Thoughts at Large from a Bishop at Large

Monday, January 02, 2012

Sermon for the Feast of the Circumcision of Our Lord

And when eight days were accomplished for the circumcising of the child, his name was called JESUS, which was so named of the angel before he was conceived in the womb. --Luke 2:21

Today is traditionally celebrated as the Feast of the Circumcision. Under Jewish law, baby boys are circumcised on the eighth day, so if Christmas is celebrated as the birth of Jesus as a Jewish boy, then today is the celebration of his circumcision.

The liturgical changes in the 1960’s and 1970’s led to this feast being known under different names. The church in Rome in the early centuries celebrated the octave day of Christmas as a feast in honor of the Blessed Virgin Mary, recognizing her role in the Incarnation, and traces of this persisted in the liturgical texts for the Feast of the Circumcision down through the centuries. So the Roman Catholic calendar renamed the feast the “Solemnity of Mary, the Mother of God”. Episcopalians and Lutherans renamed the feast the “Feast of the Holy Name”, recognizing that it was on this occasion that the name Jesus was given to the newborn infant. However, the gospel read on this day continues to be the account of the circumcision, and I believe we have much to learn from considering its significance.

In Genesis, we read that God commanded Abraham to be circumcised, with all the males of his household, and to circumcise the boys on the eighth day from that point forward. It quotes God as saying “[M]y covenant shall be in your flesh for an everlasting covenant” (Genesis 17:13). The Hebrew word “bris”, or “b’rit”, as it is pronounced in Israel, which is the common Jewish term referring to circumcision, literally means “covenant”. The circumcision is a very visible reminder in the flesh of a Jewish man of the covenant God made with the Jewish people, promising certain things to them in return for obeying God’s commandments.

This sign of the covenant is so serious and important that, despite the fact that it would normally fall under the category of prohibited activities on the Sabbath, it is not only permitted but required to be done if the eighth day is a Sabbath. The account in Genesis states that anyone not circumcised is “cut off” from his people for violating the covenant.

What is a covenant? A covenant is a solemn agreement between two parties, with each promising to do something for the other. God promises, in the covenant of circumcision, to be the guardian and keeper of the Jewish people, while the people promise to follow God’s commandments and to be a holy people.

It was necessary for Jesus to enter into this covenant as the one inaugurating the New Covenant, which would bring Gentiles into covenant with God as well. We as Christians believe that through baptism, we are brought into covenant with God. God promises to give us eternal life, in return for our promise to renounce sin and all the forces of evil, and to accept Christ as our Lord and Savior, living a new life in, through, and for him.

We often hear that the gift of new life in Christ is a “free gift” – and in one sense, it is true. We are given this new life without our having done anything to deserve it. It is a free gift of grace.

But in another sense, it is not free – in return for this “free gift”, we agree to be completely transformed in Christ, and to give our whole lives over to him.

The covenant in the Old Testament involved many sacrifices. Clearly, circumcision involves a sacrifice of flesh and blood. Many other parts of the covenant were sealed with animal sacrifice. On Candlemas, which we celebrate on February 2, we celebrate the Presentation of Jesus in the Temple, with a sacrifice of two turtledoves, in accordance with the commandment in the Torah.

And much of our faith as Christians revolves around the doctrine that Christ sacrificed his life for us on the cross, and there is a long tradition of thinking about the precious blood of Jesus, and its cleansing power in our lives. There are many hymns written about it, such as “There Is a Fountain Filled with Blood” and “There is Power in the Blood”, but even many more traditional hymns, such as “The Church’s One Foundation”, make reference to it, saying of the church that “with his own blood he bought her, and for her life he died”. There is even a devotion to the seven sheddings of blood of our Lord, of which the Circumcision is the first.

In our day, many are uncomfortable talking about the place of blood and sacrifice in our faith, and it is certainly outside the scope of this sermon to examine all of the theories of the Atonement. However, it is significant to note that just as circumcision involves the shedding of blood in bringing someone new into God’s covenant with the Jewish people, so baptism is the symbolic death and resurrection of the new Christian into Christ’s death and resurrection.

