Christine Sunderland

Rogation Sunday doesn’t always land on Mother’s Day, but it seems fitting when it happens. Rogation comes from the Latin rogare, to ask, and in this case ask (pray) for God’s blessing upon the crops, newly seeded.

And just so, mothers carry the seed of fathers to term within their bodies, to bear fruit, be fruitful, and give birth to the next generation that will ensure the life of the community, state, nation, world.

It is good to remember, honor, and give thanks for mothers, particularly in a world at war upon the family. For, in many ways, the mother holds the family together, providing a home in which love can feed growth, a kind of seedbed. Fathers protect that home from outside threats, as they provide sustenance and shelter. Yet today many forces rip the family apart. We must heal the wounds, wiping tears with our love.

Mothers of course can also be fruitful in other ways, creative in endeavors outside the home, for the span of child rearing comes to an end and other doors open, beckoning. Fathers can mother, as well as father. There are times when we share roles for good purpose, but the heart of the mother is to mother, and the heart of the father is to father. Both mothers and fathers can comfort their children in overlapping roles, drying their tears together.

But what about God’s tears for the unborn? What about the seeds that never mature, never become what they were intended to become? What about those children who never take their first breath of life in our astounding world of light and love? What about those mothers who live with their “choice” to kill their own children, the Lady Macbeths who cannot be cleansed, until finally facing the Lord of Life in his Church, confessing, repenting, and being absolved.

I was thinking today in our chapel about our General Confession in which we offer our penitence to Christ and are forgiven. It is a regular prayer said before the beginning of the Canon of the Mass and is intended to replace or perhaps supplement private Confession to a priest. We offer all our selfishness, our un-love, our “manifold sins and wickedness,” sins committed by thought, word, and deed, “Against thy Divine Majesty.” We are heartily sorry, the memory is grievous, the burden intolerable. We ask for mercy and forgiveness, and with this prayer, followed by absolution, we are cleansed, these dark gritty places in our heart made clean like a slate. We slough off the soil dirtying our soul and start anew, ready now to receive the Real Presence of Christ in the Holy Eucharist. We have cleaned our house to give him a home in which to dwell.

Ritual – saying the same words with each liturgy, weekly or more often – can dull our hearts and minds, yet it can also free us to fully experience God’s presence, in this case his absolution. Memorized words and phrases are engrafted upon our souls, changing us and opening us up to the glories of the Eucharist. There is an action that occurs as we say these words with intent, as we reach for God and God reaches for us. Christ allows the engrafting, for he is the Way, the Truth, and the Life. The Holy Spirit prompts us to repent and to reach out, and Christ carries us to the Father in his arms to be wrapped in love. For, after all, it is his blood shed for us that allows the shedding of our sins, freeing us from death itself.

I speak of repentance today, even in this season of Eastertide, for many of us must confess and repent our part in the death of our culture, the death of love, the death of the unborn. For if we do not honor mothers, make them worthy of respect and dignity and much more, we become a part of this culture of death, and we bear responsibility. And to honor mothers is to support family life and all that that means. One day we shall face judgment, shall see the children that were not born, shall see what part we may have played in their deaths.

And so we honor those who mother those who do not belong to them. We honor women who could not bear children for whatever reason, and who support other mothers and other families. I see this in parish life, an extension of family life. I have been mothered by these ladies, and my little boy was mothered by the whole parish. Christ’s Body, the Church, honors mothers, for mothers give life to the unborn and ongoing love to the living.

May is Mary’s month too, the mother of all of us, the reborn Eve. She said yes to God’s will in her life, and in that fiat she became holy, whole, full of grace and blessed among women. She gives us her son, and in the giving gives us life forever, should we too say yes.

And when we say yes, we become “doers of the word, and not hearers only” as St. James writes in today’s epistle (James 1:22+). As doers we honor mothers, all those who mother, and especially those who create families and homelife in which children are welcome, families open to life itself.

