Category: Wednesday Morning Thoughts

On Monday of this week, we observed the Feast Day of John Chrysostom (c. 347-Sept. 14, 407). Among our Saints, known for preaching, and in our tradition, for this lovely prayer:

Almighty God, you have given us grace at this time with one accord to make our common supplication to you; and you have promised through your well-beloved Son that when two or three are gathered together in his Name you will be in the midst of them: Fulfill now, O Lord, our desires and petitions as may be best for us; granting us in this world knowledge of your truth, and in the age to come life everlasting. Amen.

An Eastern patriarch. He was born at Antioch in Syria. Early in life John became a monk, and, at times he lived as a hermit. He was soon recognized as a great preacher. In 397 he became the Patriarch of Constantinople. He served in that position until 404 when he was deposed and banished by Empress Eudoxia and Theophilus, Patriarch of Alexandria. Chrysostom was an opponent of the Arians. He placed great emphasis on the eucharist. He died in Comana in Pontus, now in northeast Turkey. His most significant writing was On the Priesthood, a manual for priests and bishops. Chrysostom is a Doctor of the Church. In 1908 Pope Pius X named him the patron saint of preachers. His life and ministry are commemorated in the Episcopal calendar of the church year on Jan. 27.

Of course, we know this prayer from our Morning and Evening disciplines in the Book of Common Prayer, and it is among my favorites. He is reminding us that whenever Christians gather to pray, they can trust that Christ is present. Chrysostom’s prayer also guards against a blind, uninformed faith. We ask that God fulfill our requests “as may be best for us.”

Chrysostom, like the Anglican priest and poet RS Thomas, was unafraid to ask tough questions, and both remind us that faith is not the same as certainty. This is among the reasons Vicky and I were drawn to, and remain members of the Anglican Communion. Chrysostom wrote that “faith is not certainty,” meaning that true Christian faith involves a level of trust and reliance on God even when faced with doubt or uncertainty, rather than complete, unwavering knowledge or understanding; it is a leap of faith that requires ongoing commitment despite not having all the answers.

Last week, while running on the neighborhood trails, I was entranced by the winter woods, with snow still present in shaded Beech groves deep in the forest.

I also remembered to look down, and I was fascinated by the fractal-like ice formations along the way:

Our faith can be like this too…taking both the long view and paying attention to even the smallest details in our day to day lives. This is one reason that forms of prayer and mindfulness practice can deepen our attention, as the poet Mary Oliver said so well:

“Instructions for living a life.

Pay attention.

Be astonished.

Tell about it.”

The priest and poet RS Thomas reminds us that our faith is often deeply connected to our prayer life, however we define it, keeping our eyes on that Divine Spark we have each been given:

My luminary,

my morning and evening

star. My light at noon

when there is no sun

and the sky lowers. My balance

of joy in a world

that has gone off joy’s

standard. Yours the face

that young I recognized

as though I had known you

of old. Come, my eyes

said, out into the morning

of a world whose dew

waits for your footprint.

Before a green altar

with the thrush for priest

I took those gossamer

vows that neither the Church

could stale nor the Machine

tarnish, that with the years

have grown hard as flint,

lighter than platinum

on our ringless fingers. ~ RS Thomas

This coming Sunday we’ll begin our exploration of the book “Walk in Love,” a review of Episcopal beliefs and practices. Feel free to join us as you are able. In the lives of both Chrysostom and Thomas, we are reminded of the Latin phrase “Lex Orandi, Lex Credendi” or, loosely translated, “you are what you pray.” And we remember that wherever two or more are gathered the Spirit is among us as well.

I’ll catch you later down the trail, and I hope to see you in church!

Bill+

Rite II:O God, who gave your servant John Chrysostom grace eloquently to proclaim your righteousness in the great congregation, and fearlessly to bear reproach for the honor of your Name: mercifully grant to all who proclaim your word such excellence in preaching, that all your people may be made partakers of the glory that shall be revealed; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God for ever and ever. Amen.

“Just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ. For in the one Spirit we were all baptized into one body–Jews or Greeks, slaves or free–and we were all made to drink of one Spirit.” (The Epistle: 1 Corinthians 12:12)

Our Ministry Fair last Sunday was an outward and visible sign of the Spirit at work in our beloved Holy Family. A deep bow of gratitude for Parish Life, and all those who contributed to the success of this gathering. Thank you! We were indeed one in the same Spirit of grace, hospitality, excellence, and compassionate outreach. 

Our search process now nears the penultimate stage, and we give thanks for our nominating committee consisting of co-chairs Martha Power and Steve Franzen, and the faithful committee members Scott Armentrout, Cammie Cox, Allan DeNiro, Winship Durrett, Jeannine Krenson, and Ric Sanchez. This is a difficult and sacred process, and we thank you, each of you!

And thanks to all those who completed the Congregational Assessment Tool (CAT) Survey taken by some 140 parishioners in May. Applications for our new Rector have now been received for consideration by the nominating committee, and they will go on to the vestry to complete the search process. We are getting close to the next chapter in the life of Holy Family thanks to all of you!

