tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15995146006924482422024-03-12T20:40:58.232-04:00My Mother is a FatherRetired scientist/priest in the Episcopal Church.motherameliahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11381575553733390018noreply@blogger.comBlogger229125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1599514600692448242.post-84765285802287729082015-01-17T15:13:00.001-05:002015-01-17T15:13:04.215-05:00Sermon for the Second Sunday after Epiphany<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-AHfji7lrG14/VLrBzqufP7I/AAAAAAAAAsQ/0n728q6tK3w/s1600/640px-Brooklyn_Museum_-_Nathaniel_Under_the_Fig_Tree_(Nathanae%CC%88l_sous_le_figuier)_-_James_Tissot_-_overall.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-AHfji7lrG14/VLrBzqufP7I/AAAAAAAAAsQ/0n728q6tK3w/s1600/640px-Brooklyn_Museum_-_Nathaniel_Under_the_Fig_Tree_(Nathanae%CC%88l_sous_le_figuier)_-_James_Tissot_-_overall.jpg" height="205" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">"Brooklyn Museum - Nathaniel Under the Fig Tree (Nathanaël sous le figuier) - James Tissot - overall" by James Tissot - Online Collection of Brooklyn Museum; Photo: Brooklyn Museum, 2008, 00.159.59_PS2.jpg. Licensed under Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons - http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Brooklyn_Museum_-<br /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 11px;">
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>Christ Church, Gardiner</i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>Second Sunday after Epiphany</i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>1Samuel 3:1-10</i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>Psalm 139:1-5</i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>John 1:43-51</i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">In our Old Testament reading this morning we learn how God called Samuel as a young boy. His words, “Speak, for your servant is listening”, and Samuel’s trust in his teacher, Eli, show us a heart and mind open to God’s calling. If we read the whole of the passage, we would learn that Samuel was reluctant to tell Eli what God had said because it involved Eli’s sons, who blasphemed God and Eli did nothing about it. Eli insisted on knowing what was said and after hearing, responded “It is the Lord; let him do what seems good to him” Samuel grew up “And all of Israel from Dan to Beer-sheeba knew that Samuel was a trustworthy prophet of the Lord.”</span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">We are so very used to hearing that Jesus called people that we have no idea how unusual it is for a Rabbi, a teacher, to call someone to be his disciple. The usual way was for a student to pick his teacher. But that is what Jesus does at the start of his ministry. He calls Andrew and Peter and James and John away from their livelihoods as fishermen, and called them to become fishers of people. He called Philip, who in turn, found Nathanael. When Jesus saw Nathanael coming he said “He is truly an Israelite in whom there is no deceit.” </span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">It can be pretty risky for us to live without deceit. I know I can remember times when I didn’t correct someone about myself, because what they said sounded so much nicer than reality. Even though we like to think of ourselves as honest people, we fool ourselves into thinking that our white lies, or silences or evasions are needed either to soothe our egos or our self-esteem or to protect our positions in the community or sometimes to protect others. But mostly it’s about us.</span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">If you go on-line and read about news of the Episcopal Church, you might know that an instance of this living with deceit has come to a head these past two weeks for the Assisting Bishop of Maryland. She was driving and texting while intoxicated and killed a bicyclist. To make matters worse, she left the scene of the accident only to return within the hour. She had a DUI before she was considered for bishop, and although the search committee knew of it, the bishop, herself, did not make that known to the people of the diocese during her walkabouts. So it is not known whether at the time she was elected she was working her program and really was in recovery. Of course the internet has been buzzing with speculation about her and some very nasty things are said. She was arrested and is out on bail and in a recovery program while awaiting civil trial. She has been put on leave and Ecclesiastical Court proceedings loom in the horizon. Not coming clean has its consequences.</span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Maine, on the other hand, called a bishop who openly acknowledged that she had an alcohol problem; had been sober for years and worked in the Diocese of Chicago. She talked about it openly, wrote a book about alcoholism and never in her ten years with us was this an issue. She is so well respected in the church that three dioceses have asked her to step in either as interim bishop or assisting bishop since her retirement.</span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Now drinking in the Episcopal Church is an issue. It affects seminarians, deacons, priests and bishops as well as lay people. It does not mean that everyone who has a drink is an alcoholic, far from it. But our church does tolerate a culture of drinking. We all know the jokes about “Whiskeypalians” or “whenever four Episcopalians get together, there’s always a fifth.” I mentioned these two bishops to help us understand how hiding our flaws and blinding ourselves to who we really are, get in the way of our hearing God’s call to us. In our psalm God knows our innermost selves and calls us to wholeness and to mission.</span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">The Iona Community has a hymn called <i>The Summons, </i>it goes:</span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>Will you come and follow me if I but call your name?</i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>Will you go where you don't know and never be the same?</i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>Will you let my love be shown? Will you let my name be known,</i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>will you let my life be grown in you and you in me?</i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>Will you leave yourself behind if I but call your name?</i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>Will you care for cruel and kind and never be the same?</i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>Will you risk the hostile stare should your life attract or scare?</i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>Will you let me answer prayer in you and you in me?</i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>Will you let the blinded see if I but call your name?</i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>Will you set the prisoners free and never be the same?</i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>Will you kiss the leper clean and do such as this unseen,</i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>and admit to what I mean in you and you in me?</i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>Will you love the "you" you hide if I but call your name?</i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>Will you quell the fear inside and never be the same?</i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>Will you use the faith you've found to reshape the world around,</i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>through my sight and touch and sound in you and you in me?</i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>Lord your summons echoes true when you but call my name.</i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>Let me turn and follow you and never be the same.</i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>In Your company I'll go where Your love and footsteps show.</i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>Thus I'll move and live and grow in you and you in me.</i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">The fourth stanza is so apt for today. <i>“Will you love the “you” you hide if I but call your name?” </i>Hiding our dark secrets from ourselves, from our neighbors and from God are the result of fear. One of the real problems with any addiction is our denial that we are addicted. We fear that people will not love us if they find out who we really are and sometimes that does happen. There is so much fear that people do tend to lash out at someone they thought was so wonderful, has feet of lead. It is faith that helps us, flawed humans to reshape the world around us. It is opening up our dark spaces to God’s light and living in truth that helps us turn and follow our Lord. It is following our unique calls in the company of the one who calls us that helps us to “move and live and grow” and never be the same.</span></div>
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<br />motherameliahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11381575553733390018noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1599514600692448242.post-15940810490956446952014-12-08T07:26:00.002-05:002014-12-08T07:26:33.197-05:00Second Advent 2014<br />
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I want to thank Jay <a class="profileLink" data-hovercard="/ajax/hovercard/user.php?id=570193241" href="https://www.facebook.com/jayemersonjohnson" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; text-decoration: none;">Jay E. Johnson</a> for the ideas in this very brief homily. Christ Curch, Gardiner decided to do an Advent Lessons and Carols yesterday, and I struggled to find a short message to move us from the lessons and gospel of the day into Eucharist. This is what I came up with:</div>
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Prophets tell us the truth about the present. They are not predicting some distant future. John the Baptist, whom the Orthodox call the Forerunner, is speaking truth to people who are coming to him for baptism and it is this speaking truth that infuriates so many. That is what cost him his head. But truth telling is one of Advent's invitations. An invitation to listen to prophetic truth tellers. But it is about more than just listening. It is about action. Prophets insist that we choose where and to what we give our allegiance. We can choose to stay with the things we know; the things that are familiar and comfortable. Or we can choose to turn to the things that God is bringing about; turn toward the things we don't know. And that can be scary. This choice, what John calls repentance, means risking the comfortable and safe we know, for an unknown future. A future where we who have been baptized with water and the Holy Spirit will find God waiting. </div>
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Let us pray: "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 forever. Amen."</div>
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The service went well and it took just an hour and 10 minutes. One of their goals is to NOT have the service last and hour and a half.</div>
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motherameliahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11381575553733390018noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1599514600692448242.post-57562003659244690642014-12-01T09:05:00.002-05:002014-12-01T09:08:57.992-05:00Blogging AgainI can't believe it's been over two years since I've posted anything, but now that I will be preaching regularly, I intend (as a minimum) to post my sermons. I will be serving Christ Church, Gardiner as half-time priest-in-charge, probably for about a year. I expect that Neo will post as well. He had such a great time his first Sunday there. He sat in the pews with parishioners and really enjoyed the coffee hour. He had two laps to choose from in the vestry meeting.<br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">First Sunday in Advent, Year B</span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">The sun will be darkened,</span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">and the moon will not give its light,</span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">and the stars will be falling from heaven,</span></div>
