Sermon - Fifth Sunday of Pentecost, Year A, Proper 6

Fifth Sunday After Pentecost, Year A, Proper 6
(Romans 5:1-8, Matthew 9:35-10:8-23)
Holy Trinity Parish (Episcopal), Decatur, Ga.

AUDIO (just of me practicing at home, not the actual sermon-giving live):



TEXT:

For the past several weeks, we have been hearing stories of Jesus’s early ministry from the Gospel of Matthew. We have listened as Jesus calls the disciples to follow him and watched as he heals the sick and raises the dead. Today we reach a turning point in the story. The movement has grown unmanageable. Upon seeing the crowds of people in need gathering around him, Jesus recognizes the limits of his humanity – “the harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few” (Matt. 9:37). There are too many people in need for him to reach each person directly – and so he commissions the twelve disciples to go out into the world in his name, bringing healing to those they meet and proclaiming the good news that the kingdom of God has come near.

Not much has changed in 2,000 years. The need is still great, and the workers are still few. Just ask the front desk volunteers, who field calls and in-person visits on an almost daily basis from people looking for assistance with food, rent, or bills. Or ask Ed Buckley or Fr. Deneke about the extreme poverty they witnessed on their trip to Haiti in March. Or talk with Holy Trinity parishioners who have traveled to New Orleans multiple times over the past two years to help with the Katrina relief and rebuilding efforts - and have actually been there again this weekend. The need is great, but the workers are few.

The need is great. That’s not exactly what the passage says, of course – we all know the famous quote: “the harvest is plentiful.” But the “harvest” that is so plentiful is not an abundance of resources but an abundance of need. The potential "harvest" here refers to the crowds of people, those crowds on whom Jesus had compassion because they were in need – they were “harassed and helpless,” like “sheep without a shepherd.” The quantities of people who are in need – of basic necessities, of healing, and of the good news of God’s kingdom – is great. Those willing to go out and address these needs, heal these people, and proclaim the good news – are few.

And so Jesus sends the twelve. And 2,000 years later, Jesus sends us.

Except here’s a little secret for you: we are both the apostles and the crowd in this story. We are both those who are able to give and those who are desperately in need.

It’s easy to forget this in a church as affluent as the Episcopal Church. We are used to thinking of service as something we do to them, not something of which we are on the receiving end. And oh, we talk about the sacrifice of serving others, of how difficult it is to give of ourselves – our time, talents, and treasures – but how much easier it is to be seen and known as one who gives rather than one who receives! For there is power in the giving, there is a security in the knowledge that we have more of something than another – that we have so much of it, in fact, that we are able to give it away. There is great generosity in giving out of our abundance, but there is also great power as well.

William Willimon, the Methodist bishop of North Alabama, writes of our preference to be the servers rather than the served:


"I suggest we are better givers than getters," he writes, "not because we are generous people but because we are proud, arrogant people.”

It is tough to be served by others, Willimon writes, “because I would rather see myself as a giver. I want power -- to stand on my own, take charge, set things to rights, perhaps to help those who have nothing. I don't like picturing myself as dependent, needy, empty-handed.” [1]

So back to my little secret: while we may see ourselves as the apostles in this story, as those who are sent out into the world to help others, we are actually just as much in need as the crowds in this story -- those obnoxious, wandering, clueless crowds, harassed and helpless with no sense of direction.

ShirleyGrace Madajewski, our Monday morning front desk volunteer, often brings in interesting quotes and articles to share with our office staff. A few weeks ago she brought in an article called “Bozos on the Bus,” from a book called Broken Open by Elizabeth Lesser, founder of the Omega Institute, a nonprofit organization for personal and spiritual growth in California.

Lesser writes about the clown-activist Wavy Gravy, most famous for his role as the master of ceremonies at Woodstock, and his use of humor in the service of social activism and motivational change. She says her favorite “Wavyism” is the following quote: “We’re all bozos on the bus, so we might as well sit back and enjoy the ride.” She says she loves this phrase because

“I believe that we are all bozos on the bus, contrary to the self-assured image we work so hard to present to each other on a daily basis. We are all half-baked experiments – mistake-prone beings, born without an instruction book into a complex world. None of us are models of perfect behavior: We have all betrayed and been betrayed; we’ve been known to be egotistical, unreliable, lethargic, and stingy; and each one of us has, at times, awakened in the middle of the night worrying about everything from money, kids, or terrorism to wrinkled skin and receding hairlines. In other words, we’re all bozos on the bus.” [2]

So much of how our world is structured and how we live our lives is an attempt to avoid this truth, however. We spend lots of our time calling other people bozos because we don’t want anyone to know that inside, we’re really just bozos ourselves. And because we think we are so deserving of all the blessings we have in this life, often not seeing them as blessings but as trophies we have earned, we approach service to others with a constant eye to whether or not the recipients of our charity are truly deserving of our help.

We live in a world that is mired in measuring and calculating who is "worthy," who is "deserving," and who "qualifies" -- for this aid, for that scholarship, for this welfare program, for that job. And in many ways, the limited resources that we have to address the world’s needs demand that it be so – it is the only way we can deal with distributing limited resources to address an unlimited need.

But what we often forget, when we get so caught up in the systems of the world – systems that do a great deal of good work, by the way – but when we get so caught up in the system’s method of judging and critiquing and figuring out who qualifies, we forget that our faith, that our relationship with God, does not operate in this way. We do not receive love and acceptance from God because we have earned or deserve them – we receive God’s love as a free gift of grace.

We have been reminded of this anew lately as we have been reading through the epistle of Paul to the Romans. In the passage today, Paul says it as clearly as possible: “God proves his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8). If we were reading the Wavy Gravy Translation of the Bible instead of the New Revised Standard Version, that passage could just as well read, "while we were still bozos, Christ died for us."

God's love for us is not something we earn, but a gift freely given. When Jesus sends forth the disciples, he tells them to give to others without demanding anything in return: "You received without payment; give without payment," he says. (Matt. 10:23). We are called to model our giving to others on the way God gives to us - in waves of crazy, radical, abundant grace. Only if we first recognize ourselves as the recipients of grace can we truly give gracefully to others. This kind of servanthood to which we are called as Christians is not a hierarchical, top-down kind of relationship in which the "haves" give to the "have-nots," but a relationship of mutual sharing and support between all of us "bozos on the bus." We are certainly called to serve others, but we must also allow ourselves to be served as well.

This kind of mutual servanthood is illustrated beautifully in the "Servant Song," which we just sang as our sequence hymn before the Gospel reading, and which, by my request, we will sing again during communion. It reminds us that we are all "fellow travelers on the road" - or fellow "bozos on the bus," if you will - who are all in need of one another to "walk the mile and bear the load." But what I love most about this song is its acknowledgement of how hard it is for us to be served, how hard it is for us to admit that we are not just the apostles going forth to help others, but the crowds in need of that help as well. The first verse, which repeats as the last, starts out with a more traditional response to our call to servanthood: "Brother, sister, let me be your servant, let me be as Christ to you," it says. We're pretty cool with that. After all, we get to be "Christ" in this metaphor. But then it goes on to say, "pray that I would have the grace to let you be my servant, too."

As we sing the Servant Song again during communion, focus on the words and let them seep in. I invite you to think about what it would look like if these words described not just your relationship with your fellow parishioners or those who you already consider your equals, but those who you consider higher or lower than you in our society's hierarchy. And the next time you find yourself silently evaluating whether or not someone deserves your help, remember that you too are a receiver, that you too are just a bozo on the bus -- and respond to that person with God's crazy, radical, abundant grace.

Amen.

--------

[1] William Willimon, "The God We Hardly Knew," in Watch for the Light: Readings for Advent and Christmas. (Maryknoll: Orbis Books, 2001).

[2] Elizabeth Lesser, Broken Open: How Difficult Times Can Help Us Grow, Villard Publishing, 2004, p.28.