We ask Our Lord’s blessing upon our crops that feed the world. We ask his blessing upon our families and children and mothers, that a new generation may be seeded and born and welcomed by us all, mothered with the love and life of God within each one of us.

Like many around the world, I watched the coronation of King Charles III of England, Scotland, and Wales, in a full replay yesterday. To be honest, I had mixed feelings.

The spectacle was splendid, to be sure, and as an Anglican I enjoyed seeing the rites so beautifully done, with horns and violins and children’s choirs, talented soloists, all in the gilded holy setting in Westminster Abbey, something one does not forget. Many of the hymns were traditional, hymns we sing today in our little chapel in Berkeley. The words of the Eucharist sounded the same as our own rite, meaning they used the traditional Book of Common Prayer. There were modern touches, to be sure, in an effort to bring in everyone, other faiths and other musical traditions. It all was a grand drama, in a glittering golden abbey going back to Edward the Confessor (1002-1066), both saint and king, whose chair Charles occupied as he was anointed and handed the jeweled scepter, sword, and orb. In our travels to London, we saw the King’s chair many times in the Abbey, for it was usually on display behind the altar, and could be seen from the ambulatory. At times it was hidden from the public.

Through the years we have watched security tighten at the Abbey, fees charged, tours overseen carefully. We tried to be in London on a Sunday afternoon to sit in the choir for 3:30 Evensong.

The Abbey design reflects the monastery plan, a long choir and sanctuary, separated from the public by a screen, not affording the best views for visitors. But as Internet viewers, we were treated to views from cameras placed in key locations, so that we had many close-ups of the King and his Queen Consort, a great burden for the principals who must endure close examination worldwide. They do indeed live in a fish bowl.

Which brings me to King Charles who, in this ceremony, vows to keep the Commandments, among other vows. I wondered if he had ever confessed his adulterous affair with Camilla. I wondered if he had ever received absolution from the very Church that was anointing him. Somehow I doubted it, seeing Camilla crowned as well, and accepting her own throne to his side.

It should have been Diana, as we all know all too well.

But we are moving on, we are told, forgiving and forgetting, and to be sure, the royal pair reflect current mores, in spite of the expectation of truth when making a vow with one’s hand placed upon the Bible. Perhaps it is the medieval service itself that seems anachronistic, unsuited to today’s amorality. And once I separated the two unlikely royals from the coronation rituals, I could enjoy the pomp and circumstance. After all, who am I to judge? After all, we are all sinners, are we not?

It must be said, as the cameras lingered on the face of the new King, that there was much doubt and a little fear, perhaps confusion, in his expression. For a modern fellow whose religion is climate change, it must have been a challenge for him to go through the nearly three hours of meaningless words and actions, at least from his perspective.

It is said, and certainly somewhat true, that the monarchy, with all its rituals and wealth, serves Britain as a cohesive symbol of a better land, a Camelot, a hopeful prototype of the perfect kingdom on earth. I understand the use and the power of symbols and symbolic rites, and would agree that they are important. Perhaps the King and Queen will act out their part, no small task, and invest majesty with magisterium. Perhaps we can forget Diana, so wronged by these two royals, and embrace the glittery golden dream.

It is also true that the King has little power, and is largely a figurehead. Somewhat comforting.

And yet, I would have liked to see Queen Elizabeth deny her son – this son – the crown. I would have liked to see William and Kate crowned yesterday. But as an American, what right do I have to comment? I suppose as an inheritor of Western Civilization, the glorious Judeo-Christian history of tradition and freedom, human dignity and brotherly love, that revolutionary way that burst upon the world to remake it, rebirth it, as it did for over two thousand years, I have a heartfelt interest in such civilization’s survival. I have an interest in Christ our King returning to reign in his Kingdom on earth, a Kingdom of justice and mercy, law and order, fidelity and faith.