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- Mark 13.24</span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">It is the start of a new church year. The first Sunday in Advent. A time of waiting in the darkness for the birth of the one who is called the light of the world. A time of anticipation. So why at this time of year when we are so looking forward to Christmas, do we get such gloom and doom about the end of the world. And what is this about staying awake. It seems as though our lectionary gives us readings about endings when we are talking about beginnings. The beginning of a new church year, the beginning of the life of Jesus, the beginning a relationship between you and me.</span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">The beginning of the universe,according to scientists, was with a big bang and the release of huge amounts of energy. Then quarks and all kinds of strange sub-atomic particles formed from this energy and joined together and coalesced to form stars and then galaxies all moving out from that center bang and some many billions of years later we humans stand here on this earth and on a cold winter night look up and marvel at the night sky and maybe even marvel at the One who created it all. Who used stardust to create us. </span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">In a small, recent part of those billions of years, we humans, made-in-the-image-of-God people, are reminded that it will all end. Sometimes this reminder is called a little Apocalypse or sometimes, the Second Coming. Jesus tells this to his disciples at the Mount of Olives. He is telling about the time when he will return again; a time he thinks might be within their lifetimes, but he doesn</span><span style="font-family: 'Arial Unicode MS'; letter-spacing: 0px;">’</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">t really know. It</span><span style="font-family: 'Arial Unicode MS'; letter-spacing: 0px;">’</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">s about the end of the world. It could be tomorrow, or after our star, the sun, dies out and our earthly home turns cold and can no longer sustain life, but Jesus says to stay awake for whenever it is.</span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Some people talk about three comings. The first is the one we celebrate on Christmas day when God took human form and lived among us and there</span><span style="font-family: 'Arial Unicode MS'; letter-spacing: 0px;">’</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">s the one in our gospel that speaks of the end when: </span><span style="font-family: 'Arial Unicode MS'; letter-spacing: 0px;">“…</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">in those days, after that suffering, the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light, and the stars will be falling from heaven, and the powers in the heavens will be shaken.</span><span style="font-family: 'Arial Unicode MS'; letter-spacing: 0px;">” </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">But there is a middle coming, that Jesus also speaks of, not in today</span><span style="font-family: 'Arial Unicode MS'; letter-spacing: 0px;">’</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">s gospel, but when he speaks of God</span><span style="font-family: 'Arial Unicode MS'; letter-spacing: 0px;">’</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">s kingdom. He tells us the kingdom is already here, not fully, but it is here. There is a beginning and an end, but there is also a now. In fact, for us, it is all </span><span style="font-family: 'Arial Unicode MS'; letter-spacing: 0px;">“</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">now.</span><span style="font-family: 'Arial Unicode MS'; letter-spacing: 0px;">” </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Yes, we know, our world is broken. It is full of endings, a loved one dies, people get divorced, a young black man gets shot, people fight over television sets in Black Friday sales, a young man runs over his mother and kills her, terrorists kill innocent people, people struggle to put food on the table or heat their homes and sometimes their dreams for their children die, people give up trying and turn to drugs including alcohol. But </span><span style="font-family: 'Arial Unicode MS'; letter-spacing: 0px;">“</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">now</span><span style="font-family: 'Arial Unicode MS'; letter-spacing: 0px;">” </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">is also full of beginnings. Children are born, more people get healthcare, people of different faiths struggle to work together; people who love each other, no matter their gender, marry; We are called to keep awake and look for Christ in the darkness, to look for Christ in all we meet.</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; min-height: 16px;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">I discovered an artist and poet this week. Her name is Jan Richardson. </span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; min-height: 16px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Blessing When the World is Ending</b></span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Look, the world</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">is always ending</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">somewhere.</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Somewhere</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">the sun has come</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">crashing down.</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Somewhere</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">it has gone</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">completely dark.</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Somewhere</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">it has ended</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">with the gun</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">the knife</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">the fist.</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Somewhere</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">it has ended</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">with the slammed door</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">the shattered hope.</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Somewhere</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">it has ended</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">with the utter quiet</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">that follows the news</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">from the phone</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">the television</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">the hospital room.</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Somewhere</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">it has ended</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">with a tenderness</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">that will break</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">your heart.</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">But, listen,</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">this blessing means</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">to be anything</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">but morose.</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">It has not come</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">to cause despair.</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">It is simply here</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">because there is nothing</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">a blessing</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">is better suited for</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">than an ending,</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">nothing that cries out more</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">for a blessing</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">than when a world</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">is falling apart.</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">This blessing</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">will not fix you</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">will not mend you</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">will not give you</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">false comfort;</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">it will not talk to you</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">about one door opening</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">when another one closes.</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">It will simply</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">sit itself beside you</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">among the shards</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">and gently turn your face</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">toward the direction</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">from which the light</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">will come,</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">gathering itself</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">about you</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">as the world begins</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">again.</span></div>
<div style="color: #323333; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: 'Arial Unicode MS'; letter-spacing: 0px;">– </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Jan Richardson </span><span style="font-family: 'Arial Unicode MS'; letter-spacing: 0px;">© </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Jan Richardson. janrichardson.com</span><br />
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><br /></span>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="color: black; letter-spacing: 0px; text-align: start;">We are called to keep awake to the blessings of this life: to the beginnings. The hope and light of Jesus is present in God</span><span style="color: black; font-family: 'Arial Unicode MS'; letter-spacing: 0px; text-align: start;">’</span><span style="color: black; letter-spacing: 0px; text-align: start;">s church, this church: Christ Church, Gardiner. Christ Church has been gathered up in prayer by all the people, who throughout the years, have lifted up to God, their hopes, their fears, their conflicts and their faith. This church is a place of expectation, of waiting for the kingdom that is now. Waiting for blessings that are now. Waiting for healing that is now; for forgiveness that is now, for reconciliation that is now. The urgency in the gospel is not that the world is about to end, but the urgency is to keep awake in the now to bring about the kingdom beginning now.</span></span></div>
</div>
motherameliahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11381575553733390018noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1599514600692448242.post-80804466314142460582012-09-17T13:48:00.002-04:002012-09-17T14:30:28.278-04:00Climate Change Video: Can We Really Do It?I didn't wake up grumpy this morning. The air is clear and cool. Perfect for a Fall day. I didn't watch more than 5 minutes of Morning Joe: I just cannot deal with politics today. However, this video made me both happy and grumpy. I love the <a href="http://symphonyofscience.com/">Symphony of Science</a> stuff. This new one is on climate change threw me into a bit of despair, though. It isn't science that can "do it," it is political will and there isn't much of that around these days. See what you think.<br />
<br />
<iframe allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen" frameborder="0" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/HHP9Rh-ooh0" width="560"></iframe>
If we as Christians are to care for creation, then people of faith and people of science need to find common cause to make the "we can do it" possible.
motherameliahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11381575553733390018noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1599514600692448242.post-12560132154279790272012-07-04T12:11:00.000-04:002012-07-04T12:27:32.483-04:00Happy Fourth<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/7d/Betsy_Ross_1777_cph.3g09905.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="218" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/7d/Betsy_Ross_1777_cph.3g09905.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><i>Jean Leon Gerome Ferris [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons</i></span></div>
While in seminary I did an intern year at Christ Church, the Anglican Church in Vienna, Austria. Fourth of July was on a Sunday that year and I got to plan the music for the service, which was from the BCP. One of the hymns was this one, sung to the tune <i>Finlandia</i>. I first heard it at an <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anzac_Day">ANZAC</a> day service where the ambassadors from Australia, New Zealand and Turkey placed wreaths at the foot of the altar. It was appropriate for an international community and an important reminder for all of us here in the United States on this very special holiday.<br />
<br />
<i>This is my song, Oh God of all the nations, </i><br />
<i>A song of peace for lands afar and mine. </i><br />
<i>This is my home, the country where my heart is; </i><br />
<i>Here are my hopes, my dreams, my sacred shrine. </i><br />
<i>But other hearts in other lands are beating, </i><br />
<i>With hopes and dreams as true and high as mine. </i><br />
<i><br />
<i>My country’s skies are bluer than the ocean, </i><br />
<i>And sunlight beams on cloverleaf and pine. </i><br />
<i>But other lands have sunlight too and clover, </i><br />
<i>And skies are everywhere as blue as mine. </i><br />
<i>Oh hear my song, oh God of all the nations, </i><br />
<i>A song of peace for their land and for mine. </i><br />
<i><br />
<i>May truth and freedom come to every nation; </i><br />
<i>May peace abound where strife has raged so long;</i><br />
<i>That each may seek to love and build together, </i><br />
<i>A world united, righting every wrong; </i><br />
<i>A world united in its love for freedom, </i><br />
<i>Proclaiming peace together in one song. </i><br />
<i><br />
<i>This is my prayer, O Lord of all earth's kingdoms: </i><br />
<i>Thy kingdom come; on earth thy will be done. </i><br />
<i>Let Christ be lifted up till all shall serve him, </i><br />
<i>And hearts united learn to live as one. </i><br />
<i>O hear my prayer, thou God of all the nations; </i><br />
<i>Myself I give thee, let thy will be done.