This is a very important beginning in our new life with Christ. The deepest relationships we have are with those with whom we have gone through suffering of some kind. Put another way, if you haven’t shed blood, sweat, and tears in your spiritual journey, you haven’t gotten anywhere. Being a Christian involves putting our whole being – our blood, our sweat, our tears – as well as our joys, our laughter, our happiness – into our walk with Christ.

As we celebrate the beginning of a new secular year, in commemorating the Circumcision of our Lord, may we resolve to make this a year in which we give our all to Christ, knowing that we will receive so much more in return.

# posted by Tim Cravens @ 10:36 AM 0 comments

Sunday, October 30, 2011

Entering the Promised Land: A Sermon on Joshua 3:7-17

Many years ago, when I lived in Atlanta, I would occasionally attend Shabbat services at Congregation Bet Haverim, the glbt synagogue affiliated with the Reconstructionist movement. They met in the parish hall of an Episcopal church that I attended for two years. One Friday night, I had the great privilege of being present for the dedication of their Torah scroll. The student rabbi leading services, Rabbi Sharon Kleinbaum, later became the rabbi of Congregation Bet Simchat Torah, the glbt synagogue in New York City. She had us put our chairs in two long rows facing each other, and hold out our hands, and unrolled the Torah scrolls on our outstretched arms. She made a joke about no one getting out the correction fluid for the “clobber passage” on homosexuality. The passage in front of me was the one giving the laws of Yom Kippur.

The sermon she preached that night was one of the best and most memorable sermons I’ve ever heard. She mentioned that, while most of the Torah dealt with the journey of the Israelites toward the Promised Land, they never reached it within the Five Books. Even Moses, the greatest prophet of the Jewish people, was not allowed to enter, but had to see it from afar before dying and being buried. She compared that to our spiritual lives, during which we are always “on the way” toward the fullness of the presence of God, and of living in perfect harmony with our neighbors – yet we never reach that destination in this life, although it is to be hoped that we are moving closer to that destination.

I believe that this insight is valid for us as Christians as well. We will never reach the place where we are constantly “practicing the presence of God”, to use the phrase used by the Carmelite lay brother and spiritual master Brother Lawrence, who famously said that he was as conscious of the presence of God while washing dishes as he was on his knees in the chapel before the Blessed Sacrament. We may have glimpses, we may even have extended periods of this, yet we never reach the point where this is our reality twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week.

And we never reach the point where our whole lives are lived in perfect charity with our neighbors, live lived in full witness to peace and justice. We may strive for God’s kingdom to come on earth, but it will never be here in its fullness on earth before the eschaton.

Today’s first reading, in the book of Joshua, which appears after the Torah, tells of the arrival of the Israelites in the Promised Land. But there is a final hurdle that must be overcome before they can enter: the Jordan River. God tells Joshua that the way they can overcome that obstacle and enter is by having the priests take the Ark of the Covenant, and walk into the Jordan River. The waters will then gather in a heap, and the dry land of the riverbed will appear, and the Israelites will be able to cross over in ease.

And that is exactly what they did.

The Ark of the Covenant was the most sacred object in Israelites’ worship life. When not in travel, it rested in the Holy of Holies, the most sacred part of the Tabernacle and Temple. On top of it rested the Mercy Seat, on which the High Priest sprinkled blood on the Day of Atonement, Yom Kippur. There are two accounts in different parts of the Bible as to what was inside of the Ark. In some places, it is recorded that only the two tablets of the law, containing the Ten Commandments, were placed inside. In other placed, there are added a scroll of the Torah, a jar of manna – the mysterious substance that God rained down from heaven to feed the Israelites, and finally, the budding almond rod of Aaron. When there were those outside the Levite tribe who wished to be priests in place of Aaron, God instructed Moses to have each tribe place an almond rod – a dead branch -- inside the Tabernacle, and in the morning, Aaron’s had budded, and the others had not.