It was a beautiful drama yesterday, perhaps a dream, for it was too beautiful to be real and too glorious for the vainglorious. Still, as I watched the many guests process up that aisle and take their seats, and as I saw the royals emerge from their golden fairy tale carriage, I was hopeful for our world. We glimpsed Camelot yesterday. We glimpsed a dream. And some dreams are worth pursuing and not forgotten in the early dawn.

I pray this might be so, especially in this Eastertide, in the glorious celebration of resurrection and eternal life.

We gathered together this last week in the Bay Area for the Thirty-second Synod of the Diocese of the Western States, along with the Diocese of the Southwestern States, Anglican Province of Christ the King. There were numerous events from Tuesday through Friday, forming a rosary of prayer linking the faithful.

The week made me appreciate not only the fellowship of Christians in our own little part of Christendom but throughout the world. Those who believe in the creeds crafted by the apostles are linked by love, the love of God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. Those who live those creeds, and partake of the sacraments ordained by Christ, commune with the saints of the past, the present, and the future. They commune with eternal love.

And yet we are bound by time, as our preacher explained this morning. When the risen Christ says to the disciples that “A little while, and ye shall not see me: and again, a little while, and ye shall see me, because I go to the Father” (John 16:16+) they are confused by the time sequence. Yet Christ speaks of eternal time: his ascension to Heaven and then his return, his Second Coming to earth, an event to look forward to. Still, Our Lord doesn’t speak of hours, day, and weeks, months or years. He speaks of a different kind of time.

And in the mean-time we are bound to one another by love, the love of the Holy Trinity.

I have found, since the rise of the Internet and the worldwide web that literally weaves us together in some kind of electronic cloud, that this binding together leaps national borders and languages and cultures, joining Christians of all races, everywhere. We see them on social media, on blog platforms, in e-books, in e-magazines and podcasts. It is a worldwide Christian web, spun like a golden thread, pulling us together in some kind of miracle.

So that at this moment in history when many of us feel isolated and divided from not only our historical past but our present families and friends, we have been given this family of God that gathers together. Thus, we Christians have become the care-givers for our world, offering healing to those who seek division and death. We offer the salve of salvation to rub upon their souls, the love of the living God, the food of the living Christ in the bread and the wine.

And so in my own life I have encountered sisters and brothers of faith throughout the world through this e-cloud of witnesses. They are my family, those who share my deepest desires for life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. We pray for the unborn, that they may be born and given a chance of life and liberty and happiness, to be loved as we love. We pray for the mothers of the unborn, that each one is filled with the grace of knowing she carries her own child within her womb. We celebrate life together, and in so doing, sing our song of love.

The golden thread spun among us weaves the past into the present. As I spoke this last week of the history of our Berkeley Seminary and Chapel, I could see a golden thread linking us to those who came before us, those who listened to God’s voice in their lives and learned to love as God loves. For in prayer, that opening the door of our heart and mind to God, we allow God to enter in, to live within us, to enliven us with his life. Only then can we hear his voice. Only then can we spin our own golden thread to join the others from anywhere and everywhere throughout the world.

I have found that listening involves patience. Listening requires silence and, in the quiet, we wait, watch, and wonder what will happen next. What door will open in my life that God desires me to enter? I wonder at this marvel, in our own time, and hopefully, in time and at the right time. I don’t want to miss the door opening. I don’t want to miss a single moment of this marvel-ous world Christ has given us to inhabit, the world of life and love.

And so I pray an Our Father upon waking and an Our Father before sleeping at night. I have added other prayers to my memory treasures, from Morning Prayer and Evening Prayer, for I can witness to doors opening in my life, unexpectedly, seemingly random, yet in truth, divinely purposeful.

Many doors opened in the last year, for example, doors to knowing Christians in other states, in other countries (Francis Etheredge in England, Monique Robles in Colorado, Michelle Easton and Cindy Rushing in Washington D.C.) How did this happen? How is it I saw a link here, a post there, a friend of a friend who seemed to be singing to me? Grace. Grace notes played a melody of Grace. I heard the song, because of daily prayer and weekly Eucharist (the greatest of all prayers).

