Borrowing the language of Genesis, the final editor of the Gospel of John has attached the text of a liturgical hymn to the gospel-proper as a prologue. It is a magnificent poetic theological reflection, evidencing considerable development in Christological thought in the seventy-five or so years from the crucifixion of Jesus in 30 C.E. to the completion of this fourth gospel in.the early second century.
This Prologue, which came to constitute the first eighteen verses of the first chapter of John, speaks about a "word" just as Genesis does. In Genesis, God speaks words and creation happens. Here in Johannine depiction, we learn that this Word was present with God from before time and was the divine agent through whom creation occurred. This entity is referred to in the Hebrew Scriptures as Wisdom -- a female figure described both in Proverbs and the Wisdom of Solomon. Also, in extra-biblical Jewish writings, there is reference to God's Wisdom being sent from heaven to earth from time to time on special missions to do God's will. Now the author of John's hymn borrows a term from Heraclitus, logos, and substitutes it for Wisdom. The Greek logos is appropriately applied to Jesus, as it is a male term and refers to the rational principle behind the Universe. Thus the Word of God, which is all divine, creative, and eternal, is seen as sent from heaven to fully inhabit the person of Jesus so that God may express in a human life everything God has to say to us! Christ, not the Bible, is the Word of God.
When the One fully possessed of the Word enters human life, he will be misunderstood and rejected. And, because his life will be infallibly conformed to God's will, he will be crucified by the minions of wealth, influence, and imperial power. But to those of us who trust in him he gives, through our Mother Church, the sacred sacrament of baptism, a new "birth from above" into a new family in special relationship with the Divine. And so we begin to be like him, redeemed people of a new covenant "full of grace and truth."
In other words, the Incarnation is the means by which we become incorporated in God through the mission and ministry of Jesus. As the great composer Oliver Messiaen said, "The Word became flesh and dwelt in me!" Jesus has saved us, so we can save the world. That is what Jesus and the coming of the Kingdom mean for us.
Thursday, December 31, 2015
Christmas Eve, 2015
As Catholic Christians, we Episcopalians are countercultural. In the early days of colonial America, the Puritans outlawed the observance of Christmas with very severe penalties. Now the protestant pendulim has swung to the other extreme. These days our neighbours, who have been celebrating Christmas since well before Hallowe'en, will be throwing out their trees tomorrow morning, In the meantime, we have been observing the lovely, anticipatory season of Advent for four weeks. Now tonight we begin to celebrate twelve days of Christmas. What were they thinking? We have eleven extra days to party!,
And what are we partying about? We celebrate one gift: the Incarnation, in which God got "under our skin," lived human life in the person of Jesus, and, likewise, in Jesus, taught us what a life fully attuned to God looks like. At the point in the Mass when the priest pours wine into the chalice and then tops the wine off with a little water, the priest says silently, "By the mingling of this water and wine, may we come to share in the divinity of Christ who humbled himself to share in our humanity." That's it: he became as we are so we might become as he is.
Tonight;s readings tell the story of this marvellous conjunction. I suspect if you or I had written the script, the Divine Son would have appeared as a prince, born in a palace in some prominent city like Rome or Athens, surrounding by courtiers and all the rich and the famous of his age. But when God writes the script, we find the Son of God born in a cave to a refugee family from a backwater town, the child resting in an animal feeding trough, and being visited by smelly, sinful shepherds. What a difference between our reality and the world in which God always values the outcast, the poor, and the oppressed. "He has pulled down the powerful from their thrones and lifted up the lowly. He has filled the hungry with good things and sent the rich away empty handed." (Lk 1:52,53). Thus Our Lady describes God's Kingdom.
As important and central to this night's message as is the Incarnation, it is all for nought if God does not become incarnate in us. As Mother Barbara Brown Taylor wrote of this season, "God is in the midst of it, after all, still hunting new flesh in which to be born."
Happy Christmas!
And what are we partying about? We celebrate one gift: the Incarnation, in which God got "under our skin," lived human life in the person of Jesus, and, likewise, in Jesus, taught us what a life fully attuned to God looks like. At the point in the Mass when the priest pours wine into the chalice and then tops the wine off with a little water, the priest says silently, "By the mingling of this water and wine, may we come to share in the divinity of Christ who humbled himself to share in our humanity." That's it: he became as we are so we might become as he is.