</i></i></i></i>motherameliahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11381575553733390018noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1599514600692448242.post-15751961662110075282012-05-14T09:09:00.002-04:002012-05-14T09:15:57.161-04:00Abiding Love<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-wvpDxLc0B-s/T7EDh0F2fwI/AAAAAAAAAno/u2bX3fn110M/s1600/IMG_0131.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-wvpDxLc0B-s/T7EDh0F2fwI/AAAAAAAAAno/u2bX3fn110M/s200/IMG_0131.jpg" width="149" /></a></div>
Yesterday I drove the 75 miles to Skowhegan, Maine to celebrate the Eucharist with a small but lively congregation. In honor of Mother's Day, I used Robert Munch's "Love You Forever" as part of my sermon. Sheila McGraw's illustrations are quite wonderful with the cover showing a two-year-old with a very satisfied smile on his face, sitting next to a toilet strewing toilet paper everywhere. For those who do not know the book, it's about a mother who sings as she rocks her son back and forth:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<i>I'll love you forever,<br />I'll like you for always;<br />As long as I'm living<br />my baby you'll be.</i></blockquote>
We hear how the boy grows and grows and still the mother manages to rock him and sing the song to him (she always makes sure he is asleep by peeking up over the side of his bed). It is not all sweetness and light—the boy drives her "CRAZY;" she wants "to sell him to the zoo;" and feels like she "is in a zoo." But she continues to find ways to rock him and sing to him until at the end of her life he does the same for her and then to his new born daughter.<br />
<br />
I used the story to talk about God's abiding love for us and how God is a Mothering-Father. It is important to acknowledge all those in our lives who have mothered us: some of whom were men and others women; some were related to us by blood and others by love. God's abiding love is always there, even when we are not aware of it. We, who are nurtured by such love, are to pass it on. I ended by saying it is this abiding love that we, as Christians, have to offer to the world.motherameliahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11381575553733390018noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1599514600692448242.post-58095929706029395902012-03-12T16:48:00.003-04:002012-03-12T16:56:12.754-04:00Beautiful Bar Harbor<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-LJWrLDuS3CY/T15dzW6qTvI/AAAAAAAAAms/BC3tOALoWGQ/s1600/photo.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-LJWrLDuS3CY/T15dzW6qTvI/AAAAAAAAAms/BC3tOALoWGQ/s200/photo.JPG" width="149" /></a></div>
I had the privilege yesterday of presiding at St. Saviour's in Bar Harbor. They are a gracious group and it is wonderful to drive up US 1 through Camden and Searsport and across the Penobscot Narrows through Ellsworth and on to Mount Desert Island. The skies were a pale blue and the ocean deep blue. <br />
<br />
Reading the Jewish Study Bible last week gave me new perspectives on the Ten Commandments in Exodus. Putting some of those together with Godly Play's "The Ten Best Things" and a mild rant on the incivility and greed running rampant in our country these days were the gist of my sermon. One of the things that struck me was that the attribute for God translated in the NRSV as "jealous" is translated as "impassioned" in the Jewish Study Bible. Much more understandable to my post-modern mind.<br />
<br />
It really was hard to get up to do the early service since I was so concerned I wouldn't wake up and Miss Isabelle was restless until midnight, but we both did just fine. Coming back I stopped at the Whale's Tooth Pub on Linconville Beach for lunch. The parking lot was pretty empty when I was finished and Izzie was sound asleep in the car. It was a much needed break as I was beginning to get sleepy. We got home safe and sound. I took a nap only to be awakened by the sun in my eyes in the late afternoon. Izzie slept quietly through the night.motherameliahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11381575553733390018noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1599514600692448242.post-85684898927142779302012-01-08T18:28:00.003-05:002012-01-09T09:15:14.146-05:00Sermon-All Saint's San Francisco<i>There is some recycled material here, but it was wonderful to be able to preach at the church that sponsored me for the diaconate and then the priesthood and to see familiar and new faces. I also got to accomplish one of the aims of the Society of Ordained Scientists, that is, "To offer to God in our ordained role the work of science and technology in the exploration and stewardship of creation." The quotations are from Swimme and Tucker's book.</i><br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-eiUmMb-Icmo/TwooH--1BvI/AAAAAAAAAmY/jzHaBszGt2M/s1600/128px-NGC_6745.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-eiUmMb-Icmo/TwooH--1BvI/AAAAAAAAAmY/jzHaBszGt2M/s1600/128px-NGC_6745.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><div style="font: 12.0px Times; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"> "Wherever the interstellar clouds of the two galaxies collide, they do not freely move past each other without interruption but, rather, suffer a damaging collision. High relative velocities cause ram pressures at the surface of contact between the interacting interstellar clouds. This pressure, in turn, produces material densities sufficiently extreme as to trigger star formation through gravitational collapse. The hot blue stars in this image are evidence of this star formation."</span></div><div><i><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">NASA Goddard Space Flight Center Photo ID:</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Helvetica;"> GL-2002-001105</span></i></div></td></tr>
</tbody></table><br />
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Sermon:<br />
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There are three reasons I am in California: first to inter my friend David's ashes in the columbarium, which we did yesterday; second to see my children and some friends; and thirdly to go to Tucson on my home to Maine for a retreat/meeting of the North American Chapter of the Society of Ordained Scientists. I've watched a lot of news programs and commentators in motels on my stops across the country with Izzie. The voices get pretty strident and I find myself driving long distances with no radio or iPod music, so I can enjoy the silence and listen to the memories in my head.<br />
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Today’s readings made me pay attention to the use of the word “voice” and the presence of the Holy Spirit: God’s voice as power and God’s Holy Spirit as life giver or the one who spurs us to action. “In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth” is such a simple statement for some very complex processes. Scientists sometimes refer to this beginning of space-time as the “Big Bang.” In the book "Journey of the Universe" by Brian Thomas Swimme and Mary Evelyn Tucker, the authors instead the start of our universe as “the great exhalation.” That’s another way to describe the forces of expansion (from the big bang) and attraction (gravity), to remind us that the universe is "shaped by these two opposing and creative dynamics" and that we who are alive are also shaped by processes of expansion and contraction such as breathing and the beating of our hearts.<br />
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Just like in our Psalm, the voice of God is powerful and majestic, controlling all of nature but I can't help but wonder what the "great exhalation" sounded like. Big Bang doesn't really have the elegance or the awe or the wonder that the term "great exhalation" does. Could it really be a great shout of joy and love and unimaginable power that started all that we know and began time and space? And if the Holy Spirit is inspiration, then we have the breathing in and out of the universe in both exhalation and inspiration.<br />
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Thinking about God breathing out the universe is reflected in the prolog to John’s Gospel "In the beginning was the Word." as well as the beginning of Genesis that we heard today “God said let there be....” And God didn't just separate the light from darkness there was much more creating going on. After the initial "bang" particles began to collide and interact; sometimes bonding, sometimes separating. The formation of increasingly complex communities, started with elementary particles and seems to be the way of the universe. In order for bonding to occur, the particles have to give up part of their mass and release it as energy. "Even from the first moments, our universe moved toward creating relationships.....This bonding is at the heart of matter."<br />
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Forming a complex community is what churches are all about. Becoming part of a complex community is what baptism is all about. It’s not just this one place, All Saints’, but it is about becoming a part of the whole Body of Christ. In Maine, I’ve spent time trying to help some small parishes figure out new ways of being church. Part of that is helping them think about what it would mean when churches are willing to give up something, and what kind of energy could be released that will benefit both the churches and the communities in which they exist. What kind of new relationships can be formed?<br />
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Because there is the relationship part of bonding too. It seems as though God created the whole universe, not just us, in God's image. If bonding is at the heart of matter, then bonding or relationship has a lot to do with how we related to God and how God relates to us. I would like to think that relationships or bonding are as critical to the nature of God as to the nature of the universe God created and giving up a bit of mass to create energy is part of this.<br />
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So far I’ve used images to describe the universe and ourselves as breathing lung, an expanding heart, and a system that becomes increasingly complex. There is another image that can apply and that is of a developing seed. The process is complex, but orderly: first roots, then leaves. The universe started out focusing on building nuclei, then it stopped and other processes began. “The astonishing fact is that if the universe had continued building nuclei all the way up to iron, for example, iron nuclei would have predominated for all time.” But what happened instead was when all the light nuclei were formed the conditions for building the nuclei changed. And this stopping and changing happened again and again over the fourteen billion years it took to get to us. As with seeds developing one process stopped so something new could take over. Something that would eventually become living, breathing creatures to could contemplate the awesome complexity that the mind of God is holding in existence.<br />
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God’s power is manifest in the Holy Spirit received after Paul laid his hands on some disciples in Ephesus. And we see God’s power in our gospel when we again hear the voice and see the action of the Holy Spirit. “And just as he was coming up out of the water, he saw the heavens torn apart and the Spirit descending like a dove on him. And a voice came from heaven, "You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased."<br />
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How many times have we said of a baby “he or she is the spitting image of .....” Well we are the spitting image of the voice that said “You are my Son, the Beloved, with you I am well pleased.” God is not just well pleased with his Son with a capital S, he is well pleased with all his sons and daughters. Just as God proclaimed the first day good, he proclaimed the creating of humankind good as well.<br />
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As think about the renewal of our baptismal covenant this morning, I challenge you to remember that it is our voices bonding with voices of Christians around the globe, that allows for the creative work of the Holy Spirit to start something new. The Holy Spirit, the Creator and the Son are all bound together in a relationship dance and because of their relationship, we are bound in our baptism to God and to each other.motherameliahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11381575553733390018noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1599514600692448242.post-73668007992953446062011-12-14T07:39:00.001-05:002011-12-14T07:40:55.524-05:00Hallelujah Corporations: Or I Can't Resist a Hallelujah ChorusWith all the anger about corporate excess and the brave actions of the OCW people across the US I recommend this YouTube video for those who love Handel as well as the Capital Steps.<br />
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Wade sent the link this morning.<br />
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/ws0WSNRpy3g" width="560"></iframe><br />
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<blockquote>Hallelujah was conceived, rehearsed and filmed in Tamworth, NH, a small town with a population of 2556 that has as its backdrop Mt Chocorua, the most photographed mountain in America. Tamworth is part of Occupy The Mt Washington Valley. Tamworth was the summer home of President Grover Cleveland</blockquote>Nicely done. Clever writing too.motherameliahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11381575553733390018noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1599514600692448242.post-64333829356604221762011-08-21T08:00:00.007-04:002011-08-23T11:02:19.923-04:00Moses and the Northwoods Park<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-MZoMHdbIKWU/TlPAZrlMlJI/AAAAAAAAAlk/EA_jkgdI2iM/s1600/TjWikiKatahdin.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="93" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-MZoMHdbIKWU/TlPAZrlMlJI/AAAAAAAAAlk/EA_jkgdI2iM/s400/TjWikiKatahdin.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Mt. Katahdin, Maine<br />
Photo from Wikimedia Commons</td></tr>
</tbody></table><i> Next Sunday will be my last one at two lovely churches, one in the shadow of Mt. Katahdin and the other near the lovely Lincoln Lakes. I have decided that with everything else going on in my life, I do not, physically or emotionally, have the strength to do this for a year. The bishop supports me in this.<br />