As I looked around the room at our Ministry Fair, and wandered throughout the parish, I was reminded that relationships—their invitation to each of us—calls us out of our self-serving agendas. They require that we allow ourselves to be vulnerable. They ask us to acknowledge our humility in the face of forces greater than we are. We are “called out” of what our agenda would be if we had not come across, for example, the woman in need at the nursing home, or those on the margins in such cold winter weather as we have experienced, those in need of a visit and a prayer, and so on…all the ways we give ourselves away as the Body of Christ in the world. We are “called out” of what our agenda would be if, for example, many years ago we had not recognized the need for increased visitation for sick and shut-in parishioners. We began a Lay Pastoral Care class, and this gave birth to our pastoral care committee.

So why go to church? What do you tell your friends or perhaps your own children who no longer go but who wonder why you do? Why participate in the ritual of baptism again and again by recalling your baptismal vows? Why commit ourselves to an irrevocable covenant to a group of flawed fellow human beings and agree to journey with them for the rest of our lives?

At my ordination at the cathedral many years ago, Thee Smith and I heard the Gospel of John read—you know the story: Jesus asks Simon Peter three times if he loves him. Three times Peter says that he does. Jesus tells Peter to tend and feed his sheep. He then says, “when you were younger, you used to fasten your own belt and to go wherever you wished. But when you grow old, you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will fasten a belt around you, and take you where you do not wish to go.” Indeed. Such is the binding together we observed on Sunday. Why go to church? Because as theologian Ron Rolheiser suggests, it is not good that we should be alone, and ecclesiology—being the church in the world, in action—is walking with God in community. And because we must take our rightful place, humbly, within the family of humanity. And because the Holy Spirit calls us there—because to deal with Christ is to deal with the church. And because we need community to dispel our sometimes unrealistic and self-serving fantasies about ourselves…and in the presence of people who share life with us regularly we cannot lie and delude ourselves into thinking we are more generous and noble than we are. And because ten thousand saints have told us that God wants us to walk the spiritual journey with others, and not alone. And because we need to dream with others—and hope and pray together for justice and peace, especially in times such as these.

And we go to church because we need to practice for heaven here and now, and for the pure joy of it. So let us take one last glance back toward Christmas now. Let us recall the journey of the Magi, whose agendas were radically altered by news of the birth of a child. As T.S. Eliot wrote, “Just the worst time of the year for a journey and such a long journey: the ways deep and the weather sharp, the very dead of winter…and the night fires going out, and the lack of shelters, and the cities hostile and the towns unfriendly and the villages dirty and charging high prices. A hard time we had of it. At the end we preferred to travel all night, sleeping in snatches, with the voices ringing in our ears, saying this was all folly.” These three sojourners must have been, as Eliot suggests, haunted by the uncertainty.

Yet like them, we come to know that gifts only have life and meaning when they are taken, blessed, broken and shared with others. And Baptism is the sign of our identification with them and with Christ—a visible, tangible affirmation that binds us together and calls us out as we discover a spark of transcendence beyond our former selves or, as Eliot said so well of the Magi, who returned to their former land “no longer at ease here, in the old dispensations, with an alien people clutching their gods.” Indeed. We ought to be rightly suspicious when we are called only to joy. But Baptism is, ultimately, about the joy that was sealed and consecrated at the Jordan, in which, through the Holy Spirit, He gives His own to share.

This is what I saw last Sunday at the Ministry Fair…the joy of gathering in the Spirit, to be so much more together than we are alone! Thank you!

Bill+

Grace and peace to each of you on this chilly Wednesday in Epiphany! I hope everyone is emerging safely from the icy chrysalis of the past few days. I missed seeing you all at church on Sunday. I was able to get out on the trails a few times, and finally made my way to the counseling center to see after my patients on Monday. With a full moon riding high in the sky, I was entranced by the beauty of the ice on a cold January night, a moment to be treasured, and a luminous gift.

In the quiet stillness of the woods in winter, I am reminded of this lovely poem:

I have seen the sun break through

to illuminate a small field

for a while, and gone my way

and forgotten it. But that was the

pearl of great price, the one field that had

treasure in it. I realize now

that I must give all that I have

to possess it. Life is not hurrying

on to a receding future, nor hankering after

an imagined past. It is the turning

aside like Moses to the miracle

of the lit bush, to a brightness

that seemed as transitory as your youth

once, but is the eternity that awaits you.

This is a beautiful poem by Welsh poet, R. S. Thomas. Thomas was an Anglican priest, as well as a poet, but I think his words are full of profound wisdom for everyone, regardless of creed. The Bright Field speaks about those shining moments in life — moments of grace, beauty, inspiration, and yes…epiphany — I which we fleetingly encounter the divine or feel a deep connection to the universe. This image of the bright field evokes for me various ideas: the moment you first see your children, or grandchildren, or first fall in love, or adopt a new animal in need of rescue, or when you read and understand some complicated scientific theory about the universe and see God in a new way, or become transfixed by a Shakespeare sonnet, a work of fiction, or an incredible piece of music… or, of course, when you pray or meditate, and feel a connection to the divine.

