christian life in a world without faith.  We all stand in need of that affirmation of the Spirit’s presence in our anguish.  Pearl’s friends recalled how she would speak a word of wisdom to church members in pain or distress. Spirit led people resonate with that wind of the Spirit, rejoicing with the happy and suffering with the afflicted.

We are living at a most challenging moment in our nation’s history when the scourge of gun violence has led to even more mass shootings this week. The Spirit helps us to endure the pain of the present moment by setting our eyes on the future, on the ultimate reversal of pain with the final resurrection.  The Spirit wells up in us that hope which sees past the immediacy of a world turned upside down toward the beginning of God’s reign of abiding peace and justice.

God continues to shed that Spirit upon us.  God continues to drop down flames of love which settle in our hearts. Imagine a world where the Spirit spoke words of hope through you. Imagine a world where the Spirit touched those in your circle with blessing through you. Imagine a world where the Spirit invited you past your comfort zone to heal the broken through you.

Ask God for that Spirit today. Then bring that Spirit into your world. For the world so desperately needs a new Pentecost. 

Transforming Tragedy

Transforming Tragedy

A Sermon by the Rev. Peter De Franco

7th Sunday of Easter

The Episcopal Church of St. John the Baptist

John 17:20-26

20”I ask not only on behalf of these, but also on behalf of those who will believe in me through their word, 21that they may all be one. As you, Father, are in me and I am in you, may they also be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me. 22The glory that you have given me I have given them, so that they may be one, as we are one, 23I in them and you in me, that they may become completely one, so that the world may know that you have sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me. 24Father, I desire that those also, whom you have given me, may be with me where I am, to see my glory, which you have given me because you loved me before the foundation of the world. 25“Righteous Father, the world does not know you, but I know you; and these know that you have sent me. 26I made your name known to them, and I will make it known, so that the love with which you have loved me may be in them, and I in them.”

The past two weeks have inflicted great pain on all our hearts.  Last week, we brought into our sanctuary the pictures of 10 people murdered by a racist gunman in Buffalo, New York. This week, we share our sacred place with the pictures of 19 children and 2 adults gunned down in Uvalde, Texas.

A deep anger and frustration bubbles up in our hearts as we witness our federal government again stymied by powerful and wealthy persons and organizations which control the gun industry. They provide access to automatic weapons, weapons of war, to a civilian population which does not need these guns. The tears of God falling from heaven mingle with the blood of these latest martyrs to the gun industry in the United States of America.

The anguish of this pain we are suffering cries out to heaven for comfort.  We so need to feel the loving arms of our God embracing us, holding us so close that we can feel the beat of God’s heart. We yearn for those comforting words we may have heard from our mothers, “There, There” as she would rock us, that comforting rocking of a mother with her infant child. Sometime words cannot heal us. Sometimes only the loving comfort of God’s love can ease our pain.

Perhaps we are blessed today with those words from today’s Gospel when Jesus speaks across the centuries directly to us. “I ask not only on behalf of these, but also on behalf of those who will believe in me through their word, 21that they may all be one. As you, Father, are in me and I am in you, may they also be in us.”  (Jn. 17: 20-21)  We are among those to whom Jesus was speaking, we believe in Jesus through the words we have heard across the centuries from those first disciples.

“May they also be in us.”  Perhaps the image which leads us to best understand this strange passage is our own experience of living within our mother’s womb.  At no other time can we say that one person is physically in another person.  Yet any mother can tell you about the shape of that little hand reaching through her skin. The kicking and shifting of the baby preparing to be born. That inner dwelling of one person in another comes as our closest image to this holy love of God who holds us within God as a mother holding her child. Jesus is offering us that holy love through today’s gospel

That image of a child in its mother shifts when we receive Holy Communion and Jesus becomes present within us. It’s a deep sense of comfort we experience with Holy Communion, of Jesus dwelling in us and assuring us of his loving presence. Jesus brings you a comfort deeper than words.

We are all involved in in difficult time in our nation’s history. Whenever we experience such a moment in our lives, an energy arises in us that requires us to do something. Perhaps you feel depressed over these repeated tragedies. Perhaps you feel angry, angry at the people who kill others with automatic weapons, angry at the deaths of innocent children, angry at a government which seemingly does nothing to help our children, the most vulnerable ones in our communities. 

I encourage each of you to step out of your depression and sadness to feel your anger at the present situation and invest your energy in doing something. It is no small thing to pick up your phone and call your senators and representatives and let them know where you stand on this issue.  Yes, New Jersey’s congressional members advanced significant legislation for gun safety.  We live in a state with laws providing for the safety of our children. Let them know where you stand.  Your voice encourages them as they form their opinions.

Perhaps you might want to do more. You might search for organizations which address issues of gun safety and violence in schools.  Sandy Hook Promise was organized by Mark Barden who lost his son Daniel and Nicole Hockney who lost her child Dylan both at Sandy Hook Elementary School.  Their pain sets them apart from most of us and none of us can fail to feel the anguish they experienced on December 14, 2012 when their children were murdered at school.  On their web page they describe what happened to them: they turned their tragedy into a moment of transformation.

All their energy of loss they are directing to change the culture in our country around guns and schools. 

Turning tragedy into transformation. That phrase sounds profoundly Christian, much like what God did for Jesus in turning the tragedy of crucifixion into the transformation of resurrection. God works through moments of profound loss and directs people to engage their energies in changing the world. Their pain, their vulnerability never leaves them but these courageous people are making a difference in the world. God is working through them.

God can work through you too. Do something. Even if you only call your Senator or Representative. Do something. Do something regularly. All of us together with God can work, work that tragedy might be transformed.

Tabitha's Other Story

Acts 9:36-43

36Now in Joppa there was a disciple whose name was Tabitha, which in Greek is Dorcas. She was devoted to good works and acts of charity. 37At that time she became ill and died. When they had washed her, they laid her in a room upstairs. 38Since Lydda was near Joppa, the disciples, who heard that Peter was there, sent two men to him with the request, “Please come to us without delay.” 39So Peter got up and went with them; and when he arrived, they took him to the room upstairs. All the widows stood beside him, weeping and showing tunics and other clothing that Dorcas had made while she was with them. 40Peter put all of them outside, and then he knelt down and prayed. He turned to the body and said, “Tabitha, get up.” Then she opened her eyes, and seeing Peter, she sat up. 41He gave her his hand and helped her up. Then calling the saints and widows, he showed her to be alive. 42This became known throughout Joppa, and many believed in the Lord. 43Meanwhile he stayed in Joppa for some time with a certain Simon, a tanner.

During the Easter Season, the church presents selections from the Acts of the Apostles to replace the usual readings from the Hebrew Scripture. From its pages, we get one version of what the church looked like in the first years after the Resurrection of Jesus. From the letters of Paul and other letters contained in the Christian Scripture, we can expand that picture of the early church. We realize that there were multiple ways in which the first Christians organized themselves and professed their faith.

In today’s first reading, we heard the story of the raising from the dead of Tabitha, also known as Dorcas.  When we hear the story of the raising of Tabitha from the dead, we are invited to think of the story of Jesus raising the daughter of Jairus or the son of the widow of Nain.  Through that echo of earlier gospel stories we make the connection that the same Spirit alive in the ministry of Jesus stirs in the ministry of Peter and Paul and by extension to our own day.  Now don’t get the idea that you can call our Bishop to raise up the dead like Jesus and Peter. I don’t think Bishop Chip would welcome those phone calls. But that same Spirit who organized the first Christians around the table and with care for the disadvantaged is at work in the church today.

In today’s story about Tabitha, we hear that she is also known as Dorcas. Since she has both a Hebrew and Greek name, we understand that she comes from a diverse community make up of two groups.  Tabitha is the only woman identified in Acts as a disciple.  All the other disciples are men. She is presented as a woman of means since upon her death the widows of the Christian community not only mourn her passing but show that she provided clothing for them.  She must have been a leader in the community since when she dies the leaders of the Christian community in Joppa call Peter to come to their city to do something for her. But there is more to her story.

Her ministry is described as being “devoted to good works.” (Acts 9: 36) When the male disciples, who are called deacons, exercise that same ministry among widows, their work is called “ministry” (Acts 6:4). Why is Tabitha’s endeavor labeled “good works?” Clearly the men get the leadership roles while the women find a second class position of supporting the men.  We see this pattern throughout Luke and Acts where women are relegated to the galley while men steer the ship. Just think of that other story about service from Luke’s Gospel which riles women to no small extent. 

In the story of Martha and Mary when Martha is told not to do the work of “ministry” and Mary is celebrated for keeping silent. 

We know that while an exclusive male leadership might model the pattern in one group of early churches, Paul and the other gospels show an alternate model. In John, Martha, a clear leader of the church, is given the major confession of faith in Jesus as “the Christ, the Son of God, the one coming into the world.” (Jn. 11:27).