Brilliance

Lately I have been mesmerized again by the lyrics and haunting voice of Carrie Cheron, a folk singer in Boston who is a friend of my friend Kellie Lin Knott (another folk singer). I met Carrie last May when I was in Boston for a few days and staying with Kellie (who was at that time roommates with Carrie) and got her CD then. Most of last summer I listened to it non-stop, and I just am re-discovering it in the past few weeks. Two songs in particular seem inspired to me - I have fantasies of learning these songs on the piano and playing them in church someday, or perhaps a powerful interfaith worship service. (Interestingly enough, Carrie is Jewish but has a regular gig playing in churches, if i remember correctly.)

Really, you should look these up on iTunes -- they're just not the same without the powerful piano and Carrie's haunting, gorgeous vocals.

Arms of Our Brothers

(I interpret the "you" and "your"s in this song to be referring to God.)

Though they're falling, pattern the stars to guide us home to you.
Shatter the spear, not the spirit, make us whole anew.
By faith in trial I hold onto your shore.
Let the last of us rise up to knock on your door.
Over borders, beliefs, seek an end to this grief,
lead my soul, let my singing be clear.

Any new day will find us beyond our means.
So weary, hungry, feeding on empty dreams,
where nothing much matters but the price to pay,
though the difference is knowing what stands in our way.
Still we cover our eyes, taking aim, telling lies.
Rescue me, may my song fill the skies.

And what if this were our one chance to set everything right?
By your hands, may we walk in grace on the arms of our brothers,
in one land of light.
What if we could make love blind tonight?

Though they're falling, pattern the stars to guide us home to you
Shatter the spear, not the spirit, make us whole anew.
By faith in trial I hold onto your shore.
Let the last of us rise up to knock on your door.
Over borders, beliefs, seek an end to this grief,
lead my soul, let my singing be clear.


Time

How much is distance?
How much is pain?
How must is seeing that little girl's face?
How much is rain?
I've plenty of time to think and wish and pray
for the things I'll never deserve...

I read of hope, I read of glory.
I read of mothers, of brothers with dreams;
I read G-d's stories.
I've plenty of time to sit and think upon
this life I have earned.
So once in a while I think on sin and The Word.

[Chorus]
Just how long is a minute on a life spent in here,
under cover of bars, and years upon years?
When you've long since lost count of the worst of your fears,
yet you grieve for the sun and the sky.

Last night I heard my saviour calling.
I laid up all night and prayed I'd be gone come morning.
Cause all of the time I hope and pray ain't much,
though this time I might learn.
So once in a while I think on sin and The Word.

[Chorus]

Long is the night. Longer is evening.
I close my eyes and imagine the stars on the ceiling.
I never took time to stop and think about what life meant to her.
So most of the time I think on sin and The Word.

Just how long is a minute on a life spent in here,
under cover of bars, and years upon years?
Well, I've long since lost count of the worst of my fears,
still I grieve for the sun and the sky.

Sermon - Second Sunday of Easter, Year A

Sermon delivered at Holy Trinity Parish in Decatur, Ga., where I serve as communications coordinator.

Just a week ago, this place was filled with shouts of "alleluia," with ringing bells, and even a cymbal crash or two, proclaiming joyfully and confidently the Resurrection of Jesus. I enjoyed attending the Easter Vigil with you all on Saturday night, where we celebrated the new life of baptism. And on Sunday morning, Fr. Deneke invited you all to reflect on the ways in which, like Mary Magdelene on Easter morning, "we have seen the Lord" in this place.

But this week, the glow is off the Easter lilies.

This week, we meet Thomas. Thomas, who says not "I have seen the Lord," but "yeah, riiiiiiight."

It is significant that the "Doubting Thomas" passage always falls on the Second Sunday of Easter, no matter which of the three lectionary years we are in. The week after Easter, we are always confronted with doubt.

Doubt can be a touchy subject among people of faith. Somewhere along the line, we have been told that doubt is the opposite of faith, and so we get a little nervous, even threatened, when it rears its stubborn head. It seems to beg a response; we think we must say something about it, do something about it, explain it in some way. We see this impulse in the usual responses to the story of Thomas.

In general, it seems people want to read the story of Thomas as a commentary on the inherent value of doubt. Thomas is either vilified for having doubts or praised for being a "thinking Christian." Those who see Thomas's doubts as an indication of his weak faith point to Jesus's words to Thomas - "Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe." - while those who see Thomas's doubts in a positive light wax philosophic about how the fact that one of the disciples – a disciple who church tradition holds goes on to spread Christianity as far as India, by the way - the fact that even THIS disciple doubts the Resurrection surely means that we, with our sometimes shaky and doubtful faith, can accomplish such great things ourselves. If I had to choose, I tend to fall in the latter category, but really, I think both of these attempts to evaluate the worth of doubt really miss the point.

The fact of the matter is, doubt is neither an indication of a weak faith nor an indication of a strong faith; doubt simply IS. Doubt is a fundamental part of the human experience. The question is not whether we SHOULD have doubts - it is inevitable that we will - but in how we should respond. And in this sense the Thomas story can prove useful, for it provides a model for how to live with doubt in a community of faith.

Let's look again, closely, at the actions of this "Doubting Thomas." The other disciples tell him that Jesus has been raised from the dead, which strikes him as preposterous. "Yeah, right," he says. "Unless I see it for myself, I will not believe it." And here is the first lesson that Thomas has for us: Thomas is HONEST. He is up-front and open about his doubts. He does not go along with the crowd, does not say what he or others feel he SHOULD say. He is HONEST about where he is -- in a place of extreme skepticism about this whole Resurrection story.

The second thing Thomas does is choose to return to the community of the faithful, even with his doubts. He shows up. Somehow in all my readings of this story, I have always missed the fact that Jesus's appearance to Thomas actually comes a week after the disciples first tell Thomas of their encounters with the risen Lord. Thomas had a week's time to chew on this crazy news, to decide whether he was going to return to the next gathering of the disciples or jump ship from this bunch of loonies he had somehow gotten tangled up with. And he chooses to return. And because he chooses to return, because he chooses to show up, he is present the next time Jesus appears to the disciples -- he doesn't miss it this time.

We are not so far from Thomas, you and I. At least I know I'm not. Thomas's story, his rational skepticism and stubborn-headedness, are all too familiar to me. How many times have we echoed the words of Thomas in our own lives: "Unless I see it for myself, I will not believe"? A new acquaintance must prove their trustworthiness before we will open up to them. We must scrutinize a politician's voting patterns before we decide whether or not we will support her. We are sure that a family member who has fallen back on his word numerous times will continue to do so. In all these things, we say, "Unless I see it for myself, I will not believe it." Mere words, without an experience to back them up, ring hollow for most people. We demand to confirm with our own senses what others tell us to be true.

And herein lies the difficulty for those of us who struggle to be people of faith: We cannot FORCE the experience. We cannot MAKE ourselves believe any more than we can MAKE another person trust or love us. We cannot, out of sheer willpower, conjure up a vision of the risen Lord will dispel all doubts we might have about the veracity of the Christian story. Faith is not an intellectual proposition, a matter of agreement or disagreement over which we make the ultimate decision, but a relationship with that very living Force of Life that we call God. We are not the only ones in the equation when we talk about faith – faith is a two-way relationship that relies on the active participation of both parties. We have control over our actions, but we are at the mercy of God to grant us moments of insight, to grant us experiences of faith that reveal God's presence to us over time.

So what CAN we do, on our end of the relationship? Perhaps we can take a lesson from Thomas: to be honest about where we are, and to show up. To show up, even when we're not so sure about this whole faith thing. To show up, even when things don't seem to make sense. To show up, and in doing so, to open ourselves to the possibility of encounter with God.

In his skepticism, Thomas declares that if he can touch the body of Jesus, if he can touch his hands and his side, then he will believe - and when Jesus appears to him, he offers him the opportunity to do just that: "Put your finger here and see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it in my side. Do not doubt but believe." The blessing and grace of the Christian life is that Jesus extends that very same invitation to each one of us each time we gather together as the Christian community.

Every week that we enter this place, we have two very real and tangible ways available to us that we can touch the body of Christ.

The first is up front and center, at the climax of our liturgy: the celebration of the Eucharist. When you come forward to the altar, the ministers place into your hands "the body of Christ, the bread of heaven." If we are to take seriously our Eucharistic theology, we must affirm that Christ is really present to us in the breaking of the bread, that in touching the elements of communion, we are touching the body of Christ.