These moments are almost like—I would say exactly like the moment when the water became wine at the wedding, as we will hear on Sunday. Or that moment when the bread and wine, broken and blessed, become our journey as the Body of Christ in the world. The poet confides that he has often seen the sun “illuminate a small field” for a moment and, continued on his way and “forgotten it”. But, says Thomas, he knows that that field was “the pearl of great price”; that moment was something rare and beautiful, to hold on to and spend your life searching for. He is admitting here that he has experienced moments of profound connection to God, but that he has proceeded to move on, without dwelling on it. However, he has now come to realize that he must “give all that I have/ To possess” that moment — that “bright field” — again.

Another quality of these “bright” moments becomes clear as we enter the second stanza; the poem says that life is not “hurrying on/ to a receding future” or “hankering after/ and imagined past”. These lines deliver to me the notion that these bright moments of grace are in fact moments where we are intensely present. These are the moments we are most alive, and when we feel most connected to life, the universe, and/or God. This is as relevant for prayer and meditation as it is for all the other instances where one might experience a moment of connection to the universe.

The poem ends with the beautiful image of the burning bush from the story of Moses. Thomas tells us that life — and these moments — is about “turning/ like Moses to the miracle/ of the lit bush”. Again, there is a real sense of intense presence in this image. I think the way the bright light — which is God, and grace — is described in the final lines is just exquisite: though it had once seemed “as transitory as your youth”, it is in fact “the eternity that awaits you.”

This coming Sunday will be our Ministry Fair, an opportunity to learn more about the wonderful ministries at Holy Family, and to allow your imagination, and the inspiration of the Holy Spirit in Her wisdom, to discover ways you might become more involved in our beloved Holy Family parish. This is a remarkable gift from Tammy Kirk and the Parish Life Committee in conjunction with all of those ministries represented. Please join us, won’t you, and take time to pause, learn more about these offerings, and as RS Thomas suggests, be present and aware that we are, each of us, standing on Holy Ground. Let’s give thanks for the past year, as lay ministries have flourished in so many ways, and as we are leading the way for a new “lay led, clergy supported” way of being the church in our Diocese, and beyond. I am so very grateful for each of you. As our collect for Sunday, a lovely invitation indeed, reminds us, let us endeavor to shine together:

Almighty God, whose Son our Savior Jesus Christ is the light of the world: Grant that your people, illumined by your Word and Sacraments, may shine with the radiance of Christ’s glory, that he may be known, worshipped, and obeyed to the ends of the earth; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who with you and the Holy Spirit lives and reigns, one God, now and forever. Amen.

I’ll catch you later on down the trail, and I hope to see you at the Ministry Fair…and in church, this coming Sunday!

Bill+

On a cold Epiphany winter night at Holy Family, we joined in the Episcopal tradition of the Burning of the Greens. The Christian holy day Epiphany, on Jan. 6, is also known as the “Feast of Lights,” and some Episcopal congregations celebrate this feast quite literally, by burning Christmas trees and greens in recognition of Jesus as a light to the world.

The light from a Christmas tree fire invokes symbolism rooted in the origins of Epiphany as an alternative to pagan festivals that were held on the winter solstice – the darkest day of the year. Also known as Three Kings Day, Epiphany traditionally commemorates the day the Magi were introduced to the infant Jesus. Light also is a familiar motif in contemporary lectionary readings for Epiphany, such as Isaiah 60:1-6: “Arise, shine; for your light has come.”

Another tradition, closely associated with the winter solstice, is the burning of a Yule log in a bonfire, symbolizing the return of the sun during the darkest time of year, particularly prevalent in ancient Scandinavian cultures; people would often save a small part of the log to light the next year’s fire, signifying continuity and the cycle of life. The Germanic, Scandinavian, Norse, and Celtic peoples celebrated Yule on the winter solstice. Anciently, Yule was a celebration that, in some cases, lasted for 2 months! Norse people would celebrate Yule with evergreens, holly, wreaths, a Yule log, and bells.

In ancient customs, burning the Yule log was believed to signal the return of the sun and usher in the beginning of spring. When adopted as a Christian custom, a Yule log became symbolic of the infant Christ Child at Christmas. People would leave the Yule log burning for the 12 days of Christmas. A small portion of the log is saved to light next year’s fire, and the ashes are scattered over a garden when it is time to plant seeds. 

For many years, on the night of or near the winter solstice, my running buddies and I ventured once into the darkness of the trail with our headlamps lighting the way until, we reached a place we affectionately call “Beech Cove.” Deep in the woods, alongside a lovely brook, we turned off our headlamps and let the darkness settle in around us. The water could be heard in a new way, and Orion and the Pleiades became visible in a new way above us. Wendell Berry, our American treasure, wrote this about the dark: “To go in the dark with a light is to know the light. To know the dark, go dark. Go without sight, and find that the dark, too, blooms and sings, and is traveled by dark feet, and dark wings.” Anyone who has spent time in the wood at night will know the truth of this poem, and its paradoxical lesson that we know the light, in part, because we are willing to become familiar with the dark. And sometimes we know the dark simply because we are human, and vulnerable, and in spite of this, even amid our darkest moments, we see glimpses of light.