Paul refers to Phoebe as a deacon in Rome and Euodia and Syntyche as his collaborators in Philippi.  (Phil 4:3)  Even though Acts does not describe women as leaders in the church, the community meets in the homes of prominent women who are more than just the host for the men but actual leaders of those local churches.

Occasionally it takes time to reverse patterns so deeply entrenched in Christian practice. Only in our lifetime did women regain their position as liturgical leaders in our church while other churches continue to deny them a place at the altar. On this mother’s day, when we celebrate our mothers and the women in our lives, our liturgy provides us with an opportunity to celebrate the women leaders in our church. We are grateful that God continues to raise women as bishops, priests and deacons and we give thanks for the women who lead our congregation and take initiatives in our church.

I raise up these women among us since some of us may feel disheartened over the possibility of overturning Roe v. Wade.  Yes, our country is shifting toward a more conservative perhaps reactionary direction. But let us also remember how the Spirit continues to act among us. Remember the 2017 Women’s March on January 21 when women wore pink hats to affirm women’s rights. Remember that Spirit who restored women to their rightful place at the altar in our church. Remember the women who shaped you in your lives, the love they showed, the vision they created, the community they weaved together.

Tabitha teaches us an important lesson, one we learn from the long view of history. She ministered to those in need, forming among them a community of women who went deeper than their need for clothing to discover a community of mutual support in their lives shared together. Let us take that long view of history, trusting our God to find ways to care for women in greatest need, opening windows when doors seem to shut, and relying on the strength of those women we celebrate today and will lead us into tomorrow.  

Abundance on the Beach

Abundance on the Beach

A Sermon by the Rev. Peter De Franco

The Third Sunday in Easter

The Episcopal Church of St. John the Baptist

John 21:1-19

21After these things Jesus showed himself again to the disciples by the Sea of Tiberias; and he showed himself in this way. 2Gathered there together were Simon Peter, Thomas called the Twin, Nathanael of Cana in Galilee, the sons of Zebedee, and two others of his disciples. 3Simon Peter said to them, “I am going fishing.” They said to him, “We will go with you.” They went out and got into the boat, but that night they caught nothing. 4Just after daybreak, Jesus stood on the beach; but the disciples did not know that it was Jesus. 5Jesus said to them, “Children, you have no fish, have you?” They answered him, “No.” 6He said to them, “Cast the net to the right side of the boat, and you will find some.” So they cast it, and now they were not able to haul it in because there were so many fish. 7That disciple whom Jesus loved said to Peter, “It is the Lord!” When Simon Peter heard that it was the Lord, he put on some clothes, for he was naked, and jumped into the sea. 8But the other disciples came in the boat, dragging the net full of fish, for they were not far from the land, only about a hundred yards off. 9When they had gone ashore, they saw a charcoal fire there, with fish on it, and bread. 10Jesus said to them, “Bring some of the fish that you have just caught.” 11So Simon Peter went aboard and hauled the net ashore, full of large fish, a hundred fifty-three of them; and though there were so many, the net was not torn. 12Jesus said to them, “Come and have breakfast.” Now none of the disciples dared to ask him, “Who are you?” because they knew it was the Lord. 13Jesus came and took the bread and gave it to them, and did the same with the fish. 14This was now the third time that Jesus appeared to the disciples after he was raised from the dead.  15When they had finished breakfast, Jesus said to Simon Peter, “Simon son of John, do you love me more than these?” He said to him, “Yes, Lord; you know that I love you.” Jesus said to him, “Feed my lambs.” 16A second time he said to him, “Simon son of John, do you love me?” He said to him, “Yes, Lord; you know that I love you.” Jesus said to him, “Tend my sheep.” 17He said to him the third time, “Simon son of John, do you love me?” Peter felt hurt because he said to him the third time, “Do you love me?” And he said to him, “Lord, you know everything; you know that I love you.” Jesus said to him, “Feed my sheep. 18Very truly, I tell you, when you were younger, you used to fasten your own belt and to go wherever you wished. But when you grow old, you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will fasten a belt around you and take you where you do not wish to go.” 19(He said this to indicate the kind of death by which he would glorify God.) After this he said to him, “Follow me.”

Over the past three Sundays, we have heard the story of the Resurrection as told in the Gospel according to John. That story begins with the discovery by Mary Magdalene of the empty tomb and the appearance of the Risen Christ to her. Last week the story continued with the account of Jesus appearing to the disciples on Easter night followed by another appearance the next Sunday. 

This week we noticed that the location shifts from Jerusalem to the familiar haunts of the disciples along the Sea of Tiberius, also known as the Sea of Galilee, far from the Jerusalem capital.  More than location is shifting. The disciples have shifted from following Jesus to following their former career choices. Have Peter and the boys seen the challenges of following Jesus and fallen back to their former and familiar patterns?

We see the disciples set out at night, they are in the dark,  and they proved themselves failures at fishing. They work all night but catch nothing. These same disciples had failed Jesus at night when they fled from him at the crucifixion.  It seems they can get nothing right.

As dawn illumines the sky, they return home when a stranger greets them from the shore and bids them try an alternate approach to fishing.   They hear his voice and obey.  Then so many fish fill their nets that the nets are close to breaking.

In that miraculous moment, the Beloved Disciple realizes what is happening.  He tells the others:  “It is the Lord!” Not a stranger but the Lord has called them.  Once again God is intruding on their ordinary patterns of behavior and changing things.

As soon as Peter understands the situation, he jumps into the water and swims to Jesus.  Notice how Peter does not first see Jesus.

The Beloved Disciple sees and understands. The ever-impetuous Peter jumps headlong into the activity. 

Perhaps you were amazed at the abundance which the Risen Christ brings. One hundred fifty three fish push the net to the breaking point. This Gospel regularly hints at abundance in other sections of its message and the same echoes sound throughout this passage. In listing the disciples engaged in this fishing trip, Nathaniel of Cana of Galilee is mentioned.  We all know the sign Jesus performed in Cana where he changed 180 gallons of water into wine.  That comes to over 1,000 bottles of wine, and choice wine at that. Who wouldn’t want that stock for their wine cellar?

When we hear that the charcoal breakfast menu consists of fish and bread, once again we are invited to remember the abundant multiplication of fish and bread feeding 5,000 people.

This gospel marks a decisive moment for the disciples, a shift away from their casting their nets for fish in favor of seeking new disciples. Jesus assures them that an abundant catch waits them if they listen to his voice. 

Each of us is invited to hear Jesus call us to be disciples, to go out and do what we can to share the news of Jesus with others. We, as a community, also are invited to hear Jesus call us to share the good news about the Risen Christ with others.

Some time ago I preached about a new venture in our outreach, a ministry with and among the Hispanic community.  Over the next months, we shall begin working on a new venture as we share the good news about Jesus with the Hispanic members of our communities. We already know that a third of the people living in Linden are Hispanic. Let me say that I wish there was a better word to use to describe the different national groups about which we speak with the word Hispanic. That community not only includes a variety of people from different countries but also different cultures and they even speak different versions of Spanish.  They include people whose first language is Spanish and people who speak no Spanish. 

Our church is already involved with the Hispanic Ministry Coalition of the Diocese of New Jersey.  From May 16 – 20, I shall participate in a Latino Ministry Competency Course sponsored by the national Episcopal Church. Some of you have already expressed an interest in forming a Task Force to begin this ministry.

For our first task, we shall study the make up of the Hispanic community in our area, discovering their countries of origin, their religious needs, the ways we can collaborate with them in ministry.

Our listening to this morning’s gospel offers us an opportunity to hear Jesus inviting us to cast our nets, to begin our outreach, to consider our corporate mission to follow Jesus and to share the Good News with our neighbors. We don’t have Jesus preparing us a coffee hour with bread and fish.  For those of you who do not like fish, that comes as a blessing. We do have the continuing presence of Jesus breaking bread for us and sharing the abundant gift of the Holy Eucharist.  I invite you to consider how you can be a part of this mission. Talk to me if you feel Jesus inviting you to be a part of it. We begin this work knowing the Jesus will bless us. We begin our ministry with trust that Jesus will fill our nets with an abundance.