In our own lives as Christians, while we will not reach our true home, the Promised Land, in this life, there are even obstacles preventing us from reaching those glimpses we are given in this life. Like the Israelites, God has provided us with an Ark that contains gifts that can help us overcome those obstacles, our Jordan River separating us from the land of Canaan. If I may be permitted an allegorical interpretation of the Ark, I believe we as Christians can profit from this passage.

Just as the Ark contained the scroll of the law, and the tablets with the commandments, so we are given the gift of Scripture. In the first Psalm, it says of the righteous that “his [or her] delight is in the law of the Lord, and in his law doth he [or she] meditate day and night” (Psalm 1:2) – which is quoted in the Rule of St. Albert, the Carmelite Rule, as the principal duty of those following it. As we meditate on Scripture, day and night, our lives are transformed, and we are able to be conformed more and more to the image of Christ, in which we are created, and to which we are restored. The word of God in Scripture leads us to the Eternal Word of God, Jesus Christ.

We are also given manna in the form of the Eucharist, and by extension all of the sacraments. We are fed week by week, or even day by day, by the Body and Blood of Christ, receiving Him into our lives, so that we may become living tabernacles, sharing Christ with all with whom we come in contact. We receive the Body of Christ, so that we may become the Body of Christ in the world.

And the rod of Aaron reminds us of the baptismal priesthood to which we are all called. As we share in the offering of our lives to God as a living sacrifice, as Christ offered his body on the altar of the Cross for the whole world, so we too receive new life, just as Christ was raised from the dead. We mediate the reconciliation of the world to God through Christ by sharing with Christ in his eternal priesthood.

As we continue our journey, may we be filled with grace to receive these gifts of Scripture, Eucharist, and Royal Priesthood that we are given in our own Ark of the Covenant, Jesus Christ, and may we be enabled to pass into the Promised Land through Christ.

# posted by Tim Cravens @ 8:28 PM 0 comments

Saturday, October 22, 2011

The Challenges and Gifts of Priesthood: On being a Confessor

It is tricky to discuss one's experience as a confessor, lest it lead to inadvertent breaking of the seal of the confessional. However, let me just say that the challenge, as I see it, is not the particular sins confessed. Most confessions, I would imagine, involve the confession of mundane sins of the sort that everyone commits on a regular basis, and in this day and age, particularly in the ISM context, everyone who comes to confession is sincerely penitent. Most confessors, upon hearing the list of sins, will most likely think, "Oh, yes, I committed this sin just the other day. Yes, that is an area I need to work on as well." Giving a penance (and I have only given the reading/praying of Scripture -- mostly the Psalms -- as a penance) and giving absolution is not really the challenge.

The real challenge is meeting the penitent where they are in their spiritual life and helping them. Some penitents come because confession is a regular part of their spiritual lives, and they are really only seeking absolution. And that is okay -- that may only be there to receive the sacrament. Others, in addition to this, may come to the sacrament also seeking a way to deepen their spiritual journey, and the confessor ideally will be able to hear this and provide some counsel or advice that will help the person to take the next step, whatever that may, on that journey. And since people are coming from a variety of places along that journey, this can be a challenge.

It's really no different at all from ministering to the people who come to Mass. The priest's duty as preacher and celebrant of the Mass is to preach the Word of God well and to celebrate the sacrament in a reverent and prayerful way, so that all who attend may receive the Word and the Body and Blood of Christ to strengthen them for service in the world. However, there are those who will come with a particular spiritual need, and before or after Mass, the priest may be called upon to provide further pastoral care to help that person where they are. Again, that can be a real challenge -- in fact, that may be a much bigger challenge, since it comes in the context of interacting with a whole community, and it can be trickier to discern the signs of what is going on with a person.

Discussing the interesting hard cases of the really big sins, or the preaching of particularly difficult texts, or the precise rubrics of the Mass are fun exercises -- it is dealing pastorally with individuals and communities that is the difficult work, and it is an art, not a science -- and the grace of the Holy Spirit in the moment often proves much more valuable than all the conversation about it in the world.

