Lest Blood Be Shed

Manna

2011-09-18T12:22:07Z

First Reading: Exodus 16:2-15
Psalm: Psalm 105:1-6, 37-45
Second Reading: Philippians 1:21-30
Gospel: Matthew 20:1-16

Twenty-Fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time

Who are we? What is it that defines us a nation? What is it that defines us as a community? What is it that defines us as a church? What is it that defines us as families and friends? We are told, especially here in this cosmopolitan city, that whom we are is defined by the things we have and the size of the audience we can attract. We are taught to flit around like moths going from one glittery signpost to another finding the next best thing in our search of the brightest star in the sky. We avoid misery and hardship as if they were blights on our character. We live in a society of self-comfort. Everywhere we turn we are offered any number of new gadgets to make our lives easier and more comfortable. When the speakers of our elaborate entertainment systems aren't filled with the entertainment of our generations, endless voices try and convince us of a "once in a life time sale," "a new and improved" this or that, "which we can't live without." Walk down the bath aisle of any store and you will find row upon row of chemicals to increase our comfort as we soak in one of the tinier rooms of our living spaces. Somewhere it has entered the American psyche that self-gratification is the highest goal to be obtained and it is honorable to obtain it at whatever cost. Suffering is seen as a burden only carried by those that don't try hard enough or are lazy. You see tons of new-age self-help books nowadays, and even sometimes preachers, preaching a gospel of prosperity saying, "if you aren't prosperous, healthy and comfortable you are doing something wrong."

Fortunately for all of us life is a lot messier and complex than simplistic proclamations of American prosperity. "Why God won't you rid me of this disease?" "Why God won't you produce food for my family to eat?" "Why God won't you cure me from this addiction?" "Why God did you let that woman beat me and break my back and put me in the hospital?" These questions and many, many more much like them were asked of me every week while I was serving as chaplain at Bellevue Hospital in New York. Things only got worse as I finished my chaplain's education. The economy visibly tanked, millions have lost their jobs and livelihood, families are choosing between feeding themselves and healing themselves because they can't afford to do both. The list could go on and does as each one of us has our own personal storms that we are dealing with every day whether it is physical, mental or spiritual. What defines us as a community?

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Transformed in Blessing

2011-07-31T12:41:03Z

As I was preparing for this weeks worship, I couldnÂt help but have a nagging voice in my head bring up last weekÂs sermon. Last week I talked about the struggle we all face in determining GodÂs will for us and how no matter what we have done in life, God is able to embrace us where we stand and comfort us. In fact, GodÂs love for us is so deep that God is able to use even what tradition may call the most wretched part our past and transform its purpose into a great blessing. A solid Christian doctrine, but the nagging voice kept telling me that I had described the process as being too passive and submissive. As if all we must do is realize we donÂt know GodÂs will and passively accept the Holy SpiritÂs correction.

This submissive acceptance of passivity in our relationship with God comes from many ancient and modern theologians trying to sanitize the God we encounter in the Hebrew Bible. God gets GodÂs hands dirty in the Hebrew Bible but we have accepted a cleaned-up version of God as described in the Christian Scriptures as being a transcendent parental figure whose only interaction with us is through an emissary. As much as we would like to pride our generation with coming up with a great Christian heresy, this sanitizing is not something new. As early as the first century of our common era, sects within Christianity were trying to distance themselves from the God described in the Hebrew Bible. In some cases, they went so far as to say that the God we encounter in the Hebrew Bible is actually not the same God as described in the Christian Scriptures. You may have heard other preachers talk about or more likely experienced yourself in your own study the tension between old and new. In response to this tension some preachers may just leave out the Hebrew Scriptures reading from the lectionary selection on Sunday because the God described is too harsh or the material talked about is too raw. We ourselves may simply not read that part of the Bible. ItÂs understandable that we would want to distance ourselves from a God that seems to be complicit if not intimately involved in genocide, infanticide, misogyny, slavery or a host of other things that offend us but what we are left with then is only one side of the story. This one-sided approach leads us down a path of passivity in our relationship with God and in how we react to injustice in the world.

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Our Job as Mustard Seeds

2011-07-24T12:43:00Z

Today is the first day in the history of New York State that same-sex marriage has been recognized by the civil authorities. This transition for some is a mark of great justice after many years of struggle and suffering while for others it is the sign of a corrupt and indulgently secular world despoiling yet another holy and sacred tradition. Whichever camp you fall into or on what part of the spectrum between the two extremes, this tension between progressive and traditionalist ideologies has been the overarching narrative through much of the history of the western world. The issues themselves change but the sentiment behind them is the same.
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