Easter Hope

Easter Hope

A Sermon by the Rev. Peter De Franco

Easter Sunday

John 20:1-18

20Early on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene came to the tomb and saw that the stone had been removed from the tomb. 2So she ran and went to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one whom Jesus loved, and said to them, “They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we do not know where they have laid him.” 3Then Peter and the other disciple set out and went toward the tomb. 4The two were running together, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first. 5He bent down to look in and saw the linen wrappings lying there, but he did not go in. 6Then Simon Peter came, following him, and went into the tomb. He saw the linen wrappings lying there, 7and the cloth that had been on Jesus’ head, not lying with the linen wrappings but rolled up in a place by itself. 8Then the other disciple, who reached the tomb first, also went in, and he saw and believed; 9for as yet they did not understand the scripture, that he must rise from the dead. 10Then the disciples returned to their homes. 11But Mary stood weeping outside the tomb. As she wept, she bent over to look into the tomb; 12and she saw two angels in white, sitting where the body of Jesus had been lying, one at the head and the other at the feet. 13They said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping?” She said to them, “They have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid him.” 14When she had said this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not know that it was Jesus. 15Jesus said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you looking for?” Supposing him to be the gardener, she said to him, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away.” 16Jesus said to her, “Mary!” She turned and said to him in Hebrew, “Rabbouni!” (which means Teacher). 17Jesus said to her, “Do not hold on to me, because I have not yet ascended to the Father. But go to my brothers and say to them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’” 18Mary Magdalene went and announced to the disciples, “I have seen the Lord”; and she told them that he had said these things to her.

Easter celebrates God’s gift of new life. We celebrate this wonder when the earth is waking up from winter and bursts forth in beauty. Flowers dazzle us with their beautiful displays, trees putting forth leaves in a multiplicity of shades of green, yes, don’t our allergies tell us about the trees! On this beautiful Easter Day, God smiles on us as we celebrate this Resurrection Hope.

Last year, 33 of us gathered outside on the Great Lawn of the Church to celebrate this wonderful day. We gathered together for the first time in a long time as God’s beloved community. In the year after Easter 2021, God blessed us with new members joining our congregation, with former members returning to regular patterns of in person worship, with an expanded congregation worshipping with us on line.

God indeed is gracious with us. God regularly comes to us.

We only need Resurrection Hope to anticipate God’s presence and celebrate that presence when God arrives. Each of us faces difficult challenges in our lives, moments when everything we anticipated and hoped for are turned upside down and our world is devastated and without hope.

On Good Friday, Mary Magdalene felt that same feeling of disorientation, of unimagined grief, of a world without hope. She goes to the tomb of Jesus perhaps to mourn her loss and just when she thinks all is lost it gets worse. She plans to weep at the tomb of her beloved Jesus but sees an empty tomb and can only imagine one word: robbers. Robbers have taken his body.

She runs to tell the disciples perhaps hoping they would round up a search party. They too are baffled and return to their homes. You can just imagine her thoughts: “Typical men: Useless!”

Distraught she returns to the tomb, standing and weeping. Four times the gospel speaks of her tears. Mary has fallen into a grief which walls her off from everyone and everything. Her hope has slipped away.

Perhaps she heard a rustle behind her and she turns away from the tomb to see the persons she thinks is the gardener. Jesus comes to her but her grief blinds her to his presence. Her eyes of faith are closed. She lost her faith because she first lost all hope.

Even though she is looking at Jesus she does not see him. Then Jesus speaks her name: Mary. Again she turns, not with her body but with her heart. She turns to the one who calls her name and her heart sees.

This turning of our heart comes as the message of Easter. Jesus turns our hearts by calling us by our name. Jesus calls each of us. Jesus points us in a new direction, points us to a future with hope.

Each of us will know sorrow and disappointment. We know that as sure as we know the Easter bunny will deliver a stash of chocolate and candy to our homes.

Over this past week, we have been in training for that inevitable moment. We discovered that a deep love, Jesus profound love, surrounds us. We discovered that we need a faith that looks deeper than tragedy to discern God’s action transforming the world.

We discovered that a resurrection hope gets us through until resurrection faith leads to rediscover Jesus right before our eyes.

That Risen Christ comes to you today. Christ comes to you within your heart as you hear the gospel assuring you that Christ is risen. Christ comes to you in the Holy Eucharist, a real presence to nourish you, to touch your heart with love. Christ comes to you in your need, whenever you need that strength, that courage, that resolve. Christ never abandons you. Your faith may miss his presence. Your hope may wander. Your love will steady your hearts and when you hear Jesus speak your name in the depth of your heart you will rediscover Easter.

Enjoy the beauty of today’s worship, delight in family gatherings later this afternoon and when the evening comes to a close reflect on the day and allow the mystery of the Risen Christ to sanctify your night and all the days to come.

A Compassionate God on Calvary

A Compassionate God on Calvary

Luke 23:  32 -49

32Two others also, who were criminals, were led away to be put to death with him. 33When they came to the place that is called The Skull, they crucified Jesus there with the criminals, one on his right and one on his left. 34Then Jesus said, “Father, forgive them; for they do not know what they are doing.” And they cast lots to divide his clothing. 35And the people stood by, watching; but the leaders scoffed at him, saying, “He saved others; let him save himself if he is the Messiah of God, his chosen one!” 36The soldiers also mocked him, coming up and offering him sour wine, 37and saying, “If you are the King of the Jews, save yourself!” 38There was also an inscription over him, “This is the King of the Jews.” 39One of the criminals who were hanged there kept deriding him and saying, “Are you not the Messiah? Save yourself and us!” 40But the other rebuked him, saying, “Do you not fear God, since you are under the same sentence of condemnation? 41And we indeed have been condemned justly, for we are getting what we deserve for our deeds, but this man has done nothing wrong.” 42Then he said, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.” 43He replied, “Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in Paradise.”  44It was now about noon, and darkness came over the whole land until three in the afternoon, 45while the sun’s light failed; and the curtain of the temple was torn in two. 46Then Jesus, crying with a loud voice, said, “Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.” Having said this, he breathed his last. 47When the centurion saw what had taken place, he praised God and said, “Certainly this man was innocent.” 48And when all the crowds who had gathered there for this spectacle saw what had taken place, they returned home, beating their breasts. 49But all his acquaintances, including the women who had followed him from Galilee, stood at a distance, watching these things.

Most of us have seen some movie about the life of Jesus. Those movies work with a script which brings together different stories from the four gospels from angels to Mary Magdalene meeting the Risen Christ on Easter Day.  This single script for four gospels distorts the gospel’s faith proclamation of Jesus and his identity. The Gospels of Mark, Matthew, Luke and John give us four different pictures about the life of Jesus.  While they share a similar story line they differ radically in the details. These differences are most dramatic when we come to the stories of the last days of Jesus.

This week we shall hear the Passion stories from Luke and John. While the two Gospel stories do not match, they paint a picture of Jesus consistent with the image each gospel drew throughout its story. We should pay careful attention to the tone of Luke’s story.

A deep sense of compassion and mercy flows through all the pages of the gospel and gives Luke’s version its unique spin. Luke’s Gospel portrays Jesus as a prophet from God sent to proclaim God’s reign of good news to the marginalized and poor.  The poor and marginalized are the winners. The rich and well established feel very threatened.

On the 2nd Sunday in Lent, we heard Jesus’ lament over Jerusalem as the city which kills the prophets. Now Jerusalem will kill yet another of the prophets. Yet not all of Jerusalem will call for Jesus’ crucifixion. Not all of Jerusalem seeks Jesus on the cross. As Jesus carries the crossbeam to Calvary, he is accompanied by people who follow him and some women of Jerusalem who lament for him.

All the words which come from the mouth of Jesus on the cross are filled with mercy and show how closely he feels God’s presence. From Jesus’ prayer, Father forgive them for they know not what they do, to his promise of Paradise to the good thief to his final words:  Father into your hands I commend my spirit, we get a very different feeling from Luke’s version of the story. Even though he is suffering the anguish of crucifixion, the nails piercing his wrists and ankles, the diminishment of his ability to breath and the shock that cripples his body, Jesus maintains a deep communion with God.

You may have noticed something missing from this gospel.

Nowhere in the Gospel does Jesus say that he is being crucified to take away our sins. Nowhere in any of the Gospels does Jesus say that he will die as a substitution for our sins. Yes, we sing hymns which make that claim and some of our prayers might even lead you to that assumption. But in this Gospel, we see that Jesus is the innocent victim of a conspiracy between the temple leaders and the Roman occupiers to execute Jesus. From Pilate’s protests that Jesus is innocent to the Centurion’s confession, “Certainly this man was innocent” we might wonder why this angle?

Jesus is executed because he subverts the Roman Empire. If Jesus is the King of the Jews, then Cesar Augustus is not the Emperor in Israel. Pilate executes Jesus as a terrorist, someone threatening the stability of the Roman Empire. God sees this wrongful execution and responds with resurrection. All during the Easter Season, we shall hear sermons preached by the apostles in Jerusalem which repeat the claim:  You crucified Jesus but God raised him from the dead.