# posted by Tim Cravens @ 5:42 PM 0 comments

Saturday, October 15, 2011

On Priesthood

(in response to a question asking "What exactly it is that priests *are* and how priest, deacon, and laity are distinct in how they *are* in the world?")

First, the three orders of ordained ministry involve identification with particular aspects of Christian discipleship to which all baptized Christians are called to some degree -- it is just that deacons, priests, and bishops are called to identify with them to a degree that ordinary Christians are not. All are called to serve, as Christ was called to serve, but deacons are called to identify with that servanthood in such a way that their whole life becomes a life of servanthood. All are called to act in priestly ways, but priests are called to identify with Christ as priest and victim in such a way that their whole life becomes a life of priesthood. And bishops, in addition to being "high priests", are called to the ministry of shepherding, of overseeing the church -- and all are called to that ministry to one extent or another, but bishops are called to identify with the church in such a way that their whole life is a life lived for the church.

Specifically, priests are called to be ministers of Word and Sacrament, most especially the Eucharist. All Christians should read and meditate on Scripture, and make the Bible their own book -- but priests are called to so identify with Scripture that they are women and men of the Word, so that it permeates their very being, so that they can preach -- the official sermons during liturgy are when they do this most visibly, but in a sense, there should never be a time in their waking life when they are not (and the dreams of a priest while sleeping should be filled with biblical symbolism). All Christians are called upon to sanctify their daily lives with the presence of Christ, but through the life of constant prayer (the center of which is the Divine Office, with its round of psalms, scripture, and prayer on behalf of the church) in intercession for the church, the priest is called to live out that Incarnation constantly. (While I know that religious do this as well, the Divine Office is more of a means of sanctification for religious, whereas priests and other clergy are more bound to recite it on behalf of the church than as a means of personal sanctification. It is sacrificial.) Finally, with the Eucharist, the priest becomes an "alter Christus", "another Christ", in acting on behalf of Christ as the priest who makes the one sacrifice of Himself on Calvary, and acting with Christ in offering himself or herself on behalf of and in intercession for the world.

Another way of looking at this is to look at where the "home" of each order is. The place of ministry for the laity is in the world. When they come to church, they sit in the nave, and are the ones who receive ministry. Laity do not come to church to minister, but to be ministered to, so that they can return to the world to minister. The place of ministry for the deacon is at the threshold -- during the week, near the door of the church, acting to communicate between church and world. The place of the deacon during the liturgy of the word is at the crossing, between the nave and the chancel, proclaiming the gospel facing the people, leading the intercessions facing the altar. The place of the deacon during the liturgy of the Eucharist is at the altar, assisting the priest. The place of the priests during the week is in the church, ministering to those who come for solace and ministry. Their place in the liturgy is in the pulpit and at the altar. The bishop, as a priest, belongs in those places as well, but also at the cathedra, overseeing the whole operation. Joseph described it thus at the gathering with the clergy -- God owns the restaurant, the bishop is the manager, the priests are the chefs, the deacons are the waiters, assisted by the minor order busboys, and the laity are the customers who come to eat.

# posted by Tim Cravens @ 3:22 PM 0 comments

Monday, August 22, 2011

On This Rock I Will Build My Church

Matthew 16:13-20

There are a lot of people who have fun giving ironic nicknames to others. The giant, muscular football player named Tiny. The fluffy little dog named Killer. My neighbor’s cat Pixie, who despite the cute name, has a pit bull whimpering in fear.

Jesus did something like that in today’s gospel when he made a pun on the name Peter, which means Rock. “I say to you that you are Petros, and on this petra I will build my church.” But anyone familiar with the story of Peter in the New Testament knows that he was anything but a rock. He was actually rather unstable.