And so we watch and wait, listen and love. We enter through gates to others who do the same, and, one day, joining hands, we will enter Jerusalem to sing of our golden thread weaving our liturgy of love.We will sing to our Christ Jesus on his throne in glory.

All of this I saw this last week in our gathering of faithful, sacramental, Anglo-Catholic Christians. Deo Gratias.

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Let’s help Francis Etheredge and his remarkable family attend the World Youth Day in Lisbon. Visit Francis Etheredge and World Youth Day.

To see the dramatic work pediatrician and bioethicist Dr. Robles is doing to help children and parents, visit her site, Human Dignity Speaks.

To visit Cindy and Michelle’s outstanding program for college women see Clare Boothe Luce Center for Conservative Women.

To read the history of St. Joseph of Arimathea Anglican Theological College and Chapel: History of SJATC and Chapel in Berkeley.

We are preparing for our annual synod of the Anglican Province of Christ the King, Western and Southwestern States, here in the San Francisco Bay Area. In rummaging through files and Berkeley archives, I came across something I had written in 2000, twenty-three years ago. It heartened me to read it now, in my frail and graying years, as I prepared for our gatherings this week, so I’m sharing it with you, my dear readers.

Millennium Pilgrimage to the Shrine of Bishop Grafton, September 29, 2000 

We gathered beneath the turning leaves, shade trees still green but hinting of gold, an aura of promise. Otto carried the flag, a large triumphant one, suitable to his size, and already the breeze played with it. The bishops, their crimson capes flashing against their white cottas, mingled and waited regally. The local high school band, neatly proud in their uniforms, gathered and took their place in the line-up, the tuba, as always commanding the center of attention. We lay folks fell in behind the band, the white robed clergy behind us, followed finally by our leaders coming last, our apostolic episcopate.

A light breeze blew through the overcast skies, the sun peaking through occasionally like sudden bursts of heavenly pleasure. It was temperate still, this thirtieth day of September, as summer lingered, playing the air like a children’s choir.  We, the Anglican Province of Christ the King, the orphaned child of the apostate Episcopal Church of the United States, gathered to proclaim our beliefs: our belief in Holy Scripture, in the Creeds of the historic Church, and in the 1928 Book of Common Prayer which embodied these pillars of our faith. 

We didn’t look too regal: a hodgepodge of individuals unlikely to be friends in another time and place. We wore sweatshirts and jeans, tailored Sunday suits, parkas in case of rain, comfortable walking shoes, dangling cameras on shoulders as we maneuvered red booklets of hymns. We chatted as though we were at a church supper, amazed to be here in Fond-du-Lac, Wisconsin, home of an Anglo-Catholic history that went back one hundred years, and home to Bishop Charles Grafton, whom many considered a saint. Indeed, his sarcophagus awaited us in the stone cathedral down the street, a white marble effigy in its own side chapel. But where was he? Perhaps watching, smiling, praying and laughing too, I think. Chuckling with joy that his little seeds were still blossoming, like some winter gardener.

The clergy met yesterday in their Clericus, their national gathering of support, fellowship, and discipline. Here they listened to their Archbishop proclaim where they were, where they had come from, and where they were going. For they are a frontier band, quietly standing up for the old ways, a strange and ironic melding of revolution and conservation.  Each one of them, at some point in their pilgrimage to this moment, had met Christ, had known Jesus, his love and his power, and could not turn back. No, they could not deny this knowledge, a familiarity, perhaps even a love affair, with the Man from Galilee, the poor Jewish carpenter who took the world by storm by his simplicity, his love, and yes, his Deity.  And more than this they could not deny his presence today, his reality, his explosion in the chalice and the host when they celebrated the Divine Liturgy, the Canon of the Mass. Could any of them be a Peter who denied his Lord?  If so, they must be a Peter who also returned to Rome on that Via Appia two thousand years ago, returned to be crucified upside down. No, they could not deny him.