Tonight;s readings tell the story of this marvellous conjunction. I suspect if you or I had written the script, the Divine Son would have appeared as a prince, born in a palace in some prominent city like Rome or Athens, surrounding by courtiers and all the rich and the famous of his age. But when God writes the script, we find the Son of God born in a cave to a refugee family from a backwater town, the child resting in an animal feeding trough, and being visited by smelly, sinful shepherds. What a difference between our reality and the world in which God always values the outcast, the poor, and the oppressed. "He has pulled down the powerful from their thrones and lifted up the lowly. He has filled the hungry with good things and sent the rich away empty handed." (Lk 1:52,53). Thus Our Lady describes God's Kingdom.
As important and central to this night's message as is the Incarnation, it is all for nought if God does not become incarnate in us. As Mother Barbara Brown Taylor wrote of this season, "God is in the midst of it, after all, still hunting new flesh in which to be born."
Happy Christmas!
Sunday, December 20, 2015
Advent IV: Mary Sunday
Anglicans informally call this day Mary Sunday, not as if it replaces her feast in August or other Marian days, but because the readings on the last Sunday of Advent bid us reflect on Our Lady's role in the economy of salvation. Many years ago, I toured an Anglican church building in Peper Harow, Surrey, England where the priest explained that all the church records had been burnt by dissenters in the 16th century. In the sanctuary, the side and rear walls beside and behind the altar were made of marble and contained beautiful statues of great figures in the Christian Tradition. One of those figures, depicting Mary, had been utterly obliterated by the Calvinist Taliban in the same attack. As one writer put it, the continental reformers banished Mary to her celestial bedroom, never to return. And that was true until recent times. The Ecumenical Society of the Blessed Virgin Mary -- of which I am a member -- is an international association composed of Anglicans, Episcopalians, Roman Catholics, and Orthodox but also Methodists Presbyterians, and others who have discovered the wonderful person who was the mother of Jesus and model disciple.
She was honoured from the beginning of her life with special graces [the Conception] to follow God' will perfectly. Her strong 'yes' to an unconventional and inconvenient pregnancy [the Annunciation] made our own salvation possible. Her teaching of the Faith to her son was followed by aid to his ministry alongside the other women. Later she was there at the foot of the cross, and on to the upper room at Pentecost, then to the church in Ephesus with Saint John, and finally to Glory, reunited with her son [the Assumption.] What a life!
In today's Gospel reading, Luke 1: 39-55, Mary's cousin Elizabeth expresses the first 'Hail Mary.'
And Jesus' mother responds by predicting that all generations to come will call her the "Blessed" Virgin Mary, and she utters the amazing poem we call the Magnificat. From her prophetic side, we learn that the Kingdom of God that we are called to build is based on a new vision of justice and compassion: the powerful will be cast down, the lowly raised up, the rich sent away empty. We also learn that God is faithful to his promises to the Jewish people forever. When God covenants he never reneges; God can be trusted. Finally, the totality of the story reveals Mary as Theotokos, God-bearer, Mother of God, as she has been known since ancient times. Following her example, each of us is to bear the Light into the world in our own time and place. This was beautifully expressed by Episcopal priest and author Barbara Brown Taylor when she wrote:
"You can decide to take part in a plan you didn't choose, doing things you do not know how to do, for reasons you don't entirely understand. You can take part in a thrilling and dangerous scheme with no script and no guarantees. You can agree to smuggle God into the world inside your own body."
She was honoured from the beginning of her life with special graces [the Conception] to follow God' will perfectly. Her strong 'yes' to an unconventional and inconvenient pregnancy [the Annunciation] made our own salvation possible. Her teaching of the Faith to her son was followed by aid to his ministry alongside the other women. Later she was there at the foot of the cross, and on to the upper room at Pentecost, then to the church in Ephesus with Saint John, and finally to Glory, reunited with her son [the Assumption.] What a life!
In today's Gospel reading, Luke 1: 39-55, Mary's cousin Elizabeth expresses the first 'Hail Mary.'