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Last Thursday I attended a somewhat contentious meeting at the local high school. Proponents and opponents of a feasibility study for a Northern Woods National Park met with Secretary of the interior Salazar. He was a generous listener and I hope opened up some hearts to listen to the possibility and to decide on information rather than fear and emotion.</i><br />
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<b>Sermon</b><br />
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What a difficult time it was for the descendants of Joseph and his family when there was a Pharaoh who did not know Joseph. They had really grown in numbers and were probably viewed as a threat to the Egyptians. What if, they became so numerous they would took over the place? Not something any self-respecting dictator would put up with. So they were put to work as slaves making bricks for Pharaoh's projects.<br />
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That didn't stop the Israelites from finding ways around this oppressive system. When Moses was born, his mother had him hidden in the reeds of the Nile near where Pharaoh's daughter bathed and had his sister watch the whole scene so she could recommend a wet-nurse, who was really Mose's mother. Moses was fortunate enough to be raised in Pharaoh's household. God was watching over his people, silently providing for a leader. <br />
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Watching the evening news about the struggle the Libyans and Syrians are having trying to overthrow their dictators can't help but make me think of Moses and the Israelites. And then this past spring we watched as Egyptians freed themselves from their dictator. It is no longer a group of strangers kept captive in a foreign land struggling to be free, but people native to a country oppressed by their own brutal leaders. There is something in the human spirit that yearns to be free. My home state tells it well: "Live Free or Die." Now I know some wags say that slogan is a threat, but there is something about not being free that can kill bits of your soul. <br />
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I wonder what it is like to overcome the fear of being beaten or killed or having your family members put at risk to fight for freedom. Fear is a powerful emotion--one of our most basic and primitive ones. It gets the adrenalin going so we can fight or flee. I think I am the type who would flee, but I don't really know. When we are fearful, or have any other powerful negative emotion all we seem to be able to do is act instinctively: creative solutions go out the window.<br />
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I remember telling a fractious Vestry some years ago, that I was going to show episodes of The Vicar of Dibley (a British comedy) to them for the first half hour of our meetings so they could do problem solving instead of bickering. <br />
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God must have given the Israelites a sense of humor so they could come up with creative solutions to Pharaoh's edicts. Like the midwives saying the women were so healthy they gave birth before the midwives arrived.<br />
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I was thinking of the need for a sense of humor at the meeting on the Northwoods Park last Thursday. I know there is a lot of fear in the town over the mill closing and the lack of good paying jobs, or jobs of any kind. An unemployment rate of over 20% is frightening. I wonder if that fear is keeping some people from being able to look at possibilities other than a mill. In situations like this, it is hard to view any change as having the potential to be positive. And I know there is a lot of history that complicates matters.<br />
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If we look a bit forward into Moses' story after he gets Pharaoh to "let my people go"--what happens--they complain bitterly that things were better in Egypt. God had a plan for these stiff-necked people, but it was in the future and neither Moses, nor that first generation would get to see the promised land. That is a bit like doing interim ministry, you can lead people for a bit, but the future is in their hands. Someone else will lead them into the future with God's help. We never do any of this alone. <br />
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Our Epistle this morning tells us "For as in one body we have many members, and not all the members have the same function,so we, who are many, are one body in Christ, and individually we are members one of another. We have gifts that differ according to the grace given to us: prophecy, in proportion to faith; ministry, in ministering; the teacher, in teaching; the exhorter, in exhortation; the giver, in generosity; the leader, in diligence; the compassionate, in cheerfulness." What a great image of a church or any community of people!<br />
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Each one of you has a special gift that this church and this community needs to form a strong body. Each one of you is different and special in the eyes of God, and, I hope, in the eyes of each other. Imagine the power of a smile to a stranger. Imagine the power of a hand of friendship to someone who has no family or whose family is far away. Imagine the power of a gentle sense of humor when there is a tense situation. Imagine the strength of shared experiences to build bonds between people. Imagine the satisfaction of guiding someone else's child find the security that comes in learning that God is love. Imagine the gratefulness of finding other people who share your love of this church and this area and joining with them to serve. <br />
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In Matthew, this morning, we hear Jesus say to his disciples, "But who do you say that I am?" And "Simon Peter answered, "You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God." And Jesus answered him, "Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah! For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father in heaven." <br />
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If we believe that Jesus is the anointed one of God -- the one sent to show us the way, then like the Israelites of old, we may grumble and complain, but as long as we keep struggling to break free from whatever bonds keep us as slaves to our Pharaohs, God will be there. As the psalmist tells us: "Our help is in the name of the LORD, who made heaven and earth."motherameliahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11381575553733390018noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1599514600692448242.post-67229559145357554312011-07-30T12:30:00.000-04:002011-07-30T12:30:14.037-04:00It's No Fun Without DavidI love doing interim or transition work, at least I used to. I did not realize, though, that my ability to speak with David nearly every day, helped make this exhausting work fun. I know it may become fun again, but I'm concerned that right now I cannot do the work these two congregations need for me to do.<br />
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Yesterday I was in a real blue funk. I kept wanting to reach for the phone to speak with him. It's not that we often spoke of what was on my plate, but after patiently listening to his latest ideas on medicine or (his latest) how he could contribute to the issue of overpopulation in the world, he usually had some uplifting things to say about me or us or nothing in particular.motherameliahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11381575553733390018noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1599514600692448242.post-60527341077860678172011-07-24T08:00:00.001-04:002011-07-24T08:33:37.694-04:00Resurrection of a Galaxy<div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Sermon </span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">July 24, 2011 Millinocket and Winn</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><br />
</span></div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Dq0QgOUOGKs/TitiY7cPS-I/AAAAAAAAAlc/O9It_gBNEOE/s1600/Spiral+Galaxy.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Dq0QgOUOGKs/TitiY7cPS-I/AAAAAAAAAlc/O9It_gBNEOE/s320/Spiral+Galaxy.jpg" width="256" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">NASA Hubble<br />
Spiral Galaxy</td></tr>
</tbody></table><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">The second chapter of <i>Journey of the Universe</i> by Swimme and Tucker, is about the formation of galaxies. When the universe was about a half a million years old, it was like a huge cumulus cloud growing ever larger. You know, the big puffy kind of cloud we’ve seen in the summer sky over the last week. But, instead of just continuing to grow and expand, the gigantic single cloud split into many smaller clouds. Each of these clouds collapsed into itself and formed a galaxy of stars. After each galaxy “jelled,” it started on its own unique journey: moving farther and farther apart from the other galaxies. </span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 15.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">In some ways you could also say this is the story of St. Thomas’ and St. Andrews’. Years ago there was only St. Thomas’, but as the Magic City rose out of the woods in the early 1900s, St. Andrews’ started its life joined to St. Thomas. I wonder if you could look at this phase as the marriage of Jacob to Leah. Maybe not exactly what was wanted, but necessary at the time. It wasn’t long though, before Jacob was able to marry Rebecca. Jacob was then able to separate his family from his father-in-law’s.</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 15.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">But in to the story of the universe: we might well ask the question: “What broke this initial cloud so it could form galaxies”? Scientists have discovered that there are waves that were present from the initial exhalation at the birth of the universe: waves that are fluctuations in the density of matter that also grew as the universe expanded and eventually got large enough to break the cloud apart so smaller clouds could form. We can think of these waves as something like the sound waves we create when we speak or when we make music, or when we jackhammer concrete. These waves go from our mouths or our instruments and disturb the air around us so that the waves hit our eardrums making them vibrate and so we hear. Sometimes these sounds can be disturbing, grating or loud. Sometimes we hear the vibrations as music, sometimes as a whisper. Some people have called these waves in the universe the “music of the spheres.” Try to imagine this cosmic music as what “moved the universe into the next phase of its journey.” The phase of galaxies forming. The natural next phase of St. Andrew’s and St. Thomas’ was as separate parishes with separate identities in separate communities. And that has brought your two parishes to where they now are. This brings up the question of a center. Where can the center of these two parishes be? I know it is not in the middle of the Penobscot River or in Medway.</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 15.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Let’s answer this by looking at where the center of the universe lies? In times past we humans believed it to be here on our lovely blue planet: in Jerusalem, or Mecca or on a special mountain in Tibet or Africa. Each culture has its own explanation of where the center was, but over time, we realized this was not literally true. The center of the universe was not a city, nor the earth itself, nor our sun, nor our galaxy the Milky Way. In fact, we have learned that the Milky Way is just one galaxy in an universe that has millions of galaxies and the Milky Way is part of a supercluster of galaxies that revolve around each other. This is a concept that is very difficult to grasp: each supercluster of galaxies is at the center of the expanding universe. In other words, there are millions of centers in our universe. Not only is that concept a hard one to understand it goes against all the logic we’ve been brought up with. How can there be multiple centers, yet one expanding universe. All we can do is say with the psalmist (Psalm 105:5a) “Remember the wonderful works he has done, his miracles, ... “ The more I learn about the wonders of God’s creation, the more I am awestruck by the complexity and creativity that is present in all of God’s creation. </span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 15.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">What might be useful for us is to consider today is what it means to have multiple centers. For St. Thomas’ and St. Andrew’s it is a fact of who you have become. The communities in which you exist are different centers, yet there are lots of things in common. Multiple centers seems to be a way of being in the universe.</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 15.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">But going back to our own galaxy, the Milky Way: we know it has spiral arms, and those spiral arms turned out to be important. Density waves pulsing through our Milky Way causes the cloud to condense in certain places. This condensing forms stars: stars which burn brightly for millions of years then either explode or die out. Spiral galaxies are the birthing places for new stars. On the other hand, elliptical galaxies are doomed to die out because they cannot produce new stars: it takes those spiral arms like those in our Milky Way, reaching out, to form new stars. C</span>reativity in our universe is not uniform, but it is there.</div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 15.0px;"><br />
</div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Q_NAGC4nNs4/TitikqulAzI/AAAAAAAAAlg/uUUIDx4TpFU/s1600/LMC+star+formation+region.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="256" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Q_NAGC4nNs4/TitikqulAzI/AAAAAAAAAlg/uUUIDx4TpFU/s320/LMC+star+formation+region.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">NASA Hubble Photo<br />
Large Magellanic Cloud—Star-birthing Area</td></tr>