The second way we can touch the body of Christ is right next to you – and all around you – and within you. The apostle Paul writes beautifully in many of his letters about the Christian community as the living body of Christ, with the different people compared to different parts of the body, each having different skills and uses, but all coming together to form the whole. WE are the body of Christ! YOU are the body of Christ. Your neighbors in the pews are the body of Christ. In a few minutes, when we share the peace with one another, remember that for each person you reach out and touch, you are touching the very body of Christ.

And when you come forward for Communion each week, remember Jesus's words to Thomas, those words that he still speaks to you and to me: Reach out your hands and touch my body. Do not doubt but believe.

Amen.

Christmas Meditations 2007

Grace and peace to you on this Christmas Eve.

Throughout the season, I have occasionally tuned in to the 24/7 Christmas music on the local Christian radio station here in Atlanta. Between renditions of the "12 Days of Christmas" by the Muppets and "O Holy Night" by Amy Grant, the announcer's voice breaks in -- "104.7 - The Fish -- helping your family keep Christ in Christmas."

Besides the irony of the fact that immediately after that announcement, completely secular Christmas tunes like "Deck the Halls" often start to play, hearing that announcement over and over has gotten me thinking -- what exactly does it mean to "keep Christ in Christmas"?

We hear this catch-phrase often this time of year, often by disgruntled Christians who feel that Christmas has been too "secularized" in the mainstream, and are upset about Christmas pageants no longer being a part of public school celebrations. But I would argue that "keeping Christ in Christmas" is not a matter of forcing our particular religious symbols into the public square that we share with our Jewish, Muslim, Hindu, and Sikh brothers and sisters (and those of others or no faith). Rather, we keep Christ in Christmas by how we LIVE, regardless of whether there is a crèche on the town hall lawn or not.

"Keeping Christ in Christmas" is a personal spiritual discipline, not something that can be mandated by the outside culture. And for those of us who recognize in Jesus of Nazareth the Christ and the incarnation of God, this most holy night when we celebrate his birth as an infant child in a manger is an occasion to reflect on what this teaches us about the nature of God.

Centuries of Christian theology have covered and buried the infant Jesus amidst a slew of heavy accolades -- Prince of Peace, King of Kings, Lord of Lords. "Glory to the newborn King!" we sing triumphantly on Christmas Eve. But the birth of Jesus was anything BUT stately and powerful. It bears repeating year after year because human beings have such a need for pomp and circumstance that over the years Christians have ascribed to Jesus the image and role of an earthly ruler. But in actuality, Jesus was born a helpless baby, to a poor peasant family, in a dirty animal stable. This was certainly not in keeping with first-century Jewish expectations of a Messiah who would come to liberate the Israelite people from their political bondage to the imperialist Roman powers of the day. And, two thousand years later, it is still not in keeping with how we human beings like to think of God -- as mighty and powerful. Jesus in the manger is not "crowned with many crowns;" he lies helpless, utterly dependent on the care of his all-too-human parents.

"So what are you saying?" someone might ask. "That God in Jesus was NOT all-mighty and all-powerful?" Most certainly not... but herein lies the paradox of the Christian faith. Yes, the God of the Universe most definitely reigns supreme over the universe. But the birth of Christ shows us that the WAYS that this God of the Universe exercises power is NOT in mighty armies, NOT in the upper eschelons of wealth and power in society. Rather, God's power is made manifest in a child -- a poor, infant child -- the single most vulnerable state of humanity that we know.

What does it mean to "keep Christ in Christmas"? What does Christmas -- God as a baby -- teach us about the nature of God? Perhaps it shows us that the places that need the most care, the most attention, the most love - the places that are the most helpless and the most vulnerable... there we find God. The God we know in Christ is Emmanuel - "God with us." Not God "over" us or God "of" us, but God WITH us -- in all the celebration and joy, and in all the pain and sorrow, of the human experience.

Our secular Christmas frenzy tells us that those with more have the better Christmases; those with the most expensive material gifts, with the best family situations, and with the best-decorated homes have the most blessed Christmases, the ones that look most like the syrupy-sweet Christmas specials playing incessantly on T.V. But the Christmas of the Bible is anything BUT these things. It is full of the fear, pain, and need that so many of us find our lives filled with during this holiday season. And although Paul tells us in the book of Acts that the adult Jesus once said that "it is more blessed to give than to receive" (Acts 20:35), William Willimon, Methodist bishop of Alabama, writes that it is actually more difficult this time of year for us to own our identity as RECEIVERS:

"I suggest we are better givers than getters, not because we are generous people but because we are proud, arrogant people. The Christmas story -- the one according to Luke not [Charles] Dickens - is not about how blessed it is to be givers but how essential it is to see ourselves as receivers... The first word of the church, a people born out of so odd a nativity, is that we are receivers before we are givers. Discipleship teaches us the art of seeing our lives as gifts. That's tough, because I would rather see myself as a giver. I want power -- to stand on my own, take charge, set things to rights, perhaps to help those who have nothing. I don't like picturing myself as dependent, needy, empty-handed."**

And yet, it is true -- and it is actually comforting to me to realize -- that we are, ALL of us -- from the neediest man standing in line at a soup kitchen tonight in search of a hot meal, to the most wealthy among us who will mark Christmas Eve with a five-course catered meal in a multi-million dollar home -- utterly dependent on God for our very life and breath. The Christmas story brings this out in full force to us. We all find it difficult to give gifts to that relative who seems to have everything - how much less do we have anything to give to the very Creator of the Universe! The English carol "In the bleak midwinter" says it best in its final verse:

What can I give him,
Poor as I am?
If I were a shepherd
I would bring a lamb,
If I were a wise man
I would do my part,
Yet what I can I give him —
Give him my heart.


Acknowledging that all we have is a gift from God, we can only humbly give thanks and try, however brokenly, to model God's generosity towards us in how we live our lives in relationship with others. I am reminded of the General Thanksgiving, used in the Episcopal liturgies of morning and evening prayer. After giving thanks to God for our creation and preservation in this life, the prayer goes on to say,

"...And, give us such an awareness of your mercies, that with truly thankful hearts, we may show forth your praise, not only with our lips, but in our lives, by giving up our selves to your service..."

What does it mean to keep Christ in Christmas? I can't think of a better definition than that.

I would like to leave you with a poem by Oscar Romero that reminds the broken and hurting among us -- which is ALL of us, in some way -- that Christmas comes for US.

No one can celebrate
a genuine Christmas
without being truly poor.
The self-sufficient, the proud,
those who, because they have
everything, look down on others,
those who have no need
even of God -- for them there
will be no Christmas.
Only the poor, the hungry,
those who need someone
to come on their behalf,
will have that someone.
That someone is God.
Emmanuel. God-with-us.
Without poverty of spirit
there can be no abundance of God.

It is my prayer that we might all know the power of Emmanuel, "God-with-us," this Christmas. Peace be to you and yours this most blessed night.


** William Willimon, "The God We Hardly Knew," in Watch for the Light: Readings for Advent and Christmas. (Maryknoll: Orbis Books, 2001).

Spiritual Autobiography for DYVE

I have entered the discernment process for the priesthood in the Diocese of Atlanta, through a program called Discerning Young Vocations Experience (DYVE), designed specifically for young adults (twentysomethings). This is the spiritual autobiography I wrote for my first meeting with that group on Nov. 17. (It could only be three pages, double-spaced, so that really forced me to edit and create something more structured and precise than I otherwise would have!)

When I think back on the wrestling match that has been my Christian journey over the past ten years, the overarching theme could be summed up in one brilliantly concise line from a book called Encountering God, by Harvard religion professor Diana Eck. She writes, "Theological questions are not merely theoretical; they are the life and death questions of real people attempting to live with intellectual and personal honesty in a world too complex for simplistic answers." As I have walked the path of faith, I have always asked tough theological questions; in the early years of my journey, they took the form of philosophical and intellectual speculation and turmoil, while more recently I have asked more practical questions about ways "to live with intellectual and personal honesty" in how I embody my faith.