And Jesus' mother responds by predicting that all generations to come will call her the "Blessed" Virgin Mary, and she utters the amazing poem we call the Magnificat. From her prophetic side, we learn that the Kingdom of God that we are called to build is based on a new vision of justice and compassion: the powerful will be cast down, the lowly raised up, the rich sent away empty. We also learn that God is faithful to his promises to the Jewish people forever. When God covenants he never reneges; God can be trusted. Finally, the totality of the story reveals Mary as Theotokos, God-bearer, Mother of God, as she has been known since ancient times. Following her example, each of us is to bear the Light into the world in our own time and place. This was beautifully expressed by Episcopal priest and author Barbara Brown Taylor when she wrote:
"You can decide to take part in a plan you didn't choose, doing things you do not know how to do, for reasons you don't entirely understand. You can take part in a thrilling and dangerous scheme with no script and no guarantees. You can agree to smuggle God into the world inside your own body."
Sunday, December 13, 2015
Advent I : God is With Us
The gospel pericope is Luke 21: 25-36. If you or I were to hold a press conference and and talk like Jesus did in this passage, we would be taken to jail, which is where we keep our mentally ill here in Oklahoma. But the language Jesus is using is eschatological, a fifty-cent word referring to the last things in time.
Early Judaism believed in the possibility of the Kingdom of God on earth. Later, some experienced discouragement and began to look for direct divine intervention. This is apocalyptic eschatology in which people imagined that the end-time would be cataclysmic, with universal disturbances, as the cosmic forces of evil are finally defeated. The Lord would arrive on Zion, serve an eschatological banquet at which the wine never ran out, abolish death, raise the dead to judgement, and create new heavens and a new earth that is paradise. The prophet Daniel changed the script by introducing a mysterious Human One ("Son of Man") who would be in on the action, and whom people quickly began to identify with an expected Messiah.
We call expectation of the Kingdom on earth realized eschatology, and expectation of the Kingdom at the end consistent eschatology. What Jesus himself introduced was what we call inaugural eschatology meaning Jesus believed that he had brought the dawn of the inbreaking of the Kingdom, but that its full realization must await the end,which he talks about today. He speaks of the actual generation in which he lived experiencing that end; yet, elsewhere in Lucan material, he says he has no idea when the end will come! Perhaps Jesus thought his death would trigger the final age, the coming of God's kingdom in its fullness.
In any event, as Christians we must see ourselves as living somewhere between the coming of Jesus and the end. It is no time to be passive, it is the right time to work for Kingdom values. In the film The Shawshank Redemption, we see the theme that being freed from prison after a long time did not bring joy but anxiety, because jail had become home. We can be like that -- trapped in our old ways of thinking, mired down in the world's values. So we resist liberation, perhaps without knowing it. With God as the beginning and end of our journey, and our companion in between, we can live new and bountiful lives, and prepare with confidence to celebrate again the coming of the one whose name is Emanu-el, meaning 'God is with us.'
Advent III: The War on Christmas
Every year we hear about a war on Christmas, usually related to saying 'Merry Christmas' to people who celebrate a different religious holiday, or to expecting government officials to use tax money from non-Christians to fund nativity scenes and the like in public venues.
In my opinion there is a real war on Christmas but it is rooted in other problems, sentimentalism and consumerism. In today's gospel reading [Lk. 3: 7-18] John the Baptiser chops away the props of the real war on Christmas. First he attacks merely inherited religion: it wasn't 'good enough' just to be a child of Abraham, i.e. Jew, any more than it is now good enough to be a member of the politically- connected or most entertaining church in a community. John also attacks spiritual feelings that only warm the believer who then ignores the real-life needs of other people in the community. Finally, John hits hard on the habit of blurring ethics -- going along to get along. And there you have the problem: religion that is prideful, affirms faith without works, and tolerates ethical sloppiness.
The answer to these unhealthy tendencies is repentance: In Hebrew, teshuvah, meaning to turn around and go in the right direction; in biblical Greek, metanoia, a new way of thinking, a new attitude; in Latin, the language of the Church, poenitentiam agere, taking action that shows the reformed way of thinking and the decision to move in the right direction.
When the crowd asked for specific instructions, John offered commonsense advice. The one with two coats must give one to someone who has no coat, and those with food must give food to those going hungry. The tax agent must collect only his due. The soldier must not extort to enhance his income. With honest discernment, you and I can determine where the holes in our individual souls are, and respond with true repentance. That is how we are called to prepare to celebrate Christmas.