</tbody></table><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">But don’t think that is all there is to the creativity of our universe. We have a satellite of our Milky Way, called the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC). Some think it was once a spiral galaxy that experienced a major calamity. What that calamity was we don’t really know, but whatever happened, the LMC could not produce new stars and was dying. But then, something truly amazing happened. After billions of years it came within reach of the gravitational pull of our Milky Way and the two galaxies interacted: the LMC was able to produce new stars again. Both the Milky Way and the LMC were changed by the interaction. The creativity present in one led to creativity in the other. It wasn’t just the creativity either, there was a generosity in sharing.</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 15.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">All of Jesus’ parables this morning about the kingdom of heaven speak of God’s incredible generosity. Generosity in the smallest of seeds growing to the size of a tree. Generosity in a huge amount of leavened flour that would make enough bread to feed a small army. Generosity in a treasure found in an unexpected place or a pearl of great price and even generosity in fish from the sea, even though some will not serve as food. The story of universe is also one of incredible generosity, creativity and awe. A galaxy has come to life again. The story of God’s people is always one of coming to life again. The story of Jesus’ resurrection is pre-eminent among them. Jacob didn’t give up on marrying Rebecca, even though he was tricked by Laban. Although, I must admit I do hear a common refrain in Laban’s words “this is not done in our country--giving the younger before the older.” makes me think of the frequently used: “that’s not how we’ve always done it.” And yet there is always the possibility of resurrection. God doesn’t give up on any of us.</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 15.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Matthew reports Jesus as saying” “And he said to them, ‘Therefore every scribe who has been trained for the kingdom of heaven is like the master of a household who brings out of his treasure what is new and what is old.’” All of you here at St. Andrew’s and St. Thomas’ are scribes being trained for the kingdom of heaven and I challenge you both to look at your treasures of time, talent and money to bring something new out of the old Like mustard seeds, new leaven, new treasures in unexpected place this is also resurrection.</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 15.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">I say with Paul: “For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor the present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.”</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 15.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div>motherameliahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11381575553733390018noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1599514600692448242.post-10111826987189735022011-07-18T10:16:00.005-04:002011-07-18T16:04:29.398-04:00David W. Gregg, Ph.D., RIP<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-jjiTrbXzA-Q/TiQ-g8z-mnI/AAAAAAAAAlY/fg6CvE4yugw/s1600/IMGP0007.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="147" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-jjiTrbXzA-Q/TiQ-g8z-mnI/AAAAAAAAAlY/fg6CvE4yugw/s200/IMGP0007.JPG" width="200" /></a></div>My friend David died on July 6. He had open heart surgery and was in the hospital for a week. They agreed to his request to go home, although they recommended he go to a skilled nursing facility to get stronger. David was insistent. He loved watching the deer and foxes and turkeys and quail that came on his patio and the majestic views of the hills beyond his home. We had decided to get him at-home help after I left, but it was clear over the course of the day that he really needed to go to a facility and he said he would do it in the morning. Morning never came. He dropped dead in front of me as he was getting back to his chair for the night. The paramedics couldn't revive him. I'm still processing my loss. I already miss our nearly daily phone conversations.<br />
<br />
Let me tell you a bit about our relationship. I met him in 1974 when he was working on Underground Coal Gasification at Lawrence Livermore National Lab and at a meeting on that topic at Fallen Leaf Lake, we went sailing together and got drenched from a sudden rainstorm that appeared over the Sierra Nevada, but he insisted on sailing the small boat back to shore in spite of wind and rain and the offer of a tow. We dated briefly, but I moved on to Denver, then Washington, DC then Vienna. David needed to have someone in his life every day. He couldn't be alone after dusk and he did not want to marry again after two failed marriages and a failed live-in relationship, but he really needed someone to be present with him at that time of day. <br />
<br />
When I returned from Vienna he had just started going with a lovely woman. They each had their own homes, but he had someone to spend the evenings with, to go out to dinner with and to travel with. He even rented a room in her home so he had a place to stay overnight. Since her health began to seriously deteriorate a few years ago, he found other ways to fill this need like taking friends from his church to dinner and/or dancing.<br />
<br />
David and I began our weekly brunches after my return from Vienna. On Saturday, after he played tennis, we would meet for food and conversation, and what conversations they were. David was interested in researching health issues and I designed a web site for him to put his findings. It turned out I also had to upload his files for him as well, although I could manage to get him through the process over the phone as well. He had quite a following and was active in holistic health circles.<br />
<br />
David came to my graduation from Seminary and to my ordinations and when I moved around to do my interim ministry we started what became daily phone calls to continue our conversations. Since I've been in Maine he has talked about moving here, but he really didn't want to leave his beautiful home. We spoke about traveling together after he recovered from his surgery and I finally retire from ministry, but alas that is not to be.<br />
<blockquote><i>Funeral Blues by W. H. Auden</i></blockquote><blockquote><i>Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone.</i><br />
<i>Prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone,</i><br />
<i>Silence the pianos and with muffled drum </i><br />
<i>Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come.</i></blockquote><blockquote><i>Let aeroplanes circle moaning overhead</i><br />
<i>Scribbling in the sky the message He is Dead,</i><br />
<i>Put crêpe bows round the white necks of the public doves,</i><br />
<i>Let the traffic policemen wear black cotton gloves.</i></blockquote><blockquote><i>He was my North, my South, my East and West,</i><br />
<i>My working week and my Sunday rest</i><br />
<i>My noon, my midnight, my talk, my song;</i><br />
<i>I thought that love would last forever, I was wrong.</i></blockquote><blockquote><i>The stars are not wanted now; put out every one,</i><br />
<i>Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun.</i><br />
<i>Pour away the ocean and sweep up the wood;</i><br />
<i>For nothing now can ever come to any good.</i></blockquote>David was a unique character: full of enthusiasm and boundless energy. He was constantly thinking outside the box and when he decided something was right, you couldn't get him to change his mind. The world has lost a very good and very creative man. Did I love him? Yes.<br />
<br />
Heaven has gained another saint. David was generous with his friends and unlike Auden, I do believe that love lasts forever and that good can come from the most difficult and trying times. The stars and sun and moon and ocean and wood will come to good. To quote Julian of Norwich "All shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well." It will just take time.<br />
<br />
Farewell my good and faithful friend. Let light perpetual shine on you and there be no more fear of the night.motherameliahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11381575553733390018noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1599514600692448242.post-60913488840388926712011-07-17T06:58:00.000-04:002011-07-17T06:58:00.568-04:00Bonding and Creativity<div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Sermon for Sunday, July 16</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">St. Andrew's and St. Thomas'</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><br />
</span></div><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-QX1kWJmKbmw/TiK_3AgqqVI/AAAAAAAAAlU/RedNgARoSQU/s1600/star+clusters.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-QX1kWJmKbmw/TiK_3AgqqVI/AAAAAAAAAlU/RedNgARoSQU/s320/star+clusters.jpg" width="256" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; line-height: 18px;"><div style="color: black; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><i>These four images are among the first observations made by the new Wide Field Camera 3 aboard the upgraded NASA Hubble Space Telescope.</i></div><div style="color: black; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><i>The image at top left shows NGC 6302, a butterfly-shaped nebula surrounding a dying star. At top right is a picture of a clash among members of a galactic grouping called Stephan's Quintet. The image at bottom left gives viewers a panoramic portrait of a colorful assortment of 100,000 stars residing in the crowded core of Omega Centauri, a giant globular cluster. At bottom right, an eerie pillar of star birth in the Carina Nebula rises from a sea of greenish-colored clouds.</i></div></span></td></tr>
</tbody></table><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">My summer reading includes <i>Journey of the Universe,</i> by Brian Thomas Swimme and Mary Evelyn Tucker. I was struck in reading it the parallels between the story of the universe and the story of ourselves as created beings. In fact, that is one of the points of the book. and maybe as the summer goes along those parallels might strike you as well. </span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 15.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Since the Pentecost season has begun we’ve been hearing some of the foundational stories of our faith, especially if you’ve been reading the Genesis option for the Old Testament. If this is so, you have heard the story of the near sacrifice of Isaac by Abraham. The story of how Isaac married Rebecca. The story of the birth of Esau and Jacob and how Jacob stole Esau’s birthright. Now we have Jacob at the beginning of his adulthood and his encounter with God in a dream. Stories are important, they help ground us and remind us of who we are.</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 15.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">So I think if we look at the story (or the journey) of the Universe and use it as a springing off point for the stories of St. Andrew’s and St. Thomas’, we might be able to find ideas and ways that will help us in what the authors call “The challenge of creating a shared future.” </span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 15.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">At the start of the book the authors describe the beginnings of the universe, with the forces of expansion (from the big bang) and forces of attraction (gravity), reminding us that the universe is "shaped by these two opposing and creative dynamics" and that we who are alive are also shaped by processes of expansion and contraction such as breathing or the beating of our hearts. To quote them: "At the very least we can say that because of the great exhalation at the start of the universe, life and humanity have emerged and are breathing within it now."</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 15.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">After the initial "bang", or exhalation, particles began to collide and interact; sometimes bonding, sometimes separating. This bonding, which resulted in the formation of increasingly complex communities, started with elementary particles and bonding seems to be the way of the universe. In order for bonding to occur, the particles have to give up part of their mass and release it as energy. "Even from the first moments, our universe moved toward creating relationships.....This bonding is at the heart of matter." </span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 15.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Forming a complex community is what we will be about over the next year. I’ve been pondering what it would mean in terms of giving up some mass, but more than that, what kind of energy will be released that will benefit both churches and the communities in which you exist. </span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 15.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">And then there is the relationship part of bonding, as well. Did God create the whole universe, not just us, in God's image? If bonding is at the heart of matter, then bonding or relationship has a lot to do with God. I would like to think that relationships or bonding are as critical to the nature of God as to the nature of the universe God created. </span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 15.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">This bonding and separation are not without cost. In Romans we hear Paul saying: “We know that the whole creation has been groaning in labor pains until now; and not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly while we wait for adoption, the redemption of our bodies. For in hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what is seen? But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience. Patience doesn’t seem to be a characteristic that is much in use in our culture. But look at the patience of a God who waits for his universe to unfold and display its glory. We tend to want things now. We want to know what the outcome will be and go for it. Yes, we are looking to be set free from bondage to decay, but the more we learn about the creativity involved in our universe, the more we need to look at the creativity within ourselves and to recognized the need for relationship to help that creativity along.</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 15.