In college, my journey was characterized by intense intellectual questions as I tried to make sense of my newfound faith in Christ. Though I had been raised Lutheran, I had never been very "into" church until I had a "conversion experience" through a retreat at a friend's church in my senior year of high school, which propelled me into several years of time in nondenominational, evangelical churches. My mindset in relation to my faith at this time was intellectual and rational; the communities of which I was a part thought of faith primarily as belief, as assent to a particular doctrine. I was drawn to these communities for their passion for Christ and spiritual certitude, but soon realized that I personally still had searing questions about God, my faith, and the scriptures. I became a religion major in an attempt to work through some of those questions, but initially the religion courses seemed to raise more questions than they answered. My first response was reactionary – I was determined to "prove" that Christianity was "right." However, after reading many apologetics, I came to the conclusion that there can be no objective proof in matters of faith. And after delving into the study of world religions in my later college years and encountering for the first time people with active faith commitments to religions other than Christianity, I found that my sense of "intellectual and personal honesty" made it impossible for me to continue to hold an exclusivist belief – the idea that Christianity held all the answers and all other faiths were wrong. This was not an easy conclusion to reach when I was involved in communities who believed there are fiery consequences for anyone who does not believe that Christianity has an exclusive hold on truth and salvation. These questions truly were "life and death," in the most literal sense, for me.

After I graduated from college and moved to Boston for graduate school, my faith began to shift, from a struggle with speculative theology about the afterlife to a sense of calling to address the immediacy of human need in the here and now. One of the things that had always compelled me most about Jesus, from the very first time I really cracked open a Bible in my senior year of high school, was his way of breaking down the social boundaries of the day and reaching out to call all people blessed and beloved of God – including those that society and the religious establishment were quick to dismiss or even condemn. Once I had exhausted myself with intellectual and philosophical questions, realizing that they were likely not ever going to be solved and answered entirely to my satisfaction, I focused instead on the practical – on what I could see and hear and feel and know on this planet. And one of the first things I noticed was that people were hungry. And I remembered that Jesus had said something about feeding them.

So began my struggle "to live with intellectual and personal (and I might add, spiritual) honesty" in the world, to live out my values in following Jesus's example, to answer what I began to increasingly understand as a calling from God to reach out to those in need, to assuage suffering, and to promote healing. After running from this call for nearly two years, I finally stepped out in faith and began to volunteer every week with a homeless ministry program that slowly but surely transformed my life. One particular Sunday, after giving lunch to a woman on the street, I offered to give her one of the crosses we wore as a symbol of our ministry with this group. She eagerly accepted, and asked me to place it around her neck for her. Many months later, I realized that this was my first true sacramental act. And in that moment, something stirred deep within me, something that let loose a chain of events that has brought me, two years later, to be entering the discernment process for the priesthood.

I went immediately home and rode a wave of inspiration as words flowed out of my fingertips into my computer, recording my circuitous path to homeless ministry. I shared that writing with friends and mentors, and some of them began to encourage me to think about ordained ministry. The next year, I wound up serving as an intern in an Episcopal church in Omaha, Nebraska, through a discernment program for young adults. I came out of that program with an increased sense of calling to ministry, and at the end of the program felt a strong call to return to my home region of the country, which precipitated my move to Atlanta this summer.

Through all my struggles with my faith, I have stared complexity in the face and refused to acquiesce to simplistic, pat answers in matters of faith. I am always and constantly "working out my salvation with fear and trembling," as Paul writes in Philippians 2:12; constantly wrestling with God, praising and thanking God, arguing with God, and listening for God. I have moved from a faith that was concerned primarily with belief and right answers to a faith that is rooted in compassionate action and is comfortable sitting with the places of uncertainty and complexity in the human experience, fully confident that the incarnate Lord will always show up in those places with us.

Sermon - Calling (no connection to Lectionary readings)

This sermon was delivered at the Church of the Holy Spirit, Bellevue, Nebraska as my 'farewell' sermon to them after serving for nine months as an intern in their parish through the Resurrection House program in Omaha.

A friend asked me the other day, "What does it feel like to have a calling?"

As I come to the end of nine months spent reflecting on that very question, I wanted to share with you my own understanding of calling and how I have experienced that in my life.

Frederick Beuchener, an American Presbyterian minister and one of the most prominent theologians of our day, has written that one's calling is found "where your deep gladness meets the world's deep need." The wisdom in this statement is that finding one's calling is not just a personal quest, not just a matter of making ourselves happy. It is a matter of finding where our gifts and talents might best be put to use in the world to benefit others. God does not call us to sit at home on the sofa watching television -- even if we find "deep gladness" in that. God calls us to address the "world's deep needs," and Buechener says we have found our vocation when we find that the thing that brings us great gladness and joy is also addressing one of those deep needs of the world.

Now, this is a nice thought, and perhaps for some people it might ring true. But my own experience of calling has not always been so pleasant. Oftentimes what I perceive to be a call from God comes to me quite apart from any sense of "deep gladness" in doing something, and instead comes as a mandate, a sense that I MUST do something, often accompanied by a sense of urgency.

For two years now, I have been involved in work with people who are homeless, first through an outdoor church community in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and for the past 9 months, through Siena Francis House, which many of you know is a shelter and residential drug and alcohol recovery program in downtown Omaha. This is work to which I have felt deeply called, but it was not a nice, warm fuzzy call, a call in which "my deep gladness met the world's deep need." I didn't reach out to care for the homeless because I WANTED to or because I felt JOY in doing so, I did so because I felt that I HAD to, that I MUST.

My experience of calling has been less about Beuchner's idea of finding my "deep gladness" in doing work that also happens to address the world's needs and more about a discomforting, unsettling encounter with God that shakes up my world and prods me to step out of my comfort zone. Singer/songwriter Susan Werner gives voice to this experience perfectly in a song called "Did Trouble Me," from her recent album, The Gospel Truth. Just a sampling of the lyrics: "When I closed my eyes so I would not see, my Lord did trouble me. When I let things stand that should not be, my Lord did trouble me. When I held myself away and apart, my Lord did trouble me. And the tears of my brother did move my heart, my Lord did trouble me." The chorus of the song describes how exactly God does this troubling: "Did trouble me, with a word or a sign, with the ringing of the bell in the back of my mind. Did trouble me, did stir my soul, for to make me human, to make me whole."

This perfectly illustrates "what it feels like to have a calling" to me -- it feels like God "troubling me" to become a more whole and human person through recognizing the humanity in others, rather than allowing me to "close my eyes" or "hold myself away and apart" from my fellow human being and their joys and sufferings. This call has not always been about feeling any "deep gladness," but about a struggle -- a struggle "to make me human, to make me whole," a struggle against my own selfishness to live out the radical love of God for all people as exemplified by Jesus in the Gospel texts.

For me, knowing WHAT the call is is not difficult. In fact, the basis of our calling as Christians is actually quite similar no matter who we are. The source of our call is the life and example of Jesus as set forth in scripture. As I read and study about the way Jesus lived his life -- reaching out with compassion precisely to those people that the wider society said were sinful, unworthy or unclean -- I know how I should be living my life. That inner nagging is loud and clear, and often takes the form of various scripture passages ringing in the back of my mind -- "If you love me, feed my sheep." "Love your neighbor as yourself." "Whatever you did to one of the least of these, you did it to me." Soren Kierkegaard, a 19th century Danish philosopher and theologian, put it well when he wrote, "The matter is simple. The Bible is very easy to understand. But we Christians are a bunch of scheming swindlers. We pretend to be unable to understand it because we know very well that the minute we understand we are obliged to act accordingly."

The difficult part is NOT in knowing what God requires of us, what God expects of us. The difficult part is deciding whether or not I am going to say "yes" to God's call or ignore it and continue along my own path. And the question, then, becomes not "what is God calling me to do?" but "where and how is God calling me to live out that call?"