In my opinion there is a real war on Christmas but it is rooted in other problems, sentimentalism and consumerism. In today's gospel reading [Lk. 3: 7-18] John the Baptiser chops away the props of the real war on Christmas. First he attacks merely inherited religion: it wasn't 'good enough' just to be a child of Abraham, i.e. Jew, any more than it is now good enough to be a member of the politically- connected or most entertaining church in a community. John also attacks spiritual feelings that only warm the believer who then ignores the real-life needs of other people in the community. Finally, John hits hard on the habit of blurring ethics -- going along to get along. And there you have the problem: religion that is prideful, affirms faith without works, and tolerates ethical sloppiness.
The answer to these unhealthy tendencies is repentance: In Hebrew, teshuvah, meaning to turn around and go in the right direction; in biblical Greek, metanoia, a new way of thinking, a new attitude; in Latin, the language of the Church, poenitentiam agere, taking action that shows the reformed way of thinking and the decision to move in the right direction.
When the crowd asked for specific instructions, John offered commonsense advice. The one with two coats must give one to someone who has no coat, and those with food must give food to those going hungry. The tax agent must collect only his due. The soldier must not extort to enhance his income. With honest discernment, you and I can determine where the holes in our individual souls are, and respond with true repentance. That is how we are called to prepare to celebrate Christmas.
Sunday, December 6, 2015
Advent II: Baruch 5: 1-9
The book of Baruch is one of seven books the continental reformers removed from their bible. That is a shame because they are all wonderful literature. For example, there is the book of Baruch who was historically-speaking the secretary of the prophet Jeremiah. He treats of the Babylonian Exile and, in today's pericope, the author and prophet speaks to those about to return to their Holy Land. Scholars tell us that the Jewish exiles had done well in what is now Iraq and most were assimilated. Only perhaps twenty percent made return to Palestine but they apparently did so with great passion and vigour to restore their heritage in their homeland. He makes two particularly important points.
First, he tells the returning exiles to change their clothes -- a metaphor for repenting, returning to God, and discerning the divine will in their personal lives and the lives of the greater community. Repentance in the biblical Hebrew is "teshuvah," meaning to turn around and go in a new direction. Certainly there is a message for us that God is always ready to lead his people into a brighter future, but it requires work on our part. We must trade the "clothes" of sorrow, distress, and disillusionment for new clothes of integrity, vision, and hope. In other words, we must trust in God, which is the primary definition of faith.
Second, Baruch reminds us that when exiles are ready to return -- the Hebrews from bondage to a foreign power, us from bondage to sin and death -- God will make a straight path, one that has been levelled by chopping off mountains and filling in valleys. We may think of this as a way that God reveals to us that all of his children are equal in his sight and equally loved, equally challenged to follow a straight path to the Kingdom. There is to be no one percent and ninety-nine percent, no upper crust and lower crust, no good-enough and not-good-enough, in the Kingdom. God calls us to level the playing field in our society and world. A favourite Advent character, John the Baptiser, reminds us of that because he came bypassing the players of his time (whom he called a bunch of snakes) and going to the marginalized, the forgotten, the nobodies. Just like his cousin Jesus.
First, he tells the returning exiles to change their clothes -- a metaphor for repenting, returning to God, and discerning the divine will in their personal lives and the lives of the greater community. Repentance in the biblical Hebrew is "teshuvah," meaning to turn around and go in a new direction. Certainly there is a message for us that God is always ready to lead his people into a brighter future, but it requires work on our part. We must trade the "clothes" of sorrow, distress, and disillusionment for new clothes of integrity, vision, and hope. In other words, we must trust in God, which is the primary definition of faith.
Second, Baruch reminds us that when exiles are ready to return -- the Hebrews from bondage to a foreign power, us from bondage to sin and death -- God will make a straight path, one that has been levelled by chopping off mountains and filling in valleys. We may think of this as a way that God reveals to us that all of his children are equal in his sight and equally loved, equally challenged to follow a straight path to the Kingdom. There is to be no one percent and ninety-nine percent, no upper crust and lower crust, no good-enough and not-good-enough, in the Kingdom. God calls us to level the playing field in our society and world. A favourite Advent character, John the Baptiser, reminds us of that because he came bypassing the players of his time (whom he called a bunch of snakes) and going to the marginalized, the forgotten, the nobodies. Just like his cousin Jesus.