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">In today’s story, the promise that God made to Abraham is repeated to Isaac in a dream: "I am the LORD, the God of Abraham your father and the God of Isaac; the land on which you lie I will give to you and to your offspring; and your offspring shall be like the dust of the earth, and you shall spread abroad to the west and to the east and to the north and to the south; and all the families of the earth shall be blessed in you and in your offspring.” And we are blessed as part of God’s family as inheritors of the tradition starting with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and a long-long line of faithful followers of that tradition of which Jesus was a part and so are we. </span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 15.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">In the morning we are told that Jacob was afraid: “and said, ‘How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven.’ With the vision of angels going up and down a ladder I guess we would all think of that place was the gate of heaven. But what of our new perspective of the universe. We can say of the universe God created too, “How awesome is this place.” This is a universe that has created stars and galaxies and a world that can support we human beings. It is an awesome place with fiery deaths and exploding life continuing to be created. It is an even more awesome place that Jacob could have ever imagined. He, like you and me, was made of stardust. Imagine that!</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 15.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">So far the images used to describe the universe were a breathing lung, an expanding heart, and a system that becomes increasingly complex. The authors give us a fourth image: that of a developing seed. The process is complex, but orderly: first roots, then leaves. The universe started out focusing on building nuclei, then it stopped and other processes began. “The astonishing fact is that if the universe had continued building nuclei all the way up to iron, for example, iron nuclei would have predominated for all time.” But what happened instead was when all the light nuclei were formed the conditions for building the nuclei changed. And this stopping and changing happened again and again over the fourteen billion years it took to get to us. As with seeds developing one process stopped so something new could take over. Something that would eventually become living, breathing creatures.</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 15.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">In Matthew’s gospel we hear: Let both of them (wheat and weeds) grow together until the harvest; and at harvest time I will tell the reapers, Collect the weeds first and bind them in bundles to be burned, but gather the wheat into my barn.' Now Matthew goes to great length to explain what this means, but we could also interpret it to include not just people, but what it is a church or a community does. Every place has weeds and wheat and telling the difference isn’t always easy, but when the time for harvest comes it will become clear. There are dead ends in God’s creation.</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 15.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px 'Times New Roman'; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">I think what is important for the coming year is summarized in this quote: “We can begin to contemplate an idea that is remarkable: perhaps the nature of the universe as a whole is shaped by the creativity of its parts.” I think the one thing a parish needs, especially in transition times, is creativity and I pray that together we will be able to contemplate and tap into the creativity that is already in these two places. Maybe this is one of those stopping points where something new begins to happen. Where with Jacob we can say a year from now: “How awesome is this place.”</span></div><div><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><br />
</span></div>motherameliahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11381575553733390018noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1599514600692448242.post-51866379567593233272011-06-19T00:10:00.002-04:002011-06-19T03:11:42.134-04:00"Journey of the Universe" and Trinity Sunday<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-_bClIrO7nXw/Tf12KdGR_7I/AAAAAAAAAlQ/vWoZb99Jtdo/s1600/640px-A_Rose_Made_of_Galaxies_Highlights_Hubble%2527s_21st_Anniversary_jpg.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-_bClIrO7nXw/Tf12KdGR_7I/AAAAAAAAAlQ/vWoZb99Jtdo/s200/640px-A_Rose_Made_of_Galaxies_Highlights_Hubble%2527s_21st_Anniversary_jpg.jpg" width="196" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A Rose Made of Galaxies<br />
NASA Hubble Telescope<br />
Wikimedia Commons</td></tr>
</tbody></table>I have started to read <i>"Journey of the Universe"</i> by Brian Thomas Swimme and Mary Evelyn Tucker. I've been waiting to see the film they made of this, but haven't been near a showing. The prose is striking and poetic and for a "geek" like me, the story of the universe is compelling reading.<br />
<br />
In the first chapter while describing the forces of expansion (from the big bang) and attraction (gravity), they remind us that the universe is "shaped by these two opposing and creative dynamics" and that we who are alive are also shaped by processes of expansion and contraction such as breathing and the beating of our hearts. "At the very least we can say that because of the great exhalation of the universe, life and humanity have emerged and are breathing within it now."<br />
<br />
After the initial "bang" particles began to collide and interact; sometimes bonding, sometimes separating. The formation of increasingly complex communities, started with elementary particles and seems to be the way of the universe. In order for bonding to occur, the particles have to give up part of their mass and release it as energy. "Even from the first moments, our universe moved toward creating relationships.....This bonding is at the heart of matter."<br />
<br />
The words above had me pondering once again The Trinity. Thinking about God breathing out the universe makes me contemplate 1John "In the beginning was the Word." I wonder what the "great exhalation" sounded like. Big Bang doesn't really have the elegance or the awe or the wonder that the term "great exhalation" does. A great shout of joy and love and unimaginable power that started all that we know and began time and space. And if the Holy Spirit is inspiration, then we have the breathing in and out of the universe in both exhalation and inspiration.<br />
<br />
But there is the relationship bit too. Did God create the whole universe in God's image? If bonding is at the heart of matter, then bonding or relationship has a lot to do with God. I wouldn't dare try to explain The Trinity, but I would like to think that relationships or bonding are as critical to the nature of God as to the nature of the universe God created.<br />
<br />
I know I'm only on the first chapter of this book, but I needed to stop and think a little about the relationship between the faith I profess and the science I love.motherameliahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11381575553733390018noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1599514600692448242.post-75814861431803535242011-05-23T13:11:00.002-04:002011-06-05T13:21:37.411-04:00Limestone and Living Stones<div class="imported-FreeForm"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';">I<i> gave this sermon at Good Shepherd, Houlton, Maine yesterday. It was a gorgeous sunny day,the first sunny day in what seems like forever rain. Izzie and I took the long way home down Route 1. When we stopped for dinner in Machias, I think Izzie had had it with being in the car, but after a short walk and some dinner, she settled in the back seat for a snooze.</i></span></div><div class="imported-FreeForm"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';"><br />
</span></div><div class="imported-FreeForm"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';"><i>The Sermon</i></span></div><div class="imported-FreeForm"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';"><br />
</span></div><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-NiPXAo8b988/TdqUfx5VJpI/AAAAAAAAAlM/Sv5xmPDTh4w/s1600/800px-Moritzbrunner_Altar_BNM.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-NiPXAo8b988/TdqUfx5VJpI/AAAAAAAAAlM/Sv5xmPDTh4w/s200/800px-Moritzbrunner_Altar_BNM.jpg" width="149" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Moritzbrunner Altar (limestone)<br />
<a href="http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Moritzbrunner_Altar_BNM.jpg"><i>Wikipedia Commons</i></a></td></tr>
</tbody></table><div class="imported-FreeForm"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';">There is a bit of a chemistry lesson in this sermon. Don’t panic. There’s not going to be a quiz and I think the lesson will be relatively painless. After all if we’ve managed to get past the second coming yesterday, and I don't know of anyone taken by rapture at 6 pm, then thinking a bit about how living stones get formed shouldn't be nearly as fearful. In a very physical and scientific sense, as well as a metaphoric one, we are all living stones. Our own bodies, especially our bones contain a lot of calcium. So does limestone.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="imported-FreeForm"><br />
</div><div class="imported-FreeForm"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';">Limestone is a form of calcium carbonate (CaCO<sub>3</sub>) called calcite. It is often made out of coral or the bodies of other living things, although it can also be precipitated out from groundwater depending on several factors, including the water temperature, how acidic or basic the water is, and what the concentration of CaCO<sub>3</sub> is in the water. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="imported-FreeForm"><br />
</div><div class="imported-FreeForm"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';">Limestone is a common building material, and you can find it in many landmarks around the world, like the Great Pyramid in Giza, Egypt. Many medieval churches and castles in Europe are made of limestone. It is easily available and relatively easy to cut into blocks or carve into statues. It is also long-lasting and stands up well to weather, but not acid rain. Train stations, banks and other structures from the 19<sup>th</sup> century are often made of limestone. Limestone was also a very popular building material in the Middle Ages since it is hard, durable, and often is found nearby in easy to quarry surface deposits. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="imported-FreeForm"><br />
</div><div class="imported-FreeForm"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';">But all of this is about dead stones. They may be stones made out of the skeletal remains of living creatures, but dead never-the-less. Peter calls us living stones, and we are. Now I know that this building is made of wood, but imagine it as being built of living stones: you and all those who have gone before you. You are the building blocks of this body we call the church. Some of you are the solid stones that form the walls and keep out the storms, some of you are a bit fancier and might have been carved into interior spaces, fluted to please the eye or made into chambers that resound with music. Yet no matter what your function is, it is needed. It is needed because it is part of this foundation of living stones that started with the disciples including Stephen, and his stoner Saul, and with the words of Peter, we are called to become a holy priesthood, building this spiritual house we call the church.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="imported-FreeForm"><br />
</div><div class="imported-FreeForm"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';">And Paul, that Saul who persecuted the followers of Jesus, speaks of Jesus as being the cornerstone for our living stones. Now when you make a stone building, the cornerstone (also called the foundation stone) is the first stone set in the construction of a stone building. This stone is important because all the other stones are to be set in reference to this stone. So the </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';">position of the corner stone impacts the whole building. In our New England, the corner stone is more likely to be made of granite, a more common type of stone, rather than limestone as it is stronger and not so subject to erosion from acid rain and so many of our churches are made of wood instead of stone, but the cornerstone is there non-the-less, only it is usually more of a ceremonial stone set in a prominent place on the outside of the building with an inscription on it usually with the date the building was constructed. Sometimes there is a time capsule included and sometimes the ceremony of laying the cornerstone includes placing an offering of grain, wine, or oil under the stone, reminiscent of both Old and New Testament times.</span></div><div class="imported-FreeForm"><br />
</div><div class="imported-FreeForm"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';">The grain, wine and oil were symbolic of the produce and the people of the land and how they earned their livings. This in turn derived from the practice in still more ancient times of making an animal or human sacrifice that was laid in the foundations. I learned that this practice wasn't so ancient in a cultural center in Fiji where we were told of how enemy warriors used to be buried under the four corners of the foundation of a building. Their strength would make the foundations strong.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="imported-FreeForm"><br />
</div><div class="imported-FreeForm"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';">While looking up materials about cornerstones i came across this report from The Cork (Ireland) Examiner of 13 January 1865: (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cornerstone">Wikipedia</a>)<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="imported-FreeForm"><br />