Jesus proclaimed this compassionate God in parables like the Good Shepherd, the Prodigal Son, the Lost Coin.  We do not have a God who is an angry father, a God who flies off the handle with rage, a God who makes us live in fear. We have a God who loves us, a God who forgives us when we sin, who welcomes us into God’s family.

Jesus knew this God on the cross, a God who forgave those who drove nails into Jesus’ flesh, a God who allowed a thief to steal paradise, a God who took Jesus into heaven. Jesus’ God is our God. Our welcoming God sustains us when we cannot find a way to forgive intolerable wrongs and opens our heart to find a way. Our welcoming God leads us back home, goes in search of us when we are lost, and carries us back to the community of faith. Our welcoming God will stand with us when we approach death’s door, comfort us in our pain, and finally open a way for us through the valley of death.

Throughout Holy Week, this loving God will come to us, open our hearts to greater love as we  receive Jesus in the nourishing Bread of Life, accompany us on the way of Jesus glorification, and when all seems darkness shines as a Paschal Candle in our hearts. May this Holy Week bring you closer to this compassionate God, this God who rescues the innocent, this God who rescues us in our pain, this God who brings us new life. 

Epiphany: Gifts Given and Received

For those of us who live with young children, watching Disney movies comes as a regular feature of family life.  Just ask Kaheisha and Keith Brooks. They sat down with their two year old son Kenzo to watch Disney’s latest animated film Encanto when something amazing happened. Kenzo, their two year old, has dark skin and a full afro.  As the movie progressed, Kenzo became fascinated with Antonio, a little boy in the animated cast.  Antonio looks exactly like Kenzo. The little boy was dumbstruck as he looked at Antonio and thought that he was seeing himself in the movie.

Many of us who are white take it for granted that we see ourselves in movies, television and theatre.  Only gradually have other people felt that same identification with persons portrayed in mass media. To feel seen in the media comes as a significant event in a person’s life. The emergence of women with power, the portrayal of black families on television, the introduction of lesbian and gay characters on a series, the fame of Amy Schneider, a trans woman million dollar winner on Jeopardy, all these breakthroughs mark a moment in our lives just as it did for Kenzo when he saw himself in Antonio.

In some ways, today’s feast of the Epiphany invites us to feel seen in the Magi. Most sets of Nativity figures feature white persons as the Holy Family, the shepherds and angels.  However many sets, as does the one displayed under our altar, include one dark skinned magi.  In a tradition going to St. Bede, Balthasar, the bearer of myrrh, is described as being “of black complexion with a heavy beard.”  Perhaps Bede was drawing on some fanciful imaginings which the stories around the Nativity always elicit. 

Each of us needs to feel seen in the Bible. Each of us needs to discover ourselves in the stories we hear. For centuries, Christians have played with the story of the Magi. The account from the gospel according to Matthew does not mention their names, neither do we know how many showed up. We usually place three Magi since the story describes three gifts. But we do not know their number.

We usually gender the Magi as male but these ancient astronomers could have been women as well as men. Such speculation involves more than feminist projections. If you pay careful attention to the gospel, you will discover that in the story of the magi and the follow up tale of the massacre of the Innocent Children, five times we hear the phrase “the child with his mother,” a decidedly feminist atmosphere surrounds the story.  This feminine image invites us to see a scene shaped by women so female magi would fit into this story.

So let’s take another playful minute, let us allow ourselves to slip into Kenzo’s shoes, let us playfully imagine ourselves among the Magi. Most of us do not have secret stashes of gold, frankincense and myrrh in our homes. So consider for minute:  What gift would you bring Jesus?  Think of the gifts which God has given you. Some of you sing, others sew, or act, or design. Some plant flowers, others serve or lead, or read or prepare for worship.  Each of us brings our own unique gift to the manger. What gift are you bringing?

Yes, the story of the Magi invites us to discover ourselves among those sages following the star. To stretch the boundaries of the story and to discover ourselves in our unique skin color, gender, giftedness as Magi. We too are invited to see the Christ and worship with our gifts.

In our focus on the gifts of the Magi, we sometimes fail to see the other gift of the Epiphany. While the gifts are given to the infant Christ, Christ is the gift given by God to the Magi. How often do we see ourselves as the ones receiving this gift of Christ at Epiphany? If we imagine ourselves as Magi, we too receive Christ.

Throughout the Christmas season, the church reminds us that we celebrate more than the birth of Jesus. We celebrate our own rebirth through Baptism, our adoption as God’s beloved children, our membership in the family of God. In a few minutes we shall remember that gift of Baptism when we renew our Baptismal covenant with God.

On this day of Epiphany, of gift giving, consider well the gift you have been given when God gives you Jesus, God’s Beloved Son. Consider well the gift you have been given as God’s Beloved daughters and sons. Consider the gift you will give in return.  At Epiphany the gift giving does not stop. 

The Angels of Christmas

A Sermon by the Rev. Peter De Franco

The Episcopal Church of St. John the Baptist

 Luke 2:1-14 [15-20]

2In those days a decree went out from Emperor Augustus that all the world should be registered. 2This was the first registration and was taken while Quirinius was governor of Syria. 3All went to their own towns to be registered. 4Joseph also went from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to the city of David called Bethlehem, because he was descended from the house and family of David. 5He went to be registered with Mary, to whom he was engaged and who was expecting a child. 6While they were there, the time came for her to deliver her child. 7And she gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped him in bands of cloth, and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn.

8In that region there were shepherds living in the fields, keeping watch over their flock by night. 9Then an angel of the Lord stood before them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. 10But the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid; for see—I am bringing you good news of great joy for all the people: 11to you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is the Messiah, the Lord. 12This will be a sign for you: you will find a child wrapped in bands of cloth and lying in a manger.” 13And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host, praising God and saying, 14“Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace among those whom he favors!”[ 15When the angels had left them and gone into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, “Let us go now to Bethlehem and see this thing that has taken place, which the Lord has made known to us.” 16So they went with haste and found Mary and Joseph, and the child lying in the manger. 17When they saw this, they made known what had been told them about this child; 18and all who heard it were amazed at what the shepherds told them. 19But Mary treasured all these words and pondered them in her heart. 20The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen, as it had been told them.]

On that first Christmas night, God lifted the veil which separates heaven from earth and God came down to us. When the veil was opened, countless angels slipped through the opening and filled the earth with visions of amazement, with messages of good news, with songs of holy joy. The angels sought out the lowly and the least, the shepherdesses and shepherds watching over their flocks by night  all seated on the ground. The angel of the Lord came down and glory shone around.

Angels always know where to go. Whenever God opens the heavens, angels are the first to pour through. When God first decided to take on our flesh, to become one of us, an angel appeared to Mary another to Joseph and started what nobody could image. God, the one whose powerful hand created the universe, would have the tiniest hand to grasp a father’s finger, would have the tiniest lips to drink from a mother’s breast, would become the most vulnerable baby to open a way for all of us vulnerable children of God. That tiniest heart would beat with the immensity of the love which brings each of us into this world, which offers us the hope beyond this world, which touches us in our vulnerability and strengthens us to continue on our journey.

The message of Christmas comes new every year. God continues to lift a veil at Christmas and angels flood the world with the message of peace on earth. God continues to lift the veil and come to us in the humility of bread and wine, consecrated into that very body and blood of the tiniest baby at Bethlehem.

We feel our vulnerability especially at this moment, when threats of Covid infections trouble our hearts, when separation from loved ones breaks our hearts, when the uncertainty of the future shakes our hearts. We are much like the shepherdesses and shepherds, alone, afraid, uncertain. To us, God speaks those same words spoken through an angel on the cold hills of Bethlehem:  Do not be afraid.

If any of us would see an angel, we would behold not some lovely lady dressed as a bride’s maid with feathered wings. We might behold the glow of holy love, the radiance of an assuring presence, the surprise of knowing heaven has opened a door and invites us to enter. To enter into a place where we can finally let go of our fear, finally surrender our anxiety, finally know the presence of a God who comes to us with the vulnerability of a child to elicit from our fearful hearts the love every child awakens in us. That love we feel for a child, that love which gives without expectation of return, that unconditional love which strengthens, upholds, and assures us.

Yes, the angels continue to show up at Christmas. They are always there. Standing quietly in the shadows. In ordinary clothes. With simple speech. Open your hearts to the angels. They appear in the most unlikely of places. In the love of gifts given and received. In the feasts prepared and enjoyed by family and friends. In the kind word, the gentle look, the loving smile.

Angels surround us. They invite you to join them. They will startle you with unexpected joy. They will fill you with a happiness you could hardly imagine.

Open your hearts to the angels. Let them sing their songs once again. Let them comfort us weary travelers. Let them lead us to the Christ who comes to us, not as a child, but as the God who walks with us,  who is food for our journey, who is comfort and joy.