This is where the Gospels of John and Luke speak to one another, in dialectic fashion perhaps. The incarnation we observe and celebrate in this season means nothing less than that God is no longer a God of the sky, relegated to Orion’s realm, but rather walks in the rhythm of humanity. Now, in Christ, we can gaze upon God, both human and divine, just as light—the Word—is both particle and wave, and in seeing Him we see who we were meant to be.

So, there is more to the cry of the infant in that cold, dark stable than meets the eye, and sometimes, even if through a glass darkly, we glimpse that something more. John, in his paradoxical insistence that the world cannot see the light which supposedly enlightens it, would not deny that even our unknowing, at times uncaring world sees glimpses of the light. Despite the sometimes-self-indulgent nature of the season, there are times when we can see glimpses of our own best selves reflected in the glimpses of light. We are reminded of W.H. Auden’s similarly paradoxical Christmas Oratorio in which he wrote: “To those who have seen the child, however dimly, however incredulously, The Time Being is, in a sense, the most trying time of all…we look round for something, no matter what, to inhibit our self-reflection.” This being human can be so very hard, until we remember that we are held in the hands of a God who chose not to leave us alone. Indeed, the lovely performance of Amahl and the Night Visitors, a one-act opera by Menotti, was a wonderful celebration of this same Epiphany message. We are transformed by these mysterious, Holy encounters with light, and with compassion shared and given away. I am so very grateful for our choir, led by John King Carter, and the musicians and actor/singers, and especially young Amahl, played by the remarkable Darwin Marie Dudgeon

Thanks, as well, to Bruce Elliott and the faithful Grounds Crew for, well, shepherding our own bonfire! A deep bow of gratitude to Jacques for creating the set design for the stage, and to the hospitality team for contributing the chili and hard work for the dinner, and to all who brought food for our bountiful feast. You kept us warm and fed on a cold winter’s night!

Epiphany blessings to each of you, and I’ll catch you later down the trail. I hope to see you in church! Bill+

I am a collector and connoisseur of light. I hold memories of these experiences of light deep within my soul, and they sustain and enliven and enrich my experience of being alive. On a remarkable day recently, I was running on the local trails, and I was rendered speechless by the slant of light and the beauty of the day. As Emily Dickinson said,

There’s a certain Slant of light,

Winter Afternoons –

And on Christmas morning I arrived early and sat in the chapel as the light streamed into that sacred space, soon to be filled with those gathered for the quiet Eucharist….

In one of his poems Gerard Manly Hopkins has written,

“The world is charged with the grandeur of God.

It will flame out, like shining from shook foil;”

In my mind’s eye, I have a collection of such days of remarkable light. They each involve a transformation of perspectives of some kind, perhaps even a transcendence of the ordinary, even if just for a moment. Each experience involves liminal, transitional space, where light seems to symbolize the passage to a new perspective, a surprising way of looking at the world. I recall the remarkable quality of light on a day in Maine, leaving Stonington Harbor in a kayak, looking back at the town as the sunlight, filtered through a dissipating fog, cast a beautiful glow on Penobscot Bay and reflected off the slick head of a harbor seal, greeting my passage there.  I recall the fiery glow of the constellation Cassiopeia, seen through a telescope one deep night in June, and realizing that the light from this beautiful origin left there two thousand years ago, only now reaching my eyes. I recall the light reflected in the eyes of my sons as they were born and the many moments since, filled with all the joys of parenting and so many memories we have shared. I remember the light of the sun filtering through the stained glass windows in the Cathedral of St. John the Divine on a late October day in New York City, and a remarkable day running on the trails near Mt. LeConte with my best friend, in a driving snow, through which the sun momentarily emerged, reflecting off of every limb and every snowflake, encasing us in a wondrous cocoon of light. I remember a day in March, or maybe April, many years ago, having fallen asleep in a hammock at my grandmothers’ farm, awaking to the sound of spring breezes in the trees, blowing the nearby wind chimes, and seeing the instant I opened my eyes her hand-made quilts, lovingly created, hanging in the bright spring sunlight and reflecting back the many colors of her loving, generous spirit. I recall coming down the aisle at First Methodist Church in downtown Atlanta, and seeing the light in Vicky’s eyes, surrounded by family and friends, on a lovely September day some 43 years ago. And these are just a few.

Conversely, the darkness we each experience on occasion in our lives, and during this season of long winter nights, reveals the absence of light which by contrast, in dialectic fashion, makes us appreciate the light we hold so dear.

“Midway this way of life we’re bound upon,

I woke to find myself in a dark wood,

Where the right road was wholly lost and gone”

wrote Dante. And the Zen koan which I like, a poem by Mizuta Masahide, a 17th-century Japanese poet.