In my own life, this has meant a question about whether or not my response to God's call necessarily involves ordained ministry. Over the past nine months, I have made a point of talking one-on-one with as many ordained people as possible, to hear their own stories of how they figured out that they were called to this ministry. I sat down with them and asked them, essentially the same question my friend asked me a few weeks ago: "What does it feel like to have a calling?" And on some level they all gave me the same answer -- they spoke of this sense of necessity, of feeling that they HAD to do this. In fact, the advice they all gave me was fairly similar as well -- don't go into this line of work unless you really feel that you HAVE to do it. This advice was far from a denigration of the ministry, but an acknowledgment that the ministry is not something to be rushed into, not something to do for the power or the status or even the pretty vestments.

When I first set off on this journey, as I left Boston to spend a year thinking about the possibility of ordination, the minister at the outdoor church where I volunteered, who was a dear mentor to me, sat me down and told me that the process of discernment for the ministry was tricky. "We are ALL called to ministry," he told me, "the trick is to figure out whether you primarily see yourself as a minister or you primarily see yourself as something else."

At the time, I wasn't quite sure what he meant, but as I reflect back on it a year later, I now understand. And interestingly enough, it was my volunteer work at Siena Francis House that really brought this home to me. Because of my strong sense of calling to work with the homeless, I had thought that perhaps this was an indication that I was called to a career working in this arena, potentially in social service work. But this year, I found that volunteering in a largely secular shelter context did not feel as deeply fulfilling and meaningful to me as my work with the Outdoor Church had been. I realized that I feel called not just to help others, not just to reach out to those on the margins, but to do so in an explicitly ministerial context, to call people into the kind of relationship and community with one another that I feel is possible only through the bonds of faith, in God's name, appealing to a higher standard than human potential can ever reach on its own. I realized that I DO see myself as a minister. Not as a volunteer, not as a social services worker, but as a minister.

I am not yet sure whether I feel that I HAVE to be ordained, but I do know that this is the first vocation that I have explored where I feel truly at home. I have explored several other possible careers -- journalism, teaching, research or non-profit work -- and while I enjoyed doing all of those things and was generally happy with my work, it seemed there was something missing, that something wasn't quite right. And after spending nine months immersed in the life and work of a parish, it just seems to fit. It feels like I've finally found a round hole for my round peg after trying to make it fit into a bunch of square holes.

If I am called to ordination, I am not yet sure to which form of ministry I am called -- does my sense of urgency about reaching out to the world outside the walls of the church lead me to the diaconate, or does that urgency coupled with my deep reverence for the Eucharist and for the sacramental elements and rituals in the church, as well as a strong desire to sustain and deepen the bonds of the community inside the walls of the church lead me to the priesthood? I would appreciate your continued prayers for my ongoing process of discernment as I leave Omaha for Atlanta, Georgia in a few weeks, where I will continue doing work for the documentary film I've been working with and do some part-time work for my dad's website company. I hope to find a church community there that will eventually sponsor me for the formal discernment process for ordination in the diocese of Atlanta.

Although a number of things are not yet clear to me in my future path, I am confident that God will continue to guide and direct me as I journey. I am reminded of the famous prayer by Thomas Merton: "My Lord God, I have no idea where I am going. I do not see the road ahead of me. I cannot know for certain where it will end. Nor do I really know myself, and the fact that I think I am following your will does not mean that I am actually doing so. But I believe that the desire to please you does indeed please you. And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing. And I know that if I do this, you will lead me by the right path although I may know nothing about it."

Thank you, beyond words, for all you have done for me this year to support me in the discernment process and in realizing and affirming my fledgling sense of calling to the ministry. I pray that the Spirit would continue to be your guide as you journey with the future interns in this parish to help them answer their own calls, however "troubling" or full of "deep gladness" they may be.

In the name of the One whose Spirit is at work within us "to make us human, to make us whole," Amen.

Sermon - Good Friday 2007

Good Friday is the most somber and dark day of the church year. Tonight we gather to remember the cruel and gruesome death that Jesus suffered on the cross.

The cross has become such a ubiquitous and over-used symbol that we Christians often become desensitized to the brutality and terror it represented to people in the first-century Roman Empire. For many of us, a cross is something comforting, even beautiful, something we cast in gold or silver and wear around our necks as a fashion accessory. It denotes our Christian identity to others, and perhaps reminds us of Christ's love and sacrifice for us. In the cross, we see a message of love and forgiveness, informed by Christian theology about the meaning of the cross. But to others, it may carry a different message.

Many of you remember Valarie Kaur, the creator/writer/producer of Divided We Fall, the documentary I'm working with that many of you saw at the Omaha Film Festival back in February. Valarie spoke at our first Wednesday night Lenten series and at the 10:30 service the following Sunday. She shared with us a bit of her experience growing up as a Sikh girl in California in a town full of many Christians, Christians who tried very hard to convert her to Christianity. She spoke of family friends performing exorcisms on her, telling her that every time she was confused or distraught over her religious identity, it was the devil speaking to her. By the end of her childhood, the image of the cross struck fear in Valarie's heart. To her, the cross meant judgment, hate, condemnation.

In early versions of Divided We Fall, Valarie included some of this discussion about her views of the cross in the narration of the film. I remember vividly a conversation we had one day last fall, sitting outside a café in Cambridge, when I told her how incredibly sad and painful it was to me to think that the cross, a symbol that meant so much to me spiritually, had been for her an object of fear and judgment. I was in tears as I spoke to her of what the cross meant to me, a symbol of God's love for us, of God's willingness to die for us. She assured me that she had made her peace with Christianity by now, that through other Christian friends she had made in her college years, she no longer saw the cross only as a symbol to be feared. We left it at that.

Several months later, I was sitting in the pews at St. James Episcopal Church for the Good Friday services, and as the enormous stark wooden cross was brought forward, I suddenly had a moment of revelation. The cross was for Jesus the same thing that it had been to Valarie in her childhood -- an object of judgment, of hate, of condemnation -- an object that struck fear in his heart and the hearts of all who were dear to him. After all, the cross was an object of execution! The modern equivalent would be if we all went around wearing miniature electric chairs around our necks! I think we lose sight of that in all the sentimentalizing we do to the cross. Ironically, my Christian faith and experience had actually blinded me from fully understanding the gravity, the horror and fear, of what Jesus experienced that dark Friday in Jerusalem. On some level, those who have experienced the cross as condemning or hateful are actually closer to understanding Jesus's own experience of the cross than are we Christians who see the cross as comforting or beautiful. It was only through my relationship with a Sikh woman and through seeing my faith through HER experiences that I was able to reach a new level of depth in my own Christian spirituality.

On that Good Friday at St. James, as I knelt at the foot of the life-sized wooden cross, as I pressed my hand against the bare, rough wood, I thought about not only the rejection, hatred, and violence that Jesus experienced that day, but the rejection, hatred, and violence that Valarie and so many others have experienced and are still experiencing today. In a single moment, I felt the weight of both the historical event of Jesus's crucifixion and the ways in which we continue to crucify Christ today, whenever we preach a gospel of condemnation, of hate, and of judgment, rather than a gospel of reconciliation, forgiveness, and redemption. My dear Sikh friend, perhaps unknowingly, had given me one of the most profound Christian spiritual insights I had ever experienced.

It was something along these lines that I was hoping for when I planned the Wednesday night Lenten series this year. By asking people of other faiths to reflect on the traditional Christian stations of the cross, I was hoping that all of you, too, might gain new insight into your own faith through seeing it through the eyes of others. That through others' experiences, you might come to feel a deeper sense of connection with God and with others, that you might come to feel a profoundly sacred human solidarity with others in the experience of suffering.

The interfaith stations project was deeply moving for some of our contributors as well. Valarie herself reflected on the experience, "I discovered that the themes of suffering, sacrifice, and service defined not only the Christian story but the human story - and the way I understand my own life experience. Here I remember the central tenet of the Sikh faith - beneath all husks and labels, humanity is one. Even across the sheer range of human experience, we are bound together by a shared humanity."

What allowed us to connect with the contributors who wrote meditations for the stations out of their non-Christian faith experiences was our shared humanity. As we read their reflections on the universal human themes of the crucifixion -- deep-seated patterns of suffering, cruelty, injustice, and death -- we were able to connect to them on a human level, even when our theologies or beliefs may not agree.