</div><div class="imported-FreeForm"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';"><i>“...The Deputy Provincial Grand Master of Munster, applying the golden square and level to the stone said ; " My Lord Bishop, the stone has been proved and found to be 'fair work and square work' and fit to be laid as the foundation stone of this Holy Temple".' After this, Bishop Gregg spread cement over the stone with a trowel specially made for the occasion by John Hawkesworth, a silversmith and a jeweller. He then gave the stone three knocks with a mallet and declared the stone to be 'duly and truly laid'. The Deputy Provincial Grand Master of Munster poured offerings of corn, oil and wine over the stone after Bishop Gregg had declared it to be 'duly and truly laid'. The Provincial Grand Chaplain of the Masonic Order in Munster then read out the following prayer: 'May the Great Architect of the universe enable us as successfully to carry out and finish this work. May He protect the workmen from danger and accident, and long preserve the structure from decay; and may He grant us all our needed supply, the corn of nourishment, the wine of refreshment, and the oil of joy, Amen. So mote it be.' The choir and congregation then sang the 100<sup>th</sup> Psalm.”</i></span><span style="color: #1a3999; font-family: 'Times New Roman';"><i><o:p></o:p></i></span></div><div class="imported-FreeForm"><br />
</div><div class="imported-FreeForm"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';">In the Eastern Orthodox tradition, and in some Western Churches as well, the cornerstone is a solid stone cube upon which a cross has been carved. In the top of the stone a cross-shaped space is hollowed out into which relics may be placed. If no relics are inserted in the stone, the inscription may be omitted, but not the cross. We are reminded as we look at these buildings that Jesus is the cornerstone. And he is the cornerstone of how we build our lives and our communities. If we try to use some other cornerstone, we risk putting up a foundation that is not true and risks falling down.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="imported-FreeForm"><br />
</div><div class="imported-FreeForm"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';">Auden speaks of limestone in his poem, <i>In Praise of Limestone,</i></span><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';"> where he mentions geology, and history and ends up with a religious questioning. I'll only recite a part of the poem, but I recommend the poem to those of you who like to wrestle with layers of meaning.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="imported-FreeForm"><br />
</div><div class="imported-FreeForm" style="margin-bottom: 1.0pt; tab-stops: 11.0pt .5in;"><span style="color: #282c2f; font-family: 'Times New Roman';"><b><a href="http://www.poemhunter.com/best-poems/wh-auden/in-praise-of-limestone-3/">“In Praise of Limestone” by W. H. Auden (1943).</a></b></span><span style="color: #282c2f; font-family: 'Times New Roman';"><o:p></o:p></span></div><br />
<i>................. these</i><br />
<i>Are our common prayer, whose greatest comfort is music</i><br />
<i>Which can be made anywhere, is invisible,</i><br />
<i>And does not smell. In so far as we have to look forward</i><br />
<i>To death as a fact, no doubt we are right: But if</i><br />
<i>Sins can be forgiven, if bodies rise from the dead,</i><br />
<i>These modifications of matter into</i><br />
<i>Innocent athletes and gesticulating fountains,</i><br />
<i>Made solely for pleasure, make a further point:</i><br />
<i>The blessed will not care what angle they are regarded from,</i><br />
<i>Having nothing to hide. Dear, I know nothing of</i><br />
<i>Either, but when I try to imagine a faultless love</i><br />
<i>Or the life to come, what I hear is the murmur</i><br />
<i>Of underground streams, what I see is a limestone landscape.</i><br />
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';">Christ, the cornerstone of our faith, is a faultless love; a love whose resurrection made a promise of our own resurrection to come. Christ is the cornerstone, whose resurrection promises us a home, a dwelling place, with Him and with the Father: a place prepared for each of us, where the foundations have been well and truly laid. We, the living stones, are called to build block by block the church, which grows in spite of our own imperfections. We, the living stones, are called to become perfect because the cornerstone was laid true. The cornerstone in whom we are able to get a glimpse of God our creator. Our precipitation or laying down of our own calcium carbonate into the underground stream of living water leaves a legacy of our faith to those who follow and the pattern of the divine architect will continue being built until it reaches perfection when we are in God’s time.</span></div>motherameliahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11381575553733390018noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1599514600692448242.post-3898102147522151182011-03-31T17:26:00.000-04:002011-03-31T17:26:15.269-04:00Yoga for YankeesFred Marple has us Yankees down pat. I needed a bit of laughter today. His "class" looks to me like the usual suspects in any New England town.<br />
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<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="390" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/5XtX74pB-3k" title="YouTube video player" width="480"></iframe>motherameliahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11381575553733390018noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1599514600692448242.post-12806193520766535512011-03-31T10:09:00.002-04:002011-03-31T10:11:14.752-04:00The Maine Labor Murals-a more "balanced" perspectiveOur governor, Mr. LePage seems to think that the murals, depicting the labor history of Maine and which used to be in the Labor Building are too one-sided and had them removed. This YouTube video tries to correct that.<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen='allowfullscreen' webkitallowfullscreen='webkitallowfullscreen' mozallowfullscreen='mozallowfullscreen' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/SFwhlG5eqgs?feature=player_embedded' frameborder='0'></iframe></div><br />
Hope you enjoyed that. It lets us see all 11 panels, even if some of the faces have been replaced. I've been following the controversy in daily posts on Facebook, but this is too good not to share more widely.motherameliahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11381575553733390018noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1599514600692448242.post-23942085357694124832011-01-03T10:59:00.001-05:002011-01-04T02:17:11.671-05:00Marmelade, the Dead Sea, and MasadaThe day started with Doug making marmalade with kumquats and lemons from his yard. He asked me about his "ornamental orange" which turns out to be kumquats and with the number he has, marmalade was in order.<br />
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We then headed off toward the Dead Sea to have a look at Masada. We stopped at one viewing spot where the smell of sulfur was very strong. Saw a yellow trail going into the sea, just like some hot springs in California. In fact the whole area reminded me of the Salton Sea area, only with really high hills on both sides of the sea. The sky wasn't completely clear, so seeing the hills on the Jordan side was problematic.<br />
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Lunch at the cafeteria in Masada, then up the cable car to the top. It's hard to believe that Herod built a palace here. What amazing views! I will add to this a bit later.<br />
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Unlike many of the tourists, especially youth groups, we took the cable car back down. Stopped at En Gedi to see people swimming in the Dead Sea, then back to Jerusalem for a Gin and Tonic and cheese.motherameliahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11381575553733390018noreply@blogger.com11tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1599514600692448242.post-939146454767289202011-01-02T09:21:00.001-05:002011-01-02T15:19:27.321-05:00Sunday at St. George's CathedralDoug and I went to the 11am Eucharist. Good message. It was about walls and the city of Bethlehem. The Palestinians there, both Chrstian and Muslim, are walled in by a thirty foot high wall. It is almost impossible for them to get out to visit relatives, to get medical care or to tend lands that are outside the city. The message was the difference between our ability to go in and kiss the star in the Church of the Nativity, in essence to "see" Christ, and our inability to see Christ in all of God's people.<br />
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We talked a bit about this over a beer. Doug works for UNICEF and he says Palestinians, who are behind the walls have little access to medical care, since it is primarily in Jerusalem and the Israeli authorities won't give permission for people to leave. Nitrates in drinking water is a big problem for the little ones. There are inadequate amounts, and pollution control is negligible. Many of the children under two are "blue babies". The US Center for Disease Control is getting involved, but it is hard to get them into the West Bank or Gaza because of security issues, so much of the work needs to be done remotely. Can you imagine your doctor not being able to see your child. In addition, schools are not being built because they can't get building materials in, so kids are not being educated.<br />
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Addendum: Since I cannot directly add photos to my web page via the blog, you'll have to go to Facebook to see any pictures. If that changes, you'll see it here.<br />
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After church, we walked through many bazaars, bought some Zatar (a spice I just live on bread), and then went into West Jerusalem, with it's fancy shops for a sandwich. Quite a contrast. We passed David's tower and two gates to the old city, did a quick run through the Holy Sepulcher (crowded,but I'll go back during the course), then stopped for the beer before heading back.motherameliahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11381575553733390018noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1599514600692448242.post-14805328252634956112011-01-01T21:10:00.001-05:002011-01-01T21:12:36.082-05:00First Day in JerusalemIt is fascinating that on one side of the highway the homes have black tanks on the roofs to hold water in case the supply is shut off. The other side doesn't have to worry about whether they will have water. And this is in the city of Jerusalem.<br />
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Robert Frost said something like "something there is that doesn't like a wall." well I was completely offended by a walled-in Jewish settlement we accidentally came upon while trying to drive up to the Mount of Olives. The settlement walls at one spot seemed far higher than those across the way for the old city walls across the valley and are of ugly concrete.<br />
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The views at the top are lovely. Some peaceful gardens of olives going down the hillside, the gilded-domed Russian Orthodox Church of Mary Magdalene, the old walls with Lion's Gate, the Dome of the Rock, and little boys trying to sell olive branches and a man with his camel selling rides (or getting money to take a picture). Tour busses would have gone a totally different way so tourists would not likely have seen what we did.<br />
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I left my camera behind, but I'm sure we will return during the Palestine of Jesus class which starts Wednesday at St George's College. I'm curious what we will learn about the settlements, though, if anything.<br />
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My friend, and host for the next couple of days, Doug, cooked us a wonderful slow cooked roast beef dinner. That and a glass of wine knocked me out. Of course I had been up for over 24 hours with some sleep on the plane.motherameliahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11381575553733390018noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1599514600692448242.post-38987057616896780042010-11-06T09:13:00.001-04:002010-11-06T12:27:57.847-04:00Einstein Quote of the Day<tr><td style="font-family: arial, sans-serif;"><br />
<center><span style="font-family: Times;"><i>I think that only daring speculation can lead us further and not accumulation of facts.</i></span></center><center><span style="font-family: Times;"><i><br />
</i></span></center><center style="text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times;">Now that's a quote that I'm sure makes more sense in its context. So much of what I hear in the media is from people who are really good at speculation and not looking at facts. Or maybe it's because people don't really make "daring speculations" at all, but merely take other people's misuse of data, or refuse to consider data at all and make pronouncements that are garbage. (I'm still grouchy over the election results.)</span></center><br />
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</i></span></div></td></tr>motherameliahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11381575553733390018noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1599514600692448242.post-65906498459042970032010-10-25T11:02:00.002-04:002010-10-25T11:58:32.778-04:00Sermon, Millinocket and Comments on Convention<div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">I drove Izzie up to Millinocket on Wednesday afternoon, so I could drive down to Diocesan Convention and have her there for the Sunday service. It is over three hours driving each way and I wasn't willing to drive home from Convention Saturday night and have to leave at 5:30 in the morning to celebrate. I will let Izzie tell you about her experiences. Convention was great. It was nice having most everybody in the same place rather than having to drive from all over town. The food was good. And, even though there were 17 resolutions, we managed to get through them all and ended up finishing on time. It is wonderful having our work bracketed by the Liturgy of the Word, at the beginning and the Liturgy of the Table at the end.</span><br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_fs2WVn094Us/TMWeyxIqQ4I/AAAAAAAAAkE/EFDaZrf-AC0/s1600/MeandBen.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_fs2WVn094Us/TMWeyxIqQ4I/AAAAAAAAAkE/EFDaZrf-AC0/s320/MeandBen.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Me and the Jr. Warden, Feast of St. Andrew 2006. We were piped into the church that morning.</td></tr>