Barn’s burnt down —

nowI can see the moon

For many reasons, this poem has been helpful to me over the years. I think it is mostly a reminder that things change and, even when it seems challenging, can lead to unexpected opportunities. Indeed, themes of darkness and light are a part of our journey in this winter solstice season. In her lovely book “The Luminous Web,” Episcopal priest Barbara Brown Taylor reminds us that quantum physics suggests that everything in life–molecules, particles, and sub-atomic particles–is inter-connected. We are all caught up in an infinite, luminous web of relationships. Indeed, as human beings–as inherently social people–each of us is the summation of our relationships. These relationships literally constitute who we are as human persons. Taylor says: “When I am dreaming quantum dreams, what I see is an infinite web of relationship, flung across the vastness of space like a luminous net.” (page 54 of The Luminous Web)

Recently we lost the process theologian John Cobb, a student of Alfred North Whitehead, who like Teilhard de Chardin, wrote extensively about the deep, intimate connections between science and religion. Each of these authors evokes a strong sense of being part of a larger movement, participating with the divine spirit, expanding in love and being borne along by love, like the light of Christ, ever flowing outward, just like our universe. We know that light is both particle and wave, and this “luminous web” of light, as John’s Gospel reminds us, “…shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.” 

I am so very grateful for our Holy Family parish, and for each of you. I pray luminous blessings upon you all in this New Year. I’ll catch you later down the trail, and I hope to see you in church!

Bill+

The Gospel:  John 1:1-14

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being in him was life, and the life was the light of all people. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it.

There was a man sent from God, whose name was John. He came as a witness to testify to the light, so that all might believe through him. He himself was not the light, but he came to testify to the light. The true light, which enlightens everyone, was coming into the world.

He was in the world, and the world came into being through him; yet the world did not know him. He came to what was his own, and his own people did not accept him. But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God, who were born, not of blood or of the will of the flesh or of the will of man, but of God.And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father’s only son, full of grace and truth.

Grace and peace to you all on this Christmas Day, and blessings in this season of the Incarnation, the Word made flesh!

Blessings, Bill+

This coming Sunday will be the Fourth Sunday of Advent, followed by Christmas Eve on Tuesday and Christmas Day on Wednesday. It is a wonderful season, and the Gospel text for Sunday sets the stage for what is to come in such a lovely way:

The Gospel: Luke 1:39-55

In those days Mary set out and went with haste to a Judean town in the hill country, where she entered the house of Zechariah and greeted Elizabeth. When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the child leaped in her womb. And Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit and exclaimed with a loud cry, “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb. And why has this happened to me, that the mother of my Lord comes to me? For as soon as I heard the sound of your greeting, the child in my womb leaped for joy. And blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfillment of what was spoken to her by the Lord.”

And Mary said,

“My soul magnifies the Lord,

and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior,

for he has looked with favor on the lowliness of his servant.

Surely, from now on all generations will call me blessed;

for the Mighty One has done great things for me,

and holy is his name.

His mercy is for those who fear him

from generation to generation.

He has shown strength with his arm;

he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts.

He has brought down the powerful from their thrones,

and lifted up the lowly;

he has filled the hungry with good things,

and sent the rich away empty.

He has helped his servant Israel,

in remembrance of his mercy,

according to the promise he made to our ancestors,

to Abraham and to his descendants forever.”

In some ways, last Wednesday at the Grandview Center (now Jasper Point) was the embodiment of Advent and Christmas for me, and I am so grateful for the gifts offered so freely by our Holy Family cohort. It is true that in many ways, outreach is the heart of who we are and what we do at Holy Family. A deep bow of gratitude to all who joined us for music (thank you John, Susan, and all those who made a joyful noise) and created and distributed the gift bags to the residents! 

 

As I looked around the room on Wednesday, I was filled with gratitude for those gathered, and for all of Holy Family, who sent us forth to represent our parish. This last Sunday of Advent gives us a brief time to reflect upon and kindle within ourselves the light of the incarnate Lord. The foundation is laid for what we will find at the manger, and beyond. Now let us prepare to join the shepherds and the angels in great joy over what God has done for us. Who knows how this may shape us, and at what levels, in the year to come? The Incarnation is finally about being present here, and now, and as fully as we can to what the world offers us.

It’s just a matter of opening our eyes and appreciating what I call “secrets hidden in plain sight.” But we can’t do that when we’re obsessing about the past or the future, or about what we don’t have, or allowing a thousand distractions to prevent us from noticing the gift of “here and now.” Imagine where we might be had Elizabeth, or Joseph, or Mary…or Jesus, had not been present to the moments at hand.

Here’s a poem from William Stafford that reminds us to pay attention to such simple gifts as what the present might offer, respecting and receiving them for the gifts they are. Look around, he says, “starting here, right in this room,” and see what we’ve been given. He’s not advocating passivity. He’s advocating receptivity and gratitude, without which life becomes hollow, and without which the Incarnation is only a possibility we have not lived out in our own lives.

You Reading This, Be Ready

by William Stafford

Starting here, what do you want to remember?

How sunlight creeps along a shining floor?

What scent of old wood hovers, what softened

sound from outside fills the air?

Will you ever bring a better gift for the world

than the breathing respect that you carry

wherever you go right now? Are you waiting

for time to show you some better thoughts?

When you turn around, starting here, lift this

new glimpse that you found; carry into evening

all that you want from this day. The interval you spent

reading or hearing this, keep it for life—

What can anyone give you greater than now,

starting here, right in this room, when you turn around?