Mary and Elizabeth – Mentoring and Shame

A Sermon by the Rev. Peter De Franco On the 4th Sunday of Advent

Luke 1:39-45 [46-55]

39In those days Mary set out and went with haste to a Judean town in the hill country, 40where she entered the house of Zechariah and greeted Elizabeth. 41When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the child leaped in her womb. And Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit 42and exclaimed with a loud cry, “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb. 43And why has this happened to me, that the mother of my Lord comes to me? 44For as soon as I heard the sound of your greeting, the child in my womb leaped for joy. 45And blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfillment of what was spoken to her by the Lord.”[ 46And Mary said, “My soul magnifies the Lord, 47and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, 48for he has looked with favor on the lowliness of his servant. Surely, from now on all generations will call me blessed; 49for the Mighty One has done great things for me, and holy is his name. 50His mercy is for those who fear him from generation to generation. 51He has shown strength with his arm; he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts. 52He has brought down the powerful from their thrones, and lifted up the lowly; 53he has filled the hungry with good things, and sent the rich away empty. 54He has helped his servant Israel, in remembrance of his mercy, 55according to the promise he made to our ancestors, to Abraham and to his descendants forever.”]

Mary is a woman wrapped in mystery. The mystery begins with the visit of the angel Gabriel to her home in Nazareth, a town in the backwaters of Galilee, the hillbilly section of Israel. The angel discloses the mystery when Mary is told of the birth of her child, whom she will call Jesus.

The birth of every child involves mystery, much is unknown about a child, her future, his personality, her potential, his talents. This birth involves yet deeper mystery. The child has questionable origins. The mother is unmarried. Social sanctions against unwed mothers threaten them with execution by stoning. A teenaged girl from the country would understandably panic when faced with such life threatening possibilities.

When we hear that Mary, after hearing the message of the angel, goes with haste to visit her cousin, we could understand her sense of urgency. She is a desperate young lady searching for the wisdom of an older cousin to help her take the next steps in this unfamiliar land of birthing babies.

We seldom associate Mary with shame but shame may have been the primary reason she flees. She runs from the familiar and threatening gaze of her small town for the anonymity of Judah where Elizabeth lives. An unwed mother would bring shame on her and on her family and Mary needs to figure out how to manage this new situation. She undertakes a 100 mile journey, possibly alone, through unfamiliar territories, with the threat of robbery and rape creating fear, and the danger of an unknown reception by Elizabeth and her family.

Were you amazed that while Mary enters the house of Zechariah, her voice calls for Elizabeth? In a world dominated by the actions and voices of men, we begin to see a reversal of the order of the world. Joseph, throughout the gospel, does not say a word. Zechariah, because of his lack of faith, is struck dumb.

The women, Mary and Elizabeth, share center stage. The voices of the woman resonate. Perhaps the men in the congregation might not like this reversal of roles. Even though Mary is pregnant but weeks, John, in Elizabeth’s womb, leaps for joy at the presence of the fetal Jesus.

Elizabeth repeatedly calls Mary “Blessed.” Did Elizabeth sense Mary’s uncertainty in her voice, did her greeting come from a heart broken by humiliation? Does Elizabeth offer her the heart of an older and wiser woman who lived with the shame of being barren only to have that stigma reversed with the conception of John the Baptist. During the three months Mary stays with Elizabeth, perhaps we can imagine Mary not only attending to preparing Elizabeth’s home for a new child. Elizabeth is mentoring Mary so she can cope with shame, can navigate the treachery of gossip, can overcome the uncertainty of a world turned on its head.

Shame and stigma continue to creep into our society and undermine people who often find themselves on the edge. While our society has dissipated much of the shame surrounding breaches of traditional sexual boundaries, some of that shame lingers in the hearts of people in church communities. The same feelings arise with the stigma surrounding mental health, addiction in its various forms and the desperation of people who work in underground economies because of lack of proper documents, gender identity or homelessness.

Elizabeth lived most of her life under the shadow of disgrace because she was barren. People facing continued embarrassment develop strategies to understand others in the same situation and build networks of support and understanding. Most of us have read The Scarlet Letter, the story of Hester Prynn, found  guilty of adultery yet silent about the father of her child. Nathaniel Hawthorne shows us how guilt acknowledged opens the heart while guilt concealed destroys the heart.

The mystery that lies at the center of today’s Gospel may be the opening of our hearts through the pain we endure. Pain has the capacity of closing us down or opening us up. Our willingness to live with the inevitability of always being vulnerable bring us a deep wisdom.

I am ever amazed at the deep wisdom I hear from so many of you who have endured deep loss and pain in your lives and continue to open your hearts to love and the creative power of love.

You manifest the deep wisdom of Elizabeth who can affirm the uncertainty of a Mary searching for hope in a desperate situation. During these days, when families gather, when friends come together, be on the look out for the Mary’s in your lives, the persons on the edge, the persons in pain, the persons unsure of what to do or where to go. They are searching for Elizabeth’s to comfort them, illumine a new way, and walk with them through the darkness. Help those in need, desperate for a mentor, to discover an Elizabeth in you.  You, like Mary, the one wrapped in mystery, disclose that mystery of loving compassion, disclose the presence of our Incarnate God. 

Into The Wilderness

The Second Sunday of Advent

Merciful God, who sent your messengers the prophets to preach repentance and prepare the way for our salvation:  Give us grace to heed their warnings and forsake our sins, that we may greet with joy the coming of Jesus Christ our Redeemer; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

Luke 3:1-6

3In the fifteenth year of the reign of Emperor Tiberius, when Pontius Pilate was governor of Judea, and Herod was ruler of Galilee, and his brother Philip ruler of the region of Ituraea and Trachonitis, and Lysanias ruler of Abilene, 2during the high priesthood of Annas and Caiaphas, the word of God came to John son of Zechariah in the wilderness. 3He went into all the region around the Jordan, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins, 4as it is written in the book of the words of the prophet Isaiah, “The voice of one crying out in the wilderness: ‘Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight. 5Every valley shall be filled, and every mountain and hill shall be made low, and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough ways made smooth; 6and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.’”

So what did you make of that list of the political leaders included in this morning’s Gospel? Those men, and they are all men, constituted the power brokers of first century Israel, the people in charge of the political and religious realms at the time of Jesus.  For those of us who know the rest of the story, these men have a sinister character for most of them will play a part in the executions of both John the Baptist and Jesus. They are not the best of company. To none of these men is spoken the Word of God.

“The word of God came to John son of Zechariah in the wilderness.” John the Baptist, compared to the notables of his day, is a genuine nobody compared to any of them. Yet John is God’s Somebody. Notice the Word of God was spoken not in the palace of the Emperor, or the audience hall of the governors and not even in the Temple. The Word of God was spoken in the wilderness.

I am not sure about your homes, but in the rectory we are not decorating our home to look like a wilderness. We present little groups of deer in a woodland setting. Perhaps some of you have a light up village which represents a Victorian hamlet with a church, town hall, village shops and beautifully decorated houses.  None of us takes out a sandbox and sets up an Advent scene with some palm trees, plastic scorpions and side winding snakes. Why does God choose not only the least likely person but also the least likely place to speak the Word of God?

If you searched the bible for the word “Wilderness” you will notice how regularly God meets people in that forsaken spot. When Abraham throws out Hagar and Ishmael an angel rescues them in the wilderness. When God appears to Moses in the burning bush, Moses is watching sheep in the wilderness. After the people of Israel cross the Reed Sea, God sends them to Mount Sinai, that place of divine encounter, and where is that? In the wilderness.

In Luke’s Gospel, we first heard of the wilderness as the place where John was living, then as the place of Jesus’ temptation.  Geographically, the wilderness is relegated to those places abandoned by civilization, places where life finds its challenges, and where human survival requires exceptional skill. In the wilderness, human survival requires a radical shift to the most essential needs. When the people of Israel wandered in the desert for 40 years, they survived on water, manna and quail.  But you do not go into the wilderness for Michelin Star dining.

God brought people into the wilderness to focus them exclusively on God and the longing of the heart for God. Whenever God leads us into the wilderness, God has a plan. God wants to draw us closer to the heart of God.

By now you may have surmised that we live close to another wilderness – the wilderness of our hearts. In spite of all the festive tone of this season, many of us experience depression, loneliness and isolation.  The gift buying, wrapping and hiding, the parties, the dinners to prepare and to attend, all create stress. The lack of light as well as lack of warmth contributes to SAD, Seasonal Affective Disorder,. Many of us find ourselves in that emotional wilderness where we feel as if our heart is out of synch with the emotional pace of the world around us. Therapists recommend light therapy, using a bright light to enhance and prolong the light of the sun. Talking with others helps.