</tbody></table><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">My sermon at St. Andrew's, Millinocket October 24, 2010. A congregation I served as an interim a while back.</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Psalm 84 which has the verse "How lovely is your dwelling place, oh Lord of Hosts" was, I think, written with St. Andrew's in mind. You have no idea how many people I have told of your beautiful church and it is so nice to be back with you. It doesn't seem as though it's been over three years since I've celebrated at your altar. God has blessed you with Fr. Bob's ministry among you for this time.</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">At convention, the bishop spoke about how we needed to change to thrive as church. Notice I said thrive, not survive. In the Press Herald this morning a columnist said Mainer's were not good at adaptive change, they preferred evolutionary change. I know You have survived many things, from your priest’s sudden death, to the impacts on your numbers with the mill closures, and now with your current priest’s decision to leave at the end of the year. Surviving is good, but thriving is better. That's what adaptive change is about.</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">So how do we move from surviving to thriving. A lot of it has to do with blessings. The blessings we receive from God and one another and the blessings we give to others.</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">The Pharisee in today's gospel is acting in a way that curses rather than blesses. He says: "God, I thank you that I am not like other people, thieves, rogues, adulterers or even like this tax collector." what a way to pray to God! And its not just God who hears. People who look down their noses at others for whatever reason make the recipient of their scorn feel badly. That's what curses do. Sometimes the people scorned feel so bad, like the rash of young people bullied so relentlessly they took their own lives. </span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Most of the time though even though our curses may seem milder, they can hurt just as much. Like the mother who tells her daughter, "it's a good thing you're bright, because you certainly aren't pretty." Or the uncle who thinks teasing is funny, but it often makes the nephew feel inadequate. I think it is when we cannot accept ourselves for who we truly are, that we lay our own imperfections on others. The tax collector knew who he was and offered himself to God, just as he was. He knew that God's mercy is wider than the sea and that God welcomes all of us sinners.</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">So how do we move from the way of curses to the way of blessing? There is some help in the title of convention. It was: "there’s a wideness in God's mercy." That is a blessing for all of us! And all of us need blessings; from a mother's first kiss on her baby's cheek, to the holding of the hand of an aging parent on their dying day. We humans thrive with blessings. Sure, some of them are formal ones that pronounce God's blessing on a newly married couple, or on all of you as you leave this place on a Sunday morning, but we are called as Christians to bless each other on our way, every day, and in lots of tiny and not so tiny ways.</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">I wrote some notes during the bishops address at convention that might help St Andrew’s as you think about your future in ways that could bless you, and your town of Millinocket and I recommend that you take home a copy of his address to read and discuss.</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><ul><li style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Preserve mission not church—church is more than buildings it is the people and if we are not a mission oriented church we will not thrive. Our mission to the local community and to the greater world is necessary to thrive. It is a blessing.</span></li>
</ul><ul><li style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Need to collaborate and share—many churches in Maine are declining in attendance and creative ways of collaboration and sharing will need to be thought through and tried. Imagine sharing as a blessing rather than a burden.</span></li>
</ul><ul><li style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Ministry sites for a regional church—not every church needs to do every thing. Giving to the church through the things you are passionate about is a blessing.</span></li>
</ul><ul><li style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Move from mine to ours—imagine viewing ministry done here as part of the greater ministry of the Diocese of Maine. What a blessing that could be.</span></li>
</ul><ul><li style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Adapt while maintaining episcopal way of worship—the “we’ve always done it that way” mentality doesn’t help adaptive change. Creative ways of worship, while keeping to the prayerbook are not mutually exclusive, they are blessings.</span></li>
</ul><ul><li style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Priest should be into Christian formation and education, rather than administration—imagine what blessings to individual congregations would come out of that thought. More people with an understanding of what it means to be an Episcopalian and a Christian means more people for the mission of the church.</span></li>
</ul><ul><li style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Mutual ministers of the good news rather than consumers— In the hymn, “There’s a wideness in God’s mercy,” it states if our love were but more faithful we would take him at his word and God’s blessings would spread out into a world that sorely needs blessings.</span></li>
</ul><ul><li style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Beacons of love in a hurting world—that’s a phrase I just loved. Again in the hymn it tells us that God's justice is kind, in fact it “is most wonderfully kind.” A blessing from God to us and from us to the world. Becoming beacons of love in the midst of injustice, hate, distrust and fear is part of our mission.</span></li>
</ul><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">So take a copy of the bishop’s address, read it, discuss it, because what is in there is important to St. Andrew’s and to its future. </span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">I am closing with the blessing used at the end of convention Eucharist.</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Life is short,</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">And we do not have much time</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>to gladden the hearts of those who make the journey with us.</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">So.....be swift to love, and make haste to be kind.</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">And the blessing of God,</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>who made us,</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>who loves us,</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>who travels with us</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>be with you now and forever.</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Amen.</span></div>motherameliahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11381575553733390018noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1599514600692448242.post-69500086377053587322010-10-19T12:12:00.001-04:002010-10-19T12:23:06.171-04:00A Sermon<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_fs2WVn094Us/TL3DDXJHZaI/AAAAAAAAAkA/aSE_nT-9_Eo/s1600/MeIzzieCar.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_fs2WVn094Us/TL3DDXJHZaI/AAAAAAAAAkA/aSE_nT-9_Eo/s320/MeIzzieCar.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Photo by Brian</i>: This is how Izzie and I travel</td></tr>
</tbody></table>I was asked to supply last Sunday at St. Peter's Episcopal Church in Bridgton. It's a lovely new church with very friendly people. They even put up with Izzie during coffee hour, although she seemed content to stay in the car during the service. Izzie was delighted to find that they were serving some cheese. Driving there takes about two hours so that meant leaving our place about 6:30 for a 9 am service. Here's what I told them in my sermon:<br />
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<div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">“Jesus told them a parable about their need to pray always and not to lose heart.” This week of wonderful news about the rescued 33 miners in Chile, has touched a lot of hearts and praying a lot has been part of this story. I’m sure that some of them did lose heart during the 17 days in that rock prison, until they were found alive, and we will hear the stories in the weeks to come, but it is clear that faith in God, faith in each other, and faith that they were being searched for helped them through those dark days.</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">But this parable that Jesus told is more than just praying always. It is a parable about justice, both human justice and God’s justice. Justice for people like the widow, who along with orphans and the stranger were to be cared for, not taken advantage of.</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">I think children have an innate sense of what justice is. I remember my daughter around the age of 5 or 6 when we went to see a re-run of Disney’s Cinderella at the local theatre. The scene when after the animals had made her a beautiful ball gown, the nasty step sisters tore it to shreds. My daughter yelled at the top her lungs, “that’s not fair!”. Of course it wasn’t. I remember saying that the world is not always fair. Almost forty years later, I know the world isn’t always fair, in fact, I see more and more injustice rather than less.</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">What would you have done if you were in the sandals of the widow. If you were told that no one cares about justice any more and that you would have to fight it out by yourself with your neighbor. Just by taking on the widow’s case, she won. In Jesus’ first century Eastern Mediterranean country, taking someone to justice was a serious matter of honor. In modern street speak, the widow “dissed” her opponent just by having the matter heard. She had enough faith to believe that God was on her side and that keet her going.</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Perseverance is important in faith and in society. If we take part in the justice system in our country we need faith and persistence. It's not easy and it costs money. A person needs to be tough and determined to get through the justice system. You really do need to believe that God works for a just society because the whole system is not only cumbersome, but the wheels of justice run slowly. </span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">And if you are one of the brave people who work to change an unjust society, faith and perseverance are two qualities you will sorely need. Entrenched positions are really hard to shift. Economic advantage or privilege and a network of injustice is hard to penetrate. And people usually have mixed motives, wanting the change, but not wanting to change themselves. I’m reminded of the speech the President of Chile made about changing the contract with the miners to make the mines more safe and thinking how difficult that is likely to be. The mine they were working in produces gold and copper. And in a contest between money and safety, safety doesn’t always win.</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Even when we try to solve conflicts in our families, faith and perseverance are needed, Broken relationships are hard to mend and people don’t like admitting they might have been wrong. And if we think God has a quick fix for the wrongs of the world, think again. Look at the cross. God knows that Justice, Truth and Reconciliation are costly. But in the parable, Jesus makes it very clear that God is on the side of justice and God does care.</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">The judge in this story has no respect for God or humanity. What a contrast this is to the God of mercy and justice who needs our hands and minds and hearts to bring about God’s kingdom on this earth. That will certainly take persistence and faith.</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Notice that at no time have I talked about justice as retaliation or vengeance. So often on the TV news we listen to people whose family members have been killed speak in their grief about outcomes that sound more like vengeance than justice. I don’t know how I would react in such a situation, but I wonder if our justice system could do with a bit less of vengeance and more of God’s justice, which is about fairness and truth. </span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><br />
</div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Today's gospel is story that challenges us and encourages us. And not only us, this challenge and encouragement was needed by those in the early church who heard Luke’s gospel. After all Christ had not yet come back in glory to usher in the kingdom where peace and justice and truth would be the norm. In the scheme of Luke's gospel, this parable is told to the disciples as they were on their way to Jerusalem with all its conflicts and the shadow of the cross looming. They needed encouragement to stay the course. Of course, we know the story doesn’t end with the cross; there is the resurrection and the coming of the Holy Spirit to sustain us. I don't know if you heard that many of those miners spoke of their rescue as a resurrection. How their future will play out will depend on their listening to the Spirit working in their new lives.</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Pete Seger wrote a folk song, called "If I had a hammer." The hammer is the hammer of justice, hammering in the morning and in the evening all over the world. Justice in that folk song hammers out danger and warning and love. God’s will for everyone is for justice: the sorting out of what is good and true in our world, it requires our cooperation and our faith in God and each other. After all the prophet told us to “do justice, love mercy and walk humbly with our God.”</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Amen</span></div>motherameliahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11381575553733390018noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1599514600692448242.post-77446530539444741092010-09-11T13:45:00.001-04:002010-09-11T19:08:03.774-04:00Climate Change is Real, PeopleWatch this Nissan commercial. It was aired at the New Orleans Saints' football game and it really nails the global warming issue. Besides, polar bears are beautiful creatures to watch. Makes me want to consider a Leaf as my next car.<br />
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