When Jesus was walking on the water, Peter impetuously decided to try it as well. But as soon as he got out on the waves, his fears got the best of him, he took his eyes off of Jesus, and he began to sink, so that Jesus then had to rescue him. On the night before he was betrayed, Jesus told Peter that he would deny him three times before the cock crowed. Peter said, “Not me! I would never do anything like that!” Of course, we all know the story – he did exactly that. When the going got tough, Peter proved himself to be a fair-weather friend.

This continued even after the resurrection. In Galatians, Paul tells how Peter would ignore the dietary laws when eating with those from a Gentile background, but then would follow them with those who insisted that all the Christians had to follow them as well. Paul rebuked him for his hypocrisy.

I even read the exchange between Jesus and Peter in the beginning of today’s gospel as Jesus gently teasing Peter. Jesus asks the disciples who people say he is, and the disciples tell him the different theories they have heard. Then, he asks them who they say he is. I picture them all looking at each other, afraid to guess, and then Peter impetuously guesses – not as the act of deep faith as it is often read, but rather as a guess, a stab in the dark. When Jesus tells him that “flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father in heaven”, it is not so much a pious statement as it is a recognition that Peter is too much of a blockhead to ever come up with such a profound statement on his own – it is only by the grace of God that he is able to perceive the truth of who Jesus is – Christ, the anointed one, the son of the living God – fully God, fully human, God incarnate.

But I take great hope in this. If Christ could use Peter to do great things for God, then Christ can use me, as well – in fact, he can use all of us.

And when Jesus says that he will build his church on this rock, he is not referring to Peter alone, and still less to someone who holds an office that Peter may have held. He is referring to all of us who, by the grace of God, are able to recognize Jesus as the Anointed One, and who, by grace, are able to live our lives by that truth. All of us, when we make that confession, are made part of that rock on which the church is built – even as we stumble, as Peter stumbled, we know Christ is always ready to extend a hand to help us up.

So may we always live by the grace that enables us to recognize Jesus as the Christ, the son of the living God.

# posted by Tim Cravens @ 1:01 PM 0 comments

Thursday, July 14, 2011

Prayers for the Journey

The request for my blessing by someone about to take a trip gives me great joy. It is not something I ever thought about prior to ordination. It is not even something that happens with any great frequency. It is certainly not something that takes a lot of time and effort, as preaching and other tasks do. But it is immensely satisfying, and I am always delighted when someone asks me to do it, as two people did this week.

I don’t have a standard formula – I pray extemporaneously for the person, adapting the prayer to the particular journey they are about to take, ending with a blessing in the name of the Trinity as I trace the sign of the cross on the supplicant’s forehead. Simple. I hope it is meaningful to the person seeking the blessing – I find great meaning in offering it.

Whenever I am about to leave for an overnight journey, I pray the Itinerary, a short office consisting of the Benedictus, the Lord’s Prayer, several versicles, and several collects evoking biblical journeys. It ends with the wonderful versicle and response “V.Let us go forth in peace. R. In the Name of the Lord. Amen.” The antiphon on the Benedictus recalls the journey of Tobit by invoking the archangel Raphael, and the Benedictus contains the prayer “to guide our feet into the way of peace”. The collects mention the journeys of the Israelites in the desert, the Magi on their way to pay homage to the newborn Christ, and Abraham as he set out from Ur, as well as recalling John the Baptist at whose birth the Benedictus was first recited by his father. It is a beautiful prayer, and it has a way of calming me as I set out. The Anglican Breviary adds to it a form of thanksgiving at the journey’s end, using Psalm 103, which is also lovely, and which helps me to return to my everyday life after a trip.

It is my prayer that all of my readers have safe travels wherever they go, as well as a blessed journey with God through life.

# posted by Tim Cravens @ 1:20 PM 0 comments

Friday, July 01, 2011

Part III of Sermon: "Confessions of a Church Polity Geek: Reflections on Doing the Holy Work of the Beloved Community"

This is part two of a three-part sermon delivered at the Unitarian Universalist Church of Delaware County on Sunday, June 26, 2011. Part one can be found here. Part two can be found there.