But this emotional wilderness can also open our hearts to God. Prayer transforms the wilderness from a place of isolation to a place of encounter. How can you transform your wilderness into a place where God comes to you?

In today’s reading, we heard that the Word of God came to John in the wilderness. That Word of God continues to be spoken and we can hear God speaking that Word to us. Reading the bible begins the process of hearing the Word of God. After reading we should sit in silence and let the Word enter into our hearts, allow the Word to echo in its demands, its invitations and its challenges.  Mostly we should let the Word speak to our hearts, to allow the Word to dwell in our hearts and so for us to discover Christ alive within us.

Advent involves more than remembering the journey of a young man and a pregnant woman to Bethlehem. Advent involves more than anticipating Jesus coming on the clouds of heaven. Advent invites us to discover that daily coming of Christ, that daily visitation, that discovery of the lingering grace after receiving Christ in this Holy Sacrament, that energy to share that Jesus with the world.  

Giving our Best to God

Giving our Best to God 

1 Samuel 1:4-20

4On the day when Elkanah sacrificed, he would give portions to his wife Peninnah and to all her sons and daughters; 5but to Hannah he gave a double portion, because he loved her, though the Lord had closed her womb. 6Her rival used to provoke her severely, to irritate her, because the Lord had closed her womb. 7So it went on year by year; as often as she went up to the house of the Lord, she used to provoke her. Therefore Hannah wept and would not eat. 8Her husband Elkanah said to her, “Hannah, why do you weep? Why do you not eat? Why is your heart sad? Am I not more to you than ten sons?”  9After they had eaten and drunk at Shiloh, Hannah rose and presented herself before the Lord. Now Eli the priest was sitting on the seat beside the doorpost of the temple of the Lord. 10She was deeply distressed and prayed to the Lord, and wept bitterly. 11She made this vow: “O Lord of hosts, if only you will look on the misery of your servant, and remember me, and not forget your servant, but will give to your servant a male child, then I will set him before you as a nazirite until the day of his death. He shall drink neither wine nor intoxicants, and no razor shall touch his head.” 12As she continued praying before the Lord, Eli observed her mouth. 13Hannah was praying silently; only her lips moved, but her voice was not heard; therefore Eli thought she was drunk. 14So Eli said to her, “How long will you make a drunken spectacle of yourself? Put away your wine.” 15But Hannah answered, “No, my lord, I am a woman deeply troubled; I have drunk neither wine nor strong drink, but I have been pouring out my soul before the Lord. 16Do not regard your servant as a worthless woman, for I have been speaking out of my great anxiety and vexation all this time.” 17Then Eli answered, “Go in peace; the God of Israel grant the petition you have made to him.” 18And she said, “Let your servant find favor in your sight.” Then the woman went to her quarters, ate and drank with her husband, and her countenance was sad no longer. 19They rose early in the morning and worshiped before the Lord; then they went back to their house at Ramah. Elkanah knew his wife Hannah, and the Lord remembered her. 20In due time Hannah conceived and bore a son. She named him Samuel, for she said, “I have asked him of the Lord.”

While the stories from the Bible mostly were written by men and focus on men’s stories, this morning’s story about Hannah may have originally circulated among women and show God working through women in our sacred history. We remember the stories of pairs of women in the bible where one woman has many children and the other is barren. Sarah could not have a child while Hagar bore Ishmael. Leah would carry many children and Rachael had none.  Ruth lost her husband and became a woman, widowed, barren and a foreigner in Israel.   

We recall that these barren women would give birth to children who would dramatically shift the history of Israel.  Sarah mothered Isaac, who carried the promises God made to Abraham. Rachael gave birth to Joseph who would save his family and Egypt from famine. Ruth became the grandmother of King David. 

Hannah witnesses the deep anguish and pain felt by so many mothers who cannot conceive a child, a hurting of the heart felt by so many women even today. I wonder what the women thought of Elkanah’s insensitive attempt at comforting his wife:  “Hannah, why do you weep? Why do you not eat? Why is your heart sad? Am I not more to you than ten sons?” Elkanah cannot enter into Hannah’s heart and know that emptiness she feels with her barrenness.  Hannah endured social humiliation in a society which defines a woman’s success by the number of children she bore. Hannah suffered daily abuse from, Penninah, the other wife, who has given birth to many children.

Hannah turns to God in prayer, advocates for herself with the only One who can change her situation.  She proves herself a daring woman, a powerful woman, a woman even God, a woman of a deep and wise heart. 

Do you ever wonder why Hannah first asks God for a son and then promises to return that son back to God? The history of Israel includes a dedication of the first born to God as we read in Exodus 13: 2:  “Consecrate to me all the firstborn.” We recall this consecration and the ransoming of the first born sons by the sacrifice of animals when we remember Jesus’ Presentation in the temple.  Perhaps Hannah, in her prayer to the Lord, engages in a nuanced negotiation with God:  you give me a son whom I will return to you and you will then provide me with other children in return for this gift.  Eli, the priest who blessed Hannah with the promise of a child, seems to understand this deal making for when the family would return for their annual pilgrimage to Shiloh, Eli offered this blessing to Elkanah:  “May the Lord repay you with children by this woman for the gift that she made to the Lord” (1 Sam 2: 20)

Hannah and her offering her son to God provides us with an opportunity to reflect on stewardship. Next Sunday, you are invited to make your pledge to support the church for upcoming year.  I am not asking you to present your first born children as servants at church. Though we might save some money on cutting grass, shoveling snow and cleaning the church, we just do not have enough bedrooms and food in the Rectory to accommodate an influx of guests.  Hannah shows us that we should give our best to God, should offer to God the first of our resources since God so richly blesses us with an abundance of God’s gifts:  our lives, our families, our church, our beloved country but most importantly the incomparable gift of Jesus, God’s only begotten Son.

Now comes my NPR moment of asking you to make your gift. In the Episcopal Church, the tithe, ten percent of our income, remains the standard of our giving to church. Some of us abide by that standard, some of us do not. Some of us have promised God to move toward the tithe by offering a percent of our income to God and increase that amount, year by year, until we reach 10%. 

We came out of a challenging year and some of us have either promised nothing to God or failed to make a pledge for 2021. 

I am asking you, as a sign of your gratitude to God, to offer to God the best of what God has given you. I am asking you to make this offering as one of your spiritual practices like daily prayer, like caring for the needy, like participating in worship.  For some of us, this offering may involve a level of sacrifice. As Christians we know that our lives involve sacrificial giving.  In our Baptism, we have been consecrated as a priestly community so our sacrificial giving back to God comes as part of our priestly duty. 

Such patterns of giving may seem foreign to our society, a society more focused on self than on others. Yet we belong to God’s people, a people who worship a God who overturns the standards of the world. We pray to this God  who makes the childless woman finds her life fruitful, while the mother of many sits forlorn.

urs is the God who raises the poor from the dust; and lifts the needy from the ash heap. God accomplished this great work in lifting up Jesus from the ash heap of the grave and making us part of his holy body.

In a few moments you will receive the gift of the very Body and Blood of Jesus, a gift beyond any earthly value. May you receive in this sacrament the great gift of God’s very self. May you know in this sacrament how deeply you are loved. May you experience through this sacrament how you can return love for love.   

Slave of All

Slave of All

On the Sunday bidding Farewell to Deacon David Lawson-Beck

Mark 10.35-52

35James and John, the sons of Zebedee, came forward to him and said to him, “Teacher, we want you to do for us whatever we ask of you.” 36And he said to them, “What is it you want me to do for you?” 37And they said to him, “Grant us to sit, one at your right hand and one at your left, in your glory.” 38But Jesus said to them, “You do not know what you are asking. Are you able to drink the cup that I drink, or be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with?” 39They replied, “We are able.” Then Jesus said to them, “The cup that I drink you will drink; and with the baptism with which I am baptized, you will be baptized; 40but to sit at my right hand or at my left is not mine to grant, but it is for those for whom it has been prepared.” 41When the ten heard this, they began to be angry with James and John. 42So Jesus called them and said to them, “You know that among the Gentiles those whom they recognize as their rulers lord it over them, and their great ones are tyrants over them. 43But it is not so among you; but whoever wishes to become great among you must be your servant, 44and whoever wishes to be first among you must be slave of all. 45For the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life a ransom for many.”

Some of us fans of the Sopranos were delighted with The Many Saints of Newark, the prequel to the story of Tony Soprano and his family.  In this new movie, we see the seeds of conflict sown in the heart of a young Tony by his gangster father, his highly dysfunctional mother and the crime syndicate which framed his life in Newark. You will remember that in the Sopranos, Tony, his capos and soldiers exercise ruthless power in securing their authority and domination in the various enterprises of his crime network.