But the connections, at least for me, were not merely human or secular, but profoundly spiritual. The mystery of the incarnation that we proclaim as Christians is that it is precisely in the human that we find the divine. Thus, connecting with someone on a human level IS connecting with them on a spiritual level! I have a quote by Hadewijch of Antwerp, a 13th century Dutch poet and Christian mystic, tacked on the wall in my bedroom that says, "We must love the humanity in order to reach the divinity." This, to me, is one of the central messages of Christianity. In Jesus, the human and the divine are no longer separate. Humanity is fused with the very nature of divinity.

Jesus was indeed human, a particular historical figure who lived at a particular time in history, and his death was an historical event that happened under the Roman Empire around the year 33 AD. But for Christians, Jesus is also the cosmic Christ, the eternally begotten son, one aspect of our Trinitarian God, a God whose very nature is to be found in and with the human. Christ did not just live and die in the first-century AD; he lives and dies continually in our world today. As Christians, we are called by our baptismal vows to "seek and serve Christ in all persons." Every time we fail to see Christ in another person, we crucify Jesus again. Every time our eyes are opened to the Christ in those around us, we feel the power of Jesus's resurrection again.

In our interfaith stations, we confronted hate crimes, poverty, religious persecution, loneliness, abuse of power, suffering and the forces of destruction. Valarie wrote in her depiction of the first station that those who killed Balbir Singh Sodhi, a Sikh man in Arizona murdered 4 days after 9/11, were afraid of him because they did not understand him, because "they could not see the divine in him." Every time we cannot see the divine in someone, every time we are complicit in the suffering of others, even by our inaction -- by those "things we have left undone" -- we crucify Jesus. Our hardness of heart continues to nail Jesus to the cross. "Crucify him!" we all yell together with the crowds of the Passion narrative on Palm Sunday and again during our liturgy tonight.

On Good Friday, we must own our complicity in the violence and suffering of the world. But we do so confident in the mercy and forgiveness of God, for despite the horrors of the cross, despite the human capacities for cruelty, inhumanity, and violence, the message of the cross is ultimately a message of forgiveness. Even as he hangs gasping for breath on a cross, Jesus prays for his executioners -- "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do." I can only imagine that Jesus continues to pray this same prayer on our behalf, as we muddle through the world often unaware of how our own actions implicate us in the literal and metaphorical executions of our time, both as a society and as individuals.

The cruelties of this world are difficult to face head-on; it is human nature to close our eyes to situations that seem beyond our control to change, to refuse to see what seems beyond hope. But through his suffering on the cross, Jesus brought the divine into the most gruesome and unbearable aspects of the human experience. Through his Passion, we know that even in the darkest of pain and suffering, even in rejection, betrayal, and violent death, there is the possibility of redemption. And through his resurrection, we know that for the Christian, nothing is beyond hope.

Gracious Lord, may we live our lives in the full knowledge of the forgiveness, hope and redemption of the cross, in the name of the One who forgives even his executioners and reaches through his wounds to transform suffering, Amen.

Sermon - Fifth Sunday in Lent, Year C (BCP)

Isaiah 43:16-21 link to NRSV text
Psalm 126 link to NRSV text
Luke 20:9-19 link to NRSV text



Wilderness.

It is a somewhat scary word. We think of "the wilderness" as the opposite of the comforts offered by "civilization." For centuries, human beings have lived in dense, concentrated towns or cities not only for convenience, but as a protection against the dangers of uninhibited nature. The wilderness is a place where things are wild and unpredictable, a place where we are not in control. In the wilderness, things are uncertain. We never know what unseen threats may await us, what animal may be lurking around the next tree. It is a place many of us want to avoid, not to seek out.

But during Lent, we are called to go INTO the wilderness. The 40 days of Lent symbolically recall both the 40 years that the Israelites wandered in the wilderness after the exodus from Egypt and the 40 days that Jesus spent in prayer and fasting in the desert before the start of his public ministry. In both of these stories, the wilderness is a place of danger, of fear, of uncertainty -- but also a place of encounter with God.

The idea of "the wilderness" usually conjures up an image of a place void of God's presence, a place where we are distant from God. To be in the wilderness, to be wandering in the desert, is to be lost, to be out of touch with God, to be in a "dry spell" spiritually, if you will. But the scriptures for this morning remind us that God is present, and even active, in the wilderness.

In Isaiah 43, God declares that God is "about to do a new thing" in the wilderness. "Do not remember the former things, or consider the things of old. I am about to do a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it?" (Isaiah 43:18-19). In this passage, God promises to deliver the Israelites from captivity under the Babylonians, just as God delivered them from the Egyptians centuries before. Using imagery that echoes the story of the exodus, already a central sacred story for the Israelites at this point in their history, the writer of Isaiah ties the Israelites' present liberation to the salvation history that traces back to the exodus from Egypt. Just as God delivered the Israelites from the hands of the Egyptians, so will God deliver them from the hands of the Babylonians. Isaiah promises us that God will "make a way in the wilderness;" that is, God will bring deliverance from oppression.

The psalm for today also gives us an image of God active in the wilderness, active in nature. God has "restored the fortunes of Zion," the psalmist writes, restoring the land to the people, bringing forth a harvest from a land formerly barren, and simultaneously turning the Israelite's tears into "songs of joy." The metaphors of sowing and reaping, so prevalent in the biblical texts, show the extent to which God's activity was perceived and felt in the land, in nature, even in the wilderness, in the land that is least life-giving. The psalmist promises us that God will "restore the fortunes of Zion;" that is, God will bring new life after a period of lifeless and despair.

The gospel reading for today also shows God doing a new thing in the land -- this time with regards to the vineyard in the parable. God, represented in the story by the vineyard owner, destroys the corrupt tenants who abuse, reject and kill God's messengers and gives the vineyard to "others," presumably those who will respect those who come on behalf of God. Jesus promises us that God will make "the stone that the builders rejected to be the cornerstone;" that is, God will vindicate those the world has mistreated and deemed worthless.

Whether literally or metaphorically, these readings show us that God is doing a new thing -- IN THE WILDERNESS. God is doing a new thing precisely in those places that seem the most threatening, the most hopeless, the most fearful. God is doing a new thing precisely in those places where we may doubt God is even present.

"Do not remember the former things or consider the things of old," God commands the people in the reading from Isaiah (Isaiah 43:18). Even if the "former things" that have happened to us give us reason to doubt God's goodness or God's love for us, as the Israelites surely must have during the periods of slavery and exile, the scriptures tell us that we have the promise of God's deliverance, that God is active even in those periods of despair, that we can look forward to the new things that God has in store for us in our lives.

"I am about to do a new thing," God says, "now it springs forth, do you not perceive it?" (Isaiah 43:19) Just as with the ancient Israelites, God is about to do a new thing in OUR midst, in our community and in our lives! Do we perceive it? If we dwell too much on the past, God tells us, we will miss the new thing that God is doing in the present. Unless we take the time to look for it, we may indeed NOT perceive it. We must go to the wilderness, to take the time to look and listen for that "new thing" that God is doing -- so we can give thanks and rejoice in God's goodness in our lives and in the life of our community.

Barbara Brown Taylor, an Episcopal priest in Georgia and the author of many books, including Leaving Church, writes that "faith in God has both a center and an edge, and that each is necessary for the soul's health." The "center" is the liturgical life of the church within the buildings and hierarchical structures, and the "edge" is that wilderness on the outskirts of the community. The center is where the stories of encounter with God get preserved and passed on to future generations, she writes, but the edge, or the wilderness, is the place where most of those encounters have happened.

The wilderness can be scary, "a place where things are wild and unpredictable, a place where we are not in control" -- but is this not the very definition of what it means to be in God's presence? When we step boldly into the wilderness, we open ourselves to encounter God. When was the last time you went there, literally or metaphorically, willingly or unwillingly, and opened yourself to the voice of God?