I’ll catch you later down the trail, and I hope to see you in church. If you are traveling this coming week, traveling mercies and blessings, and Merry Christmas!

Bill+

fasting, and almsgiving (Matthew 6:2,5,16). They restored the abandoned church building and became responsible for regular services there. They taught the neighborhood children and looked after the health and well-being of the people of the district. They read the regular daily offices of the Book of Common Prayer, including the recital every day of the complete Psalter. (Day and night, there was always at least one member of the community kneeling in prayer before the altar, that they might keep the word, “Pray without ceasing.”) They wrote books and stories dealing with various aspects of Christian faith and practice. They fasted with great rigor, and in other ways embraced voluntary poverty, so that they might have as much money as possible for the relief of the poor.

The community was founded in 1626 (when Nicholas was 34). He died in 1637 (aged 45), and in 1646 the community was forcibly broken up by the Puritans of Cromwell’s army. The memory of the community survived to inspire and influence later undertakings in Christian communal living, and one of T.S. Eliot’s Four Quartets is called “Little Gidding.”

In the 20th century there was a revival of interest in Ferrar & Little Gidding, typified by the romantic historical novel John Inglesant. Bp Mandell Creighton (Bishop of London at the turn of the century) wrote an article on Ferrar for the Dictionary of National Biography. The story of how T.S. Eliot came to write the poem is told in Dame Helen Gardner’s book The Composition of Four Quartets [now out or print]. He probably visited Little Gidding only once, in May 1936. A friend was writing a play about the visit of Charles I to Gidding, and asked Eliot for his comments. After writing The Dry Salvages, Eliot wanted to complete what he now saw as a set of 4 poems, and he quickly settled on Little Gidding. It was written and published during the war when it was by no means certain that English culture and religion would survive. The opening stanzas, according to Dame Helen, are the only piece of narrative verse in the Four Quartets, unique amongst Eliot’s poetry. The “place you would be likely to come from” is London and the blitz, or German air raids; the “route you would be likely to take” is straight up the A1 from London.

Inspired by all these things, the Friends of Little Gidding was founded after the war, with the Bishop of Ely as president and Eliot as a vice-president. In the 1970s Robert Van de Weyer, one of whose ancestors had been Herbert’s patron at Leighton Bromswold, founded a trust to buy the farmhouse as the start of a new community and as a place of retreat. The community appears to be thriving, with (at a guess) some 30 members, families, couples and singles, of several denominations (RC, Anglican, and others) with some members working outside, others within the Community. By coincidence we used to live about a dozen miles from East Coker, a pretty Somerset village, featured in another of the Quartets, where Eliot’s ancestors lived before emigrating to Massachusetts, and where Eliot is buried. One day perhaps we’ll get to those Dry Salvages out at Cape Ann, Mass … perhaps one of you has been there?

Indeed, let us covenant to continue to “kneel where prayer has been valid,” in community and fellowship, and that includes our own beloved Holy Family Parish. Here’s the Collect for Nicolas Ferrar’s Feast Day: 

Loving God, the Father of all,

whose servant Nicholas Ferrar

renounced ambition and wealth

to live in a household of faith and good work:

keep us in the right way of service to you

so that, feasting at the table in your household,

we may proclaim each day the coming of your kingdom;

through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord. Amen.

Advent blessings to you all! I hope to see you in church, and I’ll catch you later down the trail!

Bill+

I have too many books, and while I am finally able to say this out loud, it’s doing something about it that is so very challenging. So, I have taken this on as an Advent discipline of “letting go.” After many years as a professor, psychotherapist, and priest I have books that I no longer need, and others might be able to use. For reasons I need not go into here, books were my friends growing up, and they provided comfort and direction to me in times of discernment, and uncertainty. As a “bookish” football player in high school, I was sometimes teased about this by my teammates. And a supervisor in the welding department at Atlantic Steel company once said to me “William, I see you reading these books during lunch. Where will this get you?” I did not know.

So, among my Advent disciplines are letting go, and giving away, and being open to what may eventually live in those empty spaces. You may wonder as to the almost penitential aspect of this, but it is not misplaced. We sometimes forget that traditionally, Advent has had this penitential, almost Lenten thread, and it can be instructive.

Consider the collect appointed for the Second Sunday of Advent: Merciful God, who sent your messengers the prophets to preach repentance and prepare the way for our salvation: Give us grace to heed their warnings and forsake our sins, that we may greet with joy the coming of Jesus Christ our Redeemer; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen. (1979 BCP, p. 211)

Taken in conjunction with the appointed gospel readings — which, in all three years of the Sunday lectionary cycle, focus on John the Baptist, with particular emphasis on his fiery preaching of impending judgement for sin in Year A of the Revised Common Lectionary — this constitutes as clear a thematic focus on sin and repentance as anything found in Lent. There are mixed opinions as to whether “alleluia” is appropriate during Advent. At the Fraction in both Rites I and II, the rubric states “Alleluia is omitted during Lent, and may be omitted at other times except during the Easter season”. The “penitential” nature of Advent is not the same as Lent but rather focuses more on hope and preparation. The Gloria is not used, but Alleluias can still be appropriate, as the use of “Let all mortal flesh” and “Lo, he comes with clouds descending” suggests.