Many of us recognize the set locations in Newark, Kearny, the Caldwells and perhaps some of us may even have closer experience of this network which works in Northern New Jersey. Even though you know that I have a Sicilian last name, I want to assure you that my family had no connections with those criminals. 

We all smile at the Tony and Carmella and the ways they navigate the challenges of Tony’s “Business.”  Tony’s extended family illustrate a phrase we heard in today’s Gospel:  “You know that among the Gentiles those whom they recognize as their rulers lord it over them, and their great ones are tyrants over them.” (Mk 10: 42)  The people for whom this gospel was written were all too familiar with these patterns of power and authority.

This Gospel was written just years after 70 AD when the Roman army ruthlessly put an end to the Jewish rebellion, a suppression which included not only the destruction of the Second Temple but also the wholesale execution of hundreds of thousands living in Judah.  Roman civilization was established with clear systems of authority which placed Roman male citizens at the summit of the system of power and at the very bottom of the ladder stood the slaves.

If you found yourself at the top, you counted yourself among those who lorded it over everybody under you. James and John, the disciples who introduce today’s Gospel, knew this system of power and control and they are looking to become Jesus’ capos in the new power system they imagine Jesus will set up. Like all the disciples with names, these two knuckleheads show how dense they are when listening to Jesus’ teaching.

In the lines before the start of today’s reading, Jesus teaches his disciples for the third time:  See, we are going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man will be handed over to the chief priests and the scribes, and they will condemn him to death; then they will hand him over to the Gentiles; they will mock him, and spit upon him, and flog him, and kill him; and after three days he will rise again.” (Mk. 10: 33-34) Jesus summarizes the brutal torture and death he will endure at the hands of the Roman and Jerusalem power elites.  These great men of power feel challenged by Jesus’ alternative vision and will do everything to eliminate him.  They will subject Jesus to the death of a slave, the death which eliminates Jesus as a person and makes him a thing. Jesus asserts that in spite of the supposed power of this elite, that God will overturn their power with God’s response to their violence when God raises Jesus from the dead and vindicates Jesus’ vision of God’s reign.

To counter the power sought by James and John, Jesus asserts:  “whoever wishes to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wishes to be first among you must be slave of all.” (Mk. 10: 43-44)  Let’s not imagine that Jesus was unaware of the power dynamics of his day. Jesus clearly understood the evils of slavery, the powerlessness of slaves, the ways they were brutalized and victimized by their overlords.  Jesus is not inviting us to some form of glorified humility and self sacrifice.  Jesus does not ask us to become door mats for others. Jesus is speaking to us as a Christian community, inviting us to examine the patterns of our relationships with one another, and shift the pattern of our authority among ourselves from domination over others to service of others.

Jesus overturns the system of authority which is power over others. Jesus’ authority consists in power for others, power with others. When all are slaves, then the power option shifts away from the power over others to power of service for others and authority shared with others.

Today we are saying farewell to our Deacon David, a person who, by his ordination, God has called to a special ministry of servanthood. We have experienced Deacon David’s devotion to the liturgy and his pastoral concern for the members of our church both here in Linden and previously in Rahway. Under Deacon David’s devoted service lies a deep spiritual practice centered on the spirituality of St. Francis.  Francis gathered together a community of brothers who considered themselves Lesser Brethren, a Christian community who abandoned the patterns of worldly authority for the pattern of Christian service as slaves of one another. Like Francis, Deacon David shows us that same community of equals, devoted to one another and to serving each other as equals. 

We gather as that community of equals, that community where we serve one another not out of a false humility but because we are followers of Jesus who gave himself in service to others. Our sharing in the Sacrament of Jesus’ Body and Blood binds us together with Christ and with one another. Bound together as servants of Jesus the servant, may God continue to overturn the oppressive systems of power and establish that equal community, a reflection of the very life of God, three persons living in equal love. 

Mending A Broken Heart

Mending a Broken Heart

A Sermon by the Rev. Peter De Franco

October 3, 2021

 Mark 10:2-16

2Some Pharisees came, and to test him they asked, “Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife?” 3He answered them, “What did Moses command you?” 4They said, “Moses allowed a man to write a certificate of dismissal and to divorce her.” 5But Jesus said to them, “Because of your hardness of heart he wrote this commandment for you. 6But from the beginning of creation, ‘God made them male and female.’ 7‘For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, 8and the two shall become one flesh.’ So they are no longer two, but one flesh. 9Therefore what God has joined together, let no one separate.” 10Then in the house the disciples asked him again about this matter. 11He said to them, “Whoever divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery against her; 12and if she divorces her husband and marries another, she commits adultery.” 13People were bringing little children to him in order that he might touch them; and the disciples spoke sternly to them. 14But when Jesus saw this, he was indignant and said to them, “Let the little children come to me; do not stop them; for it is to such as these that the kingdom of God belongs. 15Truly I tell you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child will never enter it.” 16And he took them up in his arms, laid his hands on them, and blessed them.

Weddings celebrate the love of two persons who make a life-long commitment: to have and to hold from this day forward, for better for worse, for richer for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish, until we are parted by death. All the blissful beauty and celebration of the start of a marriage stands in stark contrast with the somber ending of a marriage in a court when a judge declares the marriage ended. Even as so much love and hope are found at the beginning of a marriage, so much hurt and disappointment accompany its ending. The hearts, so filled with love at the start, lie broken and torn at its end.

Marriages involve a life long commitment and person continue to grow and change in the course of a life, or they should grow and change.  Yet some relationships fumble that initial stage of falling in love and when that feeling does not occupy every waking moment, when persons fail to grow in a marriage, when people fail to support one another as they mature as persons, marriages do fail. Sometimes marriages fail because of emotional and physical abuse. Sometimes marriages fail because unimagined losses. Sometimes marriages fail because communications faulter, emotional commitments crumble, the partners do not share common interests. Marriages fail for a variety of reasons.

Some people opt out of marriage after their first one. Some people try to pick up the pieces of their heart, discover what went wrong the first time, and try another connection.

You will notice that I have been talking about the emotional dimensions of marriage since for most of us marriage involves a bond between two persons based on their emotional commitment to one another. In the first century world of Jesus, marriage reflected the values of that time.  As a world dominated by men, marriage involved the giving of a woman from one man, the father, to another man, the husband.  Divorce in that world usually came from a man, the husband, who could reject a wife for whatever reason. We see in Jesus a shift in that world of meaning since by affirming the life long commitment involved in a marriage, Jesus protects women from the whims of a husband who tires of a wife and seeks another.

However Jesus speaks to the institution of marriage in his day and does not imagine the way we, in our day, construct the meaning of marriage. Faithful to Jesus, the Episcopal Church affirms that marriage involves a life long commitment between two persons. We also understand that sometimes that commitment is not honored by one or both persons and the marriage fails.  We also understand that marriage brings together not only a man and a woman but also two women or two men. 

To understand God’s plan for us, we Episcopalians begin with the Word of God in the Bible and balance the Bible with reason and tradition.  Tradition points us to the ongoing teaching of the church and we know that Tradition includes parts which do not change and parts which change and develop. Reason helps us to distinguish what remains unchanged and what develops. Reason allows us to understand that ethics, the standards for human behavior, are connected with our understanding of the human person.

As we deepen our understanding of what it means to be a person, so too our ethics evolves and develops. We see this development happens with some ethical teachings in the bible. The bible allowed for different behaviors which we now consider unethical. The bible allows for slavery but we understand it as unethical. The bible permits men to dominate women but we understand women and men to be equals in work and relationships. We understand both that the bible defines patterns of human behavior to which persons in every time and place must subscribe and other patterns which are conditioned by time and culture. Even in the Gospels, we see in the Gospel according to Mark a very strict teaching on no marriage after divorce, but Matthew allows for marriage after divorce when one partner is unfaithful and Paul would prefer that people not get married at all.

As we look at the Gospels, we are invited to discern broader patterns of behavior, patterns which allow for reconciliation after failures, for developing moral strength, and for the equal treatment of both genders in relationships. 

Our passage from Mark includes not only a teaching on marriage and divorce but also one on how we are to treat children, the most vulnerable ones in our society, even as they were vulnerable in Jesus’ society. We see the disciples quick to exclude the children, the vulnerable from contact with Jesus. Too often, Church leaders follow not the example of Jesus who would invite the most vulnerable but the example of the disciples who would exclude those on the margins. At one time the Episcopal church also took that position but we have seen divorced persons as vulnerable and marginalized and sought a way to help them find again in marriage a path of mutual joy, of help and comfort in prosperity and adversity and a society in which to raise and nurture children. 

There is hope after divorce, hope that hearts broken can be restored, hope that new spouses can share in the full sacramental life of the church, hope that God offers a future when new beginnings will bring new life.  With new life, God mends a broken heart.

Discerning God's Action in the World

Discerning God’s Action in the World.