Because of the time spent to prepare this sermon, I did not have time to prepare a sermon for St. Mary of Grace's Sunday evening Eucharist celebrating the feast of Corpus Christi. I had planned on recycling a sermon I have given several times on the Eucharist. A few minutes before Mass, it occurred to me that if I switched the order of "discerning Christ's body in the Church" and "discerning Christ's body in the poor", I could use the four points in the third part of this sermon as an explanation of ways to live out being Christ's body the Church. During the singing of the Gloria in excelsis, it occurred to me that each of these four points could be tied to one of the marks of the Church from the Nicene Creed, and so in brackets, I have included the appropriate mark with the appropriate section, although this was not part of the sermon as preached to the UU congregation. There was more explanation of how the marks corresponded with the points, but that will have to wait for another blogpost. Self-plagiarism is a preacher's best friend.

There are four things the church must do in order to do its work well.

[ONE] First, each part of the church, be it a congregation, a regional unit, or a denomination, must order all of its activities around the central core values it holds as foundational – the beliefs and practices that are most sacred and most important to it. Of course, first, this means that a church unit must know what those values are, and be in unity about them. Every activity in which the church engages must be evaluated to see if it is in basic harmony with those values, and if not, whether it should be let go or reconfigured in order to better express the fundamental mission of the church. The church should also carefully consider whether it is being called to new ministries to better carry out its mission.

[HOLY] A church must be concerned with spiritual growth. Many religious traditions tell stories about a mountain as a metaphor for spiritual growth. Moses went up Mount Sinai to meet God and receive the law. Jesus went up a mountain with three of his disciples for the Transfiguration. St. John of the Cross, the great Carmelite mystic, used the Carmelite foundational symbol of Mount Carmel as the basis for his teaching about prayer in his classic work The Ascent of Mount Carmel, with a diagram of the mountain laying out the progress of the Christian’s life of prayer with God.

When you climb a mountain, there are two ways to go – you can keep ascending and going toward the top, or you can start going down. The spiritual life is similar – you are either progressing, going higher or deeper, or stagnating and declining, moving away from union with the divine. Everything the church does should be helping its members grow in the spiritual life. If it is not, it is very likely that it is moving its members away from the divine and hindering the spiritual life.

[CATHOLIC] A church must also balance the needs of the community as a whole with the needs of the individual. In order for the church to prosper, its members must sacrifice in order to contribute to the well-being of the community as a whole. Just showing up week after week is a sacrifice – in our busy society, there are always more enjoyable things that one could be doing. Members need to be willing to contribute their time, their talent, and their treasure for the church to continue to do its work. And members of the church need to be willing to make the sacrifices necessary to spiritual growth so that they can support one another. A church whose members do not sacrifice is not a true community – it is a collection of individuals, a social club.

But the church must also work for the good of the individual. A church that demands sacrifice but offers no freedom in return, and runs roughshod over its members’ individual gifts and needs, is a cult. True spirituality inspires each individual to attain the highest level of growth and flowering of her individual gifts. This must always be respected and nurtured.

[APOSTOLIC] Finally, there must be a balance between the pursuit of spirituality, the nurturing of community, and reaching out to the world at large with the church’s message of faith, hope, and love. A church that focuses on spirituality to the neglect of community and mission risks pursuing a false spirituality that is not engaged with real life – a spirituality which is an illusion. A church that is only inward-looking, fostering close relationships among its members without reaching out in love to others, risks becoming a social club. A church that is only concerned with fighting for justice, neglecting spirituality and its own health risks becoming a political club or a social service agency. While there is nothing wrong with either of these, it is not what the church is called to be, and it cannot do those tasks as well as organizations whose mission is to be a political party or a social service agency. All three of these tasks are necessary, and they must be balanced.

As we reflect on how the church does its work, let us commit ourselves more fully to our beloved community, and gird ourselves to do the holy work we are called to do.

# posted by Tim Cravens @ 8:12 AM 0 comments