Unity and Diversity
The understanding and interface of these two concepts vary widely across Christianity. For example, unity in the Roman Communion must be "organic," that is, based on absolute obedience to the Pope. The papal office developed in history from that of Bishop of Rome to Vicar of Peter (one who rules in the Petrine location) and finally to Vicar of Christ (one who rules in Christ's place on earth.) When one so surrenders to this arrogation, it is possible to receive Communion in a Roman Catholic venue.
Many evangelical churches seem to have unity in the congregational pastor. The teachings of their church will be the opinions of the central personality of the community, and members are expected to believe and do as he says. Not infrequently this"holy opinion-maker is himself uneducated; the old saw "God doesn't call the qualified, he qualifies the called" is used as an excuse for the lack of real preparation for professional ministry. That is serious, because messing with peoples' souls is serious business.
In Anglicanism, we find unity in the baptismal covenant, which makes us brothers and sisters in a spiritual family (we admit all baptised to Communion), and in the apostolic succession of bishops, as each congregation is under the stewardship of a diocesan bishop who, as a successor to the Apostles, serves with authority and protects the faithful people in his care. One sees this in action when there is a troubled congregation. The bishop intervenes to preserve the integrity and heal the discord, so that the congregation may move forward again. By comparison, protestant churches frequently split like amoebae into new congregations centred round some element of dispute, often disaffection from a particular personality in the leadership.
Diversity is a great strength in our Episcopal congregations. We take seriously Jesus' counsel not to judge others. So we accept persons without regard to race or ethnicity,age or social status, colour, gender, or sexual orientation. And we prepare and admit people for all levels of ministry within the Church without bias. Over the years I have welcomed, and been blessed by, persons who had been judged and excluded from other Christian affiliations because of who they were. Often bad biblical exegesis, poor theology, and scientific ignorance, were working together in a system closed to new knowledge and information, which led to the rejection of good people. We try to be faithful to the example of Jesus who reached out to all, especially to outcasts not good enough to pass muster with the religious professionals of his time. The gift of diversity also serves to build understanding and tolerance in a world where fear fuels ignorance which in turn feeds hatred and, finally, violence. In our tradition, we practice the gospel of peace and leave judgement to the One who alone can judge without error.
Many evangelical churches seem to have unity in the congregational pastor. The teachings of their church will be the opinions of the central personality of the community, and members are expected to believe and do as he says. Not infrequently this"holy opinion-maker is himself uneducated; the old saw "God doesn't call the qualified, he qualifies the called" is used as an excuse for the lack of real preparation for professional ministry. That is serious, because messing with peoples' souls is serious business.
In Anglicanism, we find unity in the baptismal covenant, which makes us brothers and sisters in a spiritual family (we admit all baptised to Communion), and in the apostolic succession of bishops, as each congregation is under the stewardship of a diocesan bishop who, as a successor to the Apostles, serves with authority and protects the faithful people in his care. One sees this in action when there is a troubled congregation. The bishop intervenes to preserve the integrity and heal the discord, so that the congregation may move forward again. By comparison, protestant churches frequently split like amoebae into new congregations centred round some element of dispute, often disaffection from a particular personality in the leadership.
Diversity is a great strength in our Episcopal congregations. We take seriously Jesus' counsel not to judge others. So we accept persons without regard to race or ethnicity,age or social status, colour, gender, or sexual orientation. And we prepare and admit people for all levels of ministry within the Church without bias. Over the years I have welcomed, and been blessed by, persons who had been judged and excluded from other Christian affiliations because of who they were. Often bad biblical exegesis, poor theology, and scientific ignorance, were working together in a system closed to new knowledge and information, which led to the rejection of good people. We try to be faithful to the example of Jesus who reached out to all, especially to outcasts not good enough to pass muster with the religious professionals of his time. The gift of diversity also serves to build understanding and tolerance in a world where fear fuels ignorance which in turn feeds hatred and, finally, violence. In our tradition, we practice the gospel of peace and leave judgement to the One who alone can judge without error.
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