Nevertheless, the first two Sundays of Advent include a major emphasis on repentance, and the need for redemption. This emphasis remains, but this eases up on the third Sunday of Advent, and even more so on the fourth Sunday of Advent. But these themes are present throughout the entire Advent season. This suggests that we are only ready for the coming of Christ after we have “cleaned house” by doing the work of repentance. I am trying to take this literally this year, and so my donations to “Books for Africa” have become a way of decluttering and preparation:

Books For Africa Celebrates Opening of New Georgia Warehouse

Is Advent a penitential season? That’s like asking if Lent is a season of “joy, love and renewal.” While it’s not as stark as the liturgy for Ash Wednesday, the answer is, Yes, Advent is in some ways a penitential season. And it’s also a season about watching, waiting, judgment, consummation, pregnancy, and giving birth. The penitential dimension of Advent can be clearly seen in the collects and lectionary readings assigned for the season.

At a time of year when our consumer culture is in high “feel good” gear, it’s easy to go with the path of least resistance and join the party. By contrast, the Advent themes of sin and repentance convey the clear message that we need to change, that we need transformation to be ready for Christmas, and that we need to wait for the celebration in God’s time. That’s a strikingly countercultural message for time when many are all too eager to embrace the consumer culture’ Advent-trumping version of Christmas. But the message is right there in the 1979 Book of Common Prayer.

The challenge in John’s word in the wilderness came from the prophet Isaiah spoken at the time Israel was in exile in Babylon. Separating God’s people from their home was a wilderness, a barrier that appeared impossible for them to deal with. The promise in Isaiah 40, where we find the words John uses, is that comfort will come to God’s people, that in the wilderness a way will be prepared for the Lord, much like the way was prepared for ancient kings to visit the remote parts of their kingdoms.              

In these days leading up to Christmas I am hoping to see beyond the clutter of living to the hope that was born so many years ago in Bethlehem. We, too, can find the way home. The call is for us to find the way to God to be in our days and our hearts. Perhaps in “letting go” I am opening space for new growth and hopeful possibilities. Perhaps in the spaces created by giving up attachment to former things, gratitude for what remains is deepened, and a focus on what is most important is clarified.

Look at your calendar for the days between now and Christmas. Where have you set aside time for worship, for prayer, for some quiet time? Perhaps in the spaces opened by de-cluttering, there is more room for giving ourselves away. Participating in outreach at Holy Family, such as our Grandview Advent event, might be one such “outward and visible sign” of creating space for compassion. A part of uncluttering is making sure there is time for God to touch our lives and shape our days. And maybe a friend or loved one needs you more than the gift you will spend hours trying to find. Maybe more important than perfection in our decorations is a smile on our face as we spend time with those dear to us. “Preparing a way” may require us to ask some tough questions and make some hard decisions. 

One might define clutter as a disordered state. I can often see what clutter is by looking at my desk or my office or car. Clutter can be discouraging to us. It can become a barrier to one making any progress or keeping one’s focus. Clutter in our home or in the office or shop is often merely a problem of storage. Clutter in my thinking is often a result of trying to focus on too many things at once. I am often guilty of this, even as our culture sees multitasking as a skill to be honed. In this season, I need to learn to focus on one thing at a time. When we multi-task, when we try to do too many things or set too many goals, the result is that we can easily face a host of uncompleted things in our lives, which clutters our days and our thoughts.

I am learning in new ways that to “prepare the way of the Lord” means to make choices. We must decide what we are to focus our lives and days on. We must decide what we will keep. The author Ann Patchett, owner of Parnassus Books in Nashville, recently wrote a New Yorker article about the “practice” of de-cluttering and giving things away:

“This was the practice: I was starting to get rid of my possessions, at least the useless ones, because possessions stood between me and death. They didn’t protect me from death, but they created a barrier in my understanding, like layers of bubble wrap, so that instead of thinking about what was coming and the beauty that was here now I was thinking about the piles of shiny trinkets I’d accumulated. I had begun the journey of digging out.”

In a way, my efforts at de-cluttering, including giving away some of my beloved books, is an Advent, wilderness journey. It is requiring that I “practice” trusting that God will prepare a way, and trusting when we sing “comfort, comfort ye my people.” Shoshin ( 初心) is a concept from Zen Buddhism meaning “beginner’s mind.” It refers to having an attitude of openness, eagerness, and lack of preconceptions when looking at oneself and the world around us, even at an advanced level, just as a beginner would. In the philosophical school of phenomenology, the “original position” refers to the core idea that focuses on directly investigating and describing conscious experiences as they appear to the individual, without relying on pre-existing theories or assumptions about the world, essentially aiming to understand “things as they are experienced” from a first-person perspective; this approach is largely attributed to the philosopher Edmund Husserl, who considered the “lived experience” as the primary source of knowledge. Both of these are helping me, well, “prepare the way in the wilderness” as I seek to let go, and in so doing create space for the gift that is to come: Purify our conscience, Almighty God, by your daily visitation, that your Son Jesus Christ, at his coming, may find in us a mansion prepared for himself; who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen. (1979 BCP, p. 212)

And I take comfort in knowing I am not alone on this journey of “practicing” letting go of my books. Perhaps John the Baptist is helping to prepare the way. Who knows where this may lead? I’ll catch you later on down that trail, and I hope to see you in church!