A Sermon by the Rev. Peter De Franco

September 26, 2021

Mark 9:38-50

38John said to him, “Teacher, we saw someone casting out demons in your name, and we tried to stop him, because he was not following us.” 39But Jesus said, “Do not stop him; for no one who does a deed of power in my name will be able soon afterward to speak evil of me. 40Whoever is not against us is for us. 41For truly I tell you, whoever gives you a cup of water to drink because you bear the name of Christ will by no means lose the reward. 42“If any of you put a stumbling block before one of these little ones who believe in me, it would be better for you if a great millstone were hung around your neck and you were thrown into the sea. 43If your hand causes you to stumble, cut it off; it is better for you to enter life maimed than to have two hands and to go to hell, to the unquenchable fire. 45And if your foot causes you to stumble, cut it off; it is better for you to enter life lame than to have two feet and to be thrown into hell. 47And if your eye causes you to stumble, tear it out; it is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than to have two eyes and to be thrown into hell, 48where their worm never dies, and the fire is never quenched. 49“For everyone will be salted with fire. 50Salt is good; but if salt has lost its saltiness, how can you season it? Have salt in yourselves, and be at peace with one another.”

Walk into any of the major cathedrals of Europe or the United States of America and you may see them in their places of honor. Behind the altar you may see carvings of paintings of the twelve apostles. Across the centuries from St. Thomas Episcopal Church on Fifth Avenue to the baroque cathedrals of Spain, the twelve apostles occupy a place of honor in the churches.

When we come to the Gospel according to Mark, the apostles are depicted not as these great success stories but as abject failures.  Just look at the opening words of John in today’s reading. 

John calls Jesus “Teacher.” John, however, never learns anything Jesus is teaching him. John, like all the apostles, resists Jesus’ teaching. John and his brother James were among the first called apostles. Yet John, along with the other apostles, stands at the end of the line among those who have faith in Jesus, who understand his message, and follow Jesus on the difficult path he lays out.

John is trying to establish who is in and who is out when it comes to ministry. “Teacher, we saw someone casting out demons in your name, and we tried to stop him, because he was not following us.”  Establishing boundaries in ministry involves dangerous patterns and seems strange to us who live in an ecumenical environment. Just think about the service groups in our community.

LINCS, the Linden Food Pantry, was organized as an ecumenical outreach to help the hungry.  The people who run the organization come from different houses of worship and collaborate in feeding God’s hungry children.  We know of other organizations like the Lions’ Club who identify a need in the community and organize volunteers to help others.

Most of these organizations arise as secular groups not affiliated with a church or mosque or synagogue or temple.  Yet, as people of faith, we know that something deeper is happening. God is endlessly at work in the world, identifying problems, matching some people’s gifts with other people’s needs, creating opportunities where nothing existed.  God sees the need for healing in our world and as we heard from the letter of James, God invites us to collaborate with God in healing the wounds of the world.

John failed to discern this action of God in the world. John limited God to the narrow sphere of Jesus and his immediate band. Jesus saw the broader scope of work which needed to be done and the people setting their hand to accomplish that work.

God continues to get God’s hands dirty in our world. God prowls the community searching out places where people are in need, seeking people with talents to address those circumstances, and drawing people into God’s circle of healing. We all know that God is the energy behind the feeding ministries in our city. Many of us collaborate with God by bringing food to church for the food pantry or donating money to support their work. But I wonder in what other places God may be at work among us.

It seems to me that God not only identifies needs but God also gives gifts and talents to address those needs. Have you asked yourself what gifts has God given to you which you could use to help others in need?  Many of us have been involved in education.

I wonder how God may use those gifts to help others. I wonder how those gifts could be used to help our neighbors at McManus Middle School?

Some of us have talents in sewing. I wonder how God would use those gifts to bring together people of similar interests to create communities which cultivate those gifts, teach those gifts to others, draw people together as a community sharing that gift. Some of us are musicians, actors and painters. Some of us are gardeners. Some of us have talents you have not shared with others. I wonder how God may be inviting us to work with God in our community?

I would like to present you with a challenge. I would invite you to find at least one person in the church who has a talent like yours. I would then invite you to identify a need in the community which you could address. Perhaps the gardeners among us might organize that community garden about which we have talked but never started. Perhaps the sowers might organize a community of people who like to sew and bring them together for sewing events, perhaps displays, perhaps contests. You have more creative imaginations than me and you can transform possibilities into realities.

God invites us to collaborate with God in creating a better world, in healing the pain of this world, in cultivating the talents of the young people in our world.  What will you do with that invitation?

A Question of Identity

A Question of Identity

September 12, 2021

 Mark 8:27-38

27Jesus went on with his disciples to the villages of Caesarea Philippi; and on the way he asked his disciples, “Who do people say that I am?” 28And they answered him, “John the Baptist; and others, Elijah; and still others, one of the prophets.” 29He asked them, “But who do you say that I am?” Peter answered him, “You are the Messiah.” 30And he sternly ordered them not to tell anyone about him. 31Then he began to teach them that the Son of Man must undergo great suffering, and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again. 32He said all this quite openly. And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. 33But turning and looking at his disciples, he rebuked Peter and said, “Get behind me, Satan! For you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things.” 34He called the crowd with his disciples, and said to them, “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. 35For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it. 36For what will it profit them to gain the whole world and forfeit their life? 37Indeed, what can they give in return for their life? 38Those who are ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of them the Son of Man will also be ashamed when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels.”

Identity, how we define ourselves, is becoming more and more complex. How many words would you use to describe yourself? When you were born into your family, everyone wanted to know if you were a girl or a boy. As you grew, you developed your gender identity. Now people share how they want others to refer to them. Identity is becoming more complex.

We have different skin colors which tell deeper stories about who we are and who our ancestors were. Ethnic factors add another layer. As does sexual orientation. Our work brings another dimension to our identity. As well as our travel experience, our education, our family, our marital status. Our faith shapes our identity.  Our country, our state, our political perspective all make us who we are.

Today’s gospel focuses on identity when Jesus asks two big questions:  “Who do people say that I am?” “But who do you say that I am?” Chapter 8 marks the center of this Gospel so the questions Jesus asks are central to our faith. Jesus glosses over the question about what others think of him since he wants to know what the disciples think of him. Jesus then goes on to disclose how he thinks of himself:  “the Son of Man must undergo great suffering, and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again.” Jesus is correcting Peter’s confession of his being the Messiah by drawing from the portrait from Isaiah and identifies himself as the Suffering Servant whom God will raise.

Jesus asks us the same question:  Who do you say that I am?

Perhaps some of us will answer with the words of the Creed which we will shortly profess. Each of us needs to answer this question about Jesus’ identity. Each of us needs to answer this question in words of our own, words which describe our relationship with Jesus, words which paint a picture of who Jesus is for us.

Alyce McKenzie, a bible scholar, tells us why we each need to identify who Jesus is for us since we have to answer this question:  Who are we becoming as we live into Jesus’ identity that resides within us? Who are we becoming as we live into Jesus’ identity that resides within us?  We need a clear answer to the question of who Jesus is because our identity is wrapped up in Jesus’ identity.

I would hope you will take Jesus’ expression of his identity into your answer, into the reality of who you are. Jesus defines himself as God’s beloved child. Jesus also defines himself as the suffering one whom God will raise. Part of your identity involves discovering yourself as God’s beloved child.  Part of your identity involves finding yourself in Jesus’ process of dying and rising.

Yesterday we remembered the 20th anniversary of September 11. What does it mean for us as Christians, persons who have a Jesus identity, to remember that day? What would Jesus have done? I think of a friend, Father Oscar Mockridge, a retired priest, who went to St. Paul’s Chapel and ministered to those working the pile. Yes, Fr. Oz paid a price, the emotional cost of being so close to such unimagine pain, the physical cost of developing cancer which cost him his life. Whom do you remember as showing the face of Jesus shining through the way they act in the world?

I wonder about the cost of forgiving those behind the violence, the relinquishment of the desire for vengeance, the forgiving Jesus taught us from the cross of those who know not what they do. A great deal needs to die within us to find ourselves on the other side of vengeance, the other side of forgiveness. Deep within our Jesus identity lies this capacity to discover every broader boundaries for forgiveness, for compassion, for healing.

By pointing to the cross and resurrection as keys to his identity, Jesus invites us to learn how to surrender something small that something bigger might be raised up. That something might not feel small when we have to let go of feelings of hurt, a sense of injustice, the loss of someone dear. What can you create in place of hurt, in place of injustice, in the presence of grief?

The gospel begins with a question Jesus asks us about how we identify Jesus. As we answer that question we discover who we are. We discover ourselves, our deepest self, our truest self, our self as we discover ourselves in Christ.