Two weeks ago, I went on a mostly silent Lenten retreat through the Resurrection House program. In the weeks before the retreat, my life was incredibly busy and my mind was constantly going a million miles an hour... and I had completely lost touch with God's presence. For a while, I had been feeling like I was wandering in a mental wilderness -- a somewhat scary and uncertain place of not knowing what the future holds for me after this internship, of feeling restless, without a sense of direction.

But during that retreat, during the silent time I spent walking in the wilderness -- well, if you can call the 22 acres of woods on the property of Knowles Mercy Retreat Center "wilderness!" -- I reconnected with God. I was reminded of God's love for me, I saw God's active presence in nature, and one day as I walked, I suddenly received a strong sense of direction and peace -- a sense that "it's time to go home," that the next step of my life will lead me back to that land to which I am deeply connected on a visceral level -- that is, the South. I didn't receive any kind of insights just yet as to what the extended future will hold, but I do believe I received guidance for the next step. This is the "new thing" that God is doing in my life.

I would encourage you all to also spend some time, some REAL time, in the wilderness with God in these last weeks before Easter. Find some patch of nature somewhere where you can walk or sit, empty your mind of distracting thoughts, and listen for what God is trying to communicate to YOU this Lent. What things is God making new in your own life?

May we be always open to the wild and unpredictable ways of our God, may we always be willing to relinquish our control and to listen and wait for the ways in which God is calling to us in the wilderness. Amen.

"It's Time to Go Home."

It is amazing to me how easy it is to lose sight of God's presence -- or, perhaps I should say, how easy it is to forget to stop and listen for God.

On the wall in my bedroom above my bed is tacked a small blue notecard with a quote scrawled on it that I read in some book somewhere (perhaps it was Madeline L'Engle, but I can't remember) that says, simply, "Listen to the silence. Stay open to the voice of the Spirit."

When I first arrived in Omaha for the Resurrection House internship program back in late August, the first thing they did was take us on a retreat out at a Benedictine retreat center in Schulyer, NE. One of the days on that three-day retreat was a silent day. When I first heard this, it horrified me (how could I possibly be SILENT for an ENTIRE DAY? I, who have a reputation for being able to talk to a brick wall if it would listen?), but by the end of the retreat, I was sold on silence. Being forced into silence, not allowed any of the usual distractions of chatting it up with anyone and everyone, and even forcing myself to silence my INTERNAL chatter, I found a deep sense of communion with God that is often missing from my daily life.

In fact, I was so sold on silence that I even suggested to my roommate, as we formulated our "Rule of Life" for the year that would guide our community living in the Resurrection House program, that we keep one hour of silence in our house every evening after our evening prayers. Soon after returning from the retreat, I posted that blue index card on my wall. "Listen to the silence. Stay open to the voice of the Spirit."

Well, the road to hell is paved with good intentions, as the saying goes. As the luxury of retreat faded and the daily grind of life began to close in, the silence also faded. My roommate and I did not keep that hour of silence beyond perhaps the first several days of our living together. I intended to keep silence at least on my own in my room, before bed each night, setting up a small altar space in my room where I would sit and meditate, complete with candles. I think I have only lit those candles about four times in the past six months. I have not been particularly good about listening to the silence, nor staying open to the voice of the Spirit.

The past several weeks have been particularly bad. With more than the usual amount of activities peppering my calendar, I had driven myself into an active frenzy, running around non-stop with no time to simply sit and be. And not only was my calendar full, but so was my mind -- full of questions and concerns about the uncertainties lying ahead in my future. As the end of this internship program approaches in late May, I began to fret and worry over what my next step should be.

Should I stay in Omaha? There are some amazing things going on here in interfaith work, with the Tri-Faith Initiative that the Episcopal Church has entered into with the Reform Jewish congregation here in town and a Muslim organization, the goal being to build a "tri-faith campus" in West Omaha with a church, a mosque and a synagogue. I am on one of the committees for this initiative and am excited about working with this unprecedented interfaith venture. Could this be perhaps where I am called to be?

Or should I go back to Boston? I visited there in early February and found that I felt that I was home, in a very deep sense. Staying in my old apartment, it felt so comfortable and comforting to be back in such familiar surroundings. And returning to St. James, my church in Cambridge, was like a rejuvenation for my soul, realizing all the more how much I miss that community and how much it means to me after having been away from it for six months. Would it be crazy to move someplace simply for a church? But where else will I ever be able to find a community like St. James?

Or should I go back to the South somewhere? I keep saying that eventually I want to go back to the South, but I wasn't even quite sure what my relationship with the South is anymore. At times when I go home I feel somewhat out of place -- everyone's accents seem a WHOLE lot thicker than I remember them, and I am constantly afraid of rejection and judgment from the dominant Evangelical culture, perhaps due to some baggage I still carry around from my late high school and early college years.

And what about this ordination thing? I am still in discernment about what exactly my call is, and if it is to ordained ministry or not, but if it is, where should I go through that process? Here in Nebraska, where I have a great connection with the diocese here? Back in Boston, where I have an established parish that could sponsor me for ordination? I have no connections with the Episcopal Church in the South, since I didn't attend an Episcopal Church until I moved to Boston, so if I went back there, I'd have to start all over again in terms of building relationships with a parish and a diocese for a few years before I could even START the formal discernment process. And are there any dioceses in the South that would welcome a progressive woman candidate for the priesthood who is an adamant supporter of gay rights and gay ordination? I keep hearing horror stories about how the Diocese of South Carolina is one of the dioceses threatening to split from the Episcopal Church... do I really want to get into that mess?

All these questions and thoughts were pounding in my mind as I left last Monday for the Resurrection House spring/Lenten retreat. This retreat was to be nearly entirely silent, at the nearby Knowles Mercy Spirituality Center. I was nearly desperate for silence at this point, to get away and to return to a focus on God. I wanted to use this time to try to discern where God is calling me for the next step of my life, to try to listen to the silence and be open to the voice of the Spirit. My mind was exhausted from over-analyzing my situation, which I had been doing in my own mind and with Father Bob and other friends for the past several months... but I had never really taken any serious time to stop and listen, to be still, to pray. I was crying out for direction, but not taking the time to stop and listen for it. I hoped I'd be able to do that at Knowles Mercy.

First item on the agenda for the retreat was a meeting with one of the Catholic nuns who runs the retreat center, for a spiritual direction session. Immediately it was clear that Sister Jean was a pro at this spiritual direction thing, having been at it for over 20 years - we had a 45 minute session scheduled, but she had me out of there in 30 minutes! And that's really saying something, given how much I can ramble on and on and on if given the license to do so! She was able to ask me pointed questions that got right to the heart of the matter.

She immediately noticed how "in my head" I was with all these questions and encouraged me to get "in my heart" about it. She cautioned me against expecting to get any clear-cut answers as to where exactly I should be going next year, instead encouraging me to just remember that God loves me and to spend the next few days "falling in love again with this God of ours."

She encouraged me to try a method of journaling in which I would imagine a sort of "conversation with God," writing down things I wanted to say to God and then imagining what God's response to me would be. This was somewhat of a breakthrough for me, because recently I had been struggling with my age-old demons of low self-confidence and self-esteem, and as she told me to imagine what kinds of things God would say to me, I realized that the negative self-critical inner voice that haunts me is NOT the voice of God, that God would never say the kinds of things to me that I say to myself.

I left there feeling like I had had something of a spiritual revelation, and it was as simple as this: God loves me!!!! My self-critical inner voice, which Anne Lamott, one of my favorite writers, calls "Bad Mind," is not the voice of God!!!! This sounds rather basic and simple, but in that moment I understood it with a clarity that was startling.

I had been reading online about low self-confidence and whatnot, and all these articles were saying things like, "every time you find yourself thinking negative thoughts, correct yourself with positive affirmations or focus on the good things you've done." Somehow this seemed very hollow advice to me. How the heck can I make myself think positively about myself when the very problem is that I think negatively about myself?! But when I thought of it as thinking about what GOD would say to me, it was entirely different. Of COURSE God wouldn't say things things to me; God would say how much she loves me and cares for me and accepts me for who I am. This felt like a huge breakthrough for me in beginning to think more healthily about myself and reminding myself of God's care for me.