Happy Thanksgiving! This is a season of transition, and we are in what some would call “liminal” or “threshold” space between seasons, election cycles, and in our liturgical calendar, between Pentecost and Advent. The etymology of “threshold” is from the Latin, “Limen.” It describes states, times, spaces, etc., that exist at a point of transition or change—a metaphorical threshold—as in “the liminal zone between sleep and wakefulness.” The British psychiatrist Donald Winnicott focused on what he called the “transitional, potential spaces” between the developing infant and mother as the infant grows out of the state of psychological fusion with the mother, and discovers a sense of self, and the ability to symbolize, and create meaning. This includes our theological musings.

During threshold seasons such as Advent, something addresses us, prompts us, calls us, pushes us, pulls us into a relationship with itself. Transitional, liminal space is where we experience life in a lively way that feels real to us and where we discover new ways of seeing our lives. I would suggest that this includes those aspects of our lives that are dissonant and where we may be in conflict. It is from and within this space that we encounter each other, in our common finitude, and we bring forth a sense of wonder about all of those who inhabit that space with us. Indeed, liminal space in this sense is given meaning through the broader community, such as therapeutic spaces, and yes, our own beloved Holy Family parish, where we are called to go forth into the world as the Body of Christ.

Images and metaphors of transitional, potential space are common in literature and film. Examples of such liminal spaces are 9 3/4 Victoria Station, from which point Harry Potter and his fellow Hogwarts Schoolmates journey to their destination. C.S. Lewis employed the use of the wardrobe as the “threshold” through which the children made their way to Narnia. In the work of J.R.R. Tolkein, waterways and “middle earth” are chthonic, transitional places. Akira Kurosawa’s lovely short film “Dreams” is a remarkable, wondrous cinematic evocation of liminal space in living color and an invitation to find those places where we are fully alive:

Akira Kurosawa – Dreams Van Gogh

And Madeline L’Engle’s children’s book “A Wrinkle in Time,” employs the use of the transitional space known as a “tesseract,” whereby the children travel from one mode of being to another. Liturgically, Holy Saturday is an in-between, transitional space as well, not to be “resolved” or rushed through, but rather inhabited—being with the other, as opposed to doing. May we all be such travelers as this, with friends and family to accompany us.

Threshold seasons and liminal spaces can sometimes be scary, and we may feel caught between fear and lethargy. Perhaps one antidote to this is the power of gratitude. As a professor and clinician, I have long been interested in how we define illness and psychopathology, yes, but also in what makes us well, resilient, and in those conditions under which we are likely to flourish as human beings who seek to be “fully alive” as God created us to be. I am especially intrigued by those cases in which, against all odds due to illness and other constraints, people do in fact seem to thrive and flourish with resilience. Gratitude is one of the features of such cases.

In a fascinating study with the intriguing title “Counting Blessings Versus Burdens: An Experimental Investigation of Gratitude and Subjective Well-Being in Daily Life,” Emmons and McCullough, the two primary researchers in the study, set out to measure the effects of a grateful outlook on psychological and physical well-being. The word gratitude, derived from the Latin gratia, meaning grace, or gratefulness, has been defined as “the willingness to recognize the unearned increments of value in one’s experience.” Some studies have indicated that this is a two-step process—the recognition of this gift, and recognition that there is an external source of it.

Indeed, some researchers have linked this to a capacity for empathy—which implies an ability to engage in deeper levels of “feeling with” others, and to compassion. Among the findings in this study was the recognition of what the authors refer to as an “upward spiral” in the relationship between gratitude and well-being. Some have called this the “learning curve of gratitude.” This gratitude, they suggest, can lead to a broadening of mindsets and the building up of enduring personal resources. It inspires what they call “pro-social reciprocity,” increasing well-being as it builds psychological, social, and, yes, spiritual resources. And, put slightly differently, gratitude can participate in healing, both our own, and that of a broken world. The Latin root of “healing” is salve—from which we get our word “salvation.” Gratitude can “save us” from ourselves and heal those things that keep us separated from each other, and from God.

Our fellow Episcopalian and poet Mary Oliver writing on her learning curve of gratitude, put it this way:

Why worry about the loaves and fishes?

If you say the right words, the wine expands.

If you say them with love

and the felt ferocity of that love

and the felt necessity of that love,

the fish explode into many.

Imagine him, speaking,

and don’t worry about what is reality,

or what is plain, or what is mysterious.

If you were there, it was all those things.

If you can imagine it, it is all those things.

Eat, drink, be happy.

Accept the miracle.

Accept, too, each spoken word

spoken with love.

Logos~ Mary Oliver

This is a vision of Thanksgiving, and church, and hospitality that I can live with, and into, with gratitude.

Happy Thanksgiving! I’ll catch you later down the trail, and I hope to see you in church. Bill+