As I came to realize all these things, I was yet again amazed at how easy it is to forget to listen for God, even to forget that God loves us -- and how this is just as true for people working daily in the church as it is for people in corporate America. Let no one think that clergy or those training to be clergy are in any way more spiritually advanced or superior to everyone else -- they are just as in danger of losing the message as anyone. And while I don't necessarily believe in Satan or a devil, I think the ease with which we lose sight of God and God's presence are indicators of the world's fallen nature. It does not come naturally to us, at least not to many of us, to abide in that place where we constantly remember God's presence, and sometimes even those tools which are meant to bring us into closer communion with God -- liturgy, prayer, and so forth -- can actually become distractions from the real Presence out there and accessible to all of us.

For the first full day of the retreat, I merely basked in the wonder of these revelations. I read over and over again Psalm 27, which sort of came to me (I think it had been in the lectionary readings sometime recently in the days leading up to the retreat) and grabbed my attention. I meditated on its celebratory message of God's support and protection of us -- "The LORD is my light and my salvation," it begins, "whom shall I fear?" (Psalm 27:1)

I began to rest more confidently in God's control of my life, to actually FEEL in my bones that God would provide for the next step of my journey, instead of just saying those words, knowing them intellectually but not really trusting in that promise. "Wait for the LORD," the psalm closes, "Be strong, and let your heart take courage, and wait for the LORD." (Psalm 27:14) I realized that God was abundantly present with me here and now, in Nebraksa, and that whatever my next step was, whether it be staying here or moving on, God would continue to be present with me.

I put aside my analytical mind, I left the questions about the future on the shelf, and I simply soaked up the divine Presence in the landscape around me, as I wandered through the woods and by the lake of the outdoor grounds of the retreat center.

The next morning, after Morning Prayer and breakfast, I headed outdoors to walk through the woods again, simply to be with God in nature and to be open to God's presence, just to listen to what the Spirit was saying -- about anything that happened to come up. I wasn't focusing on any specific questions, I was just open -- more open than I had been in a long time -- to whatever might come to me.

I wandered down through the woods, watching rabbits jump out of the way and seeing deer gallop off in the distance through the still-bare trees, breathing the clear air and basking in the warmth of the sun and the breeze through my hair and on my face. And as I rounded a corner and came upon the banks of the Platte River, suddenly an overwhelming sense of clarity came upon me. A voice inside my head said, loud and clearly, "Yep. It's time to go home." And by "home," I knew that meant the South.

I can't even quite describe what this feeling was like, but it was a moment of clarity in direction such as I had not experienced in quite a while. It wasn't even a feeling of desire, as in "I WANT to go home" -- in fact, in terms of my feelings, the week prior to the retreat I had been deeply missing Boston and really WANTING to go back to the Northeast. But suddenly I just knew that it was TIME. Entirely apart from my wants, feelings or desires, it was time. It was like when I was a little kid playing at a friend's house and my mother walked in and said, simply, "It's time to go home." There was no question about whether I wanted to or not, or whether I thought it would be best to stay at my friend's house or go home, or if perhaps I should stay at my friend's house for just one more hour, it was simply time to go home. Period.

As I stood on the banks of the Platte and looked out over the somewhat marshy river, I was reminded of the marshlands of the coasts of South Carolina, and of all the aspects of the land, the physical location, that are home to me in the deepest sense. And as I thought about going back there, back to that familiar landscape, I felt a deep sense of peace, a sense of coming home, a sense of putting an end to my restless journeying. I felt exhausted, like I had been chasing after something, restlessly looking for something, and suddenly I realized that I knew exactly where it was -- it was home, in the South. I felt a bit like St. Augustine when he writes of God, "Our souls are restless until they find their rest in You" -- only in regard to a place rather than in regards to God, necessarily. I have been saying for years that eventually I want move back to the South, but always holding it at arm's length, always feeling like I wasn't ready to go back, or that I wanted to experience other things and places first, but suddenly I realized it was time. I was ready.

It was fascinating, because suddenly I also knew that if I was to pursue ordination, it would be in the South. I had previously not really been considering this as an option, mostly because I had no connections with the Episcopal Church in the South, thinking it would make more practical sense to go through the process here or in Massachusetts, where I have networks and connections. But something always felt uneasy about that to me, and as I thought of going through the process in the South, it just felt right. The discernment process for ordination is a considerable commitment -- the process takes many years. I felt uneasy about making that kind of a commitment to either Nebraska or Massachusetts, but I knew in that instant that I would have no problem making that kind of commitment to any place in the South (and not necessarily just South Carolina, but anywhere in the region), and I would be ready to root myself in a community right away and begin this process, if ordination is indeed what I am called to.

The next day, as I sat with Mother Judi during a one-on-one session with her and talked to her about my thoughts and my future, she shrugged off the questions of location and instead asked me, "What do you think Tracy will be doing in five years?" I told her I wasn't sure, but that I didn't see myself back in any kind of office job, that I really enjoyed working in the church and that whatever I was doing, I would want it to be intensely involved with being there for people in their lives. I spoke of the power in the very human connections that can be made with one another at the moments in our lives where we are the happiest and also the most vulnerable, and my desire to be in those moments. Mother Judi just looked at me. "You realize that what you're describing is a priest, don't you?" she asked, with her quiet chuckle and knowing smile. "I mean, you ARE aware of this fact, right?"

I laughed, somewhat flattered and somewhat scared, and sort of shrugged, saying, "Well, I don't know about that...!!" And made some comment about having thought that I was led more toward the diaconate (becoming a deacon) rather than a priest.

"I don't hear the deacon thing," she said. "Maybe it's in there, but I'm not hearing that from you. But I am hearing the priest thing."

On some level, I felt she was right. But it's still not entirely clear to me... just earlier this year I was all but sure that the diaconate was my calling. But various comments from several other people and sources over the past several months have made me stop and think about reconsidering the priesthood. Mother Judi recommended that I go out and walk the labyrinth at the retreat center with the intention of focusing only on the very next step, of not looking ahead to see where the path was leading me, but just to follow along with only focusing on one step at a time, trying to be present in the moment.

After we finished talking, I went out and did just that, and as I walked, suddenly the words of Thomas Merton came to me, the very same words that were printed on a bulletin insert at the graduation worship service at Furman University four years ago and which made me break down into tears the moment I read them on that day I graduated from college.

"My Lord God, I have no idea where I am going. I do not see the road ahead of me. I cannot know for certain where it will end. Nor do I really know myself, and the fact that I think I am following your will does not mean that I am actually doing so. But I believe that the desire to please you does indeed please you. And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing. And I know that if I do this, you will lead me by the right path although I may know nothing about it."

This prayer is just as poignant for me today as it was on the day of my graduation from college. And even though I think I may have discerned the next step, even while I may think I have received direction, guidance, that the road is leading me to the South, in all honesty, "I cannot know for certain where it will end." All I can do is put one foot in front of the other and trust. Trust that God is leading me, God is with me, and God will guide me, even those days when I am completely unaware of God's presence.

Thanks be to God!

A brief reflection on liturgical worship

Note (1/22/10): I'm actually not sure when I wrote this particular paragraph, but found it saved in a draft post that I never published in 2006 during my year in Nebraska. I just picked an arbitrary date in February (since there were no posts for February) and posted it, retroactively.

I used to think that the mainline churches, with their traditions and liturgy, provided more trappings and distractions from the presence of God than the more stripped down, low-church churches, where there was nothing to fall back on if you weren't having a direct personal experience of God at any given moment. Now, however, I realize that the liturgy and the ritual and all the other elements of the service, while they can have the effect of distracting us from God's presence when they become too rote, too repetitious, can also serve to hold us, to carry us through those times in our lives when we do NOT feel the presence of God. Those times in our life when we seem to have more questions than answers. Those times in our lives when everything seems to be falling apart, disintegrating into chaos. At those times, the liturgy will hold us. We will still recite the same words of the Nicene Creed, still celebrate the Eucharist, still be assured of God's grace and forgiveness to us. When we can do nothing else, when we cannot bring ourselves to pray of our own volition, we can go to a church and recite the words and kneel and go through the motions, with the hope that in the doing, these things will become real to us.