And so, to continue in their adoration and in their discipleship and apostolate, they formed this renegade band that, over the years, had grown slowly, conquering schisms and power struggles, poverty and alienation. Many traveled all day each Sunday to serve several parishes in rural areas of America, as the number of the faithful multiplied far faster than the number of clergy who would or could give up pension and pride. They built a seminary in California, and trained as many as could be trained, but still the supply of priests never met the demand. A tired band of white-collared creatures clothed in the black of discipline, still they toiled through long weeks, and longer Sundays, offering the cup of Christ to the kneeling faithful, healing souls hungry for him all across this country.

Some said they were the new missionaries, perhaps even the Protestant Jesuits of the modern age, these Anglicans who offered the transcendent, the mysterious, the wondrous to the material American culture, the world of MTV, Hollywood violence and sex, drugs and self-centered creeds. And the people drank their offerings gratefully, those graced with belief, those not yet absorbed by old rebirthed heresy – witchcraft, new age mysticism, Eastern and Western paganism.

So we gathered, about one hundred of us, behind the tuba and the American flag, and set off to a rousing Onward Christian Soldiers, like some Salvation Army Band, this conservative, proper, East Coast, formal-liturgy congregation. God must have smiled.

We walked slowly, singing as best we could, some with amber tenor and contralto voices; others, like myself, squeaking along in earnest. The breeze picked up, and the flag unfurled. A video man stood on the corner, catching our moment in history, our very American statement this Saturday morning, on the main street of Fond-du-Lac, Wisconsin. It was only four blocks, but they were momentous blocks to me. I realized my short temporal life meant something when joined with the eternal, and how little it meant otherwise. Somehow, all of us, united through God, and soon once again through his Eucharist, became holy, a part of the universe, an integral piece of time and history. And the cementing factor was love, his love, a love that blew through us as it blew through the trees about us. A summer love, hinting at fall. As the old song went, the times they are a changin’…Would I have felt the same parading for the March of Dimes? Certainly, I would have felt virtuous, but holy? No, I do not think so. This day I felt holy, whole.

Not many stood on the sidewalk to watch our passing. But still, here in this town, we made a public statement of who and what we are. We abandoned our Sunday hide-outs in our ornate and society-sanctioned chapels. We abandoned them for the public square, offering our faith and commitment to our God and our Country for all to see. In this pilgrimage, one of hope and one of penitence, not only personal but civic and social, we became missionaries, apostles as well as disciples, those sent out as well as those who follow.  

We crossed an intersection against a red light as the police protected us from oncoming traffic, and I thought of our penitence. Yes, we had much to be sorry for. An impatient word this morning at breakfast. A twinge of envy and a burst of greed. A surge of gluttony and perhaps a lingering lust. Our bodies continually rearing their importunate demands over our souls. And then there was yesterday’s headlines.

The abortion pill had been approved by the FDA. The words had settled into my soul like dirty silt, a kind of tangible smog, the soot of a volcanic eruption or a vast hillside fire blackening the landscape like ashy rain. All those lives, designed by God, destroyed in an instant, in two days of cramping and bleeding. For some of us, memories of miscarriage surged forward: the hours of loss, the slow dying, as the soul hemorrhages too, the waiting in the hospital bed to learn what we already knew, our children were dead. Rachel weeping for her children… And now, millions would cause this and why? For their own pleasure, their own convenience. Their souls would carry these tiny crosses the rest of their lives, miniature graves covering the green hills of America the Beautiful. So that for every child dead, a mother would mourn forever. Far too many Rachels.

And then there was the Gospel that morning. How could the FDA choose to release such news on a day with such a Gospel? “But whoso shall offend one of these little ones…it were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and that he were drowned in the depth of the sea.” The Feast of Saint Michael and All Angels it was, that September 29, and the Epistle reminded us of the dark force that was kicked out of Heaven to Earth.  Perhaps today Satan smiled.

The music stopped and we moved on in silence, as the band prepared the next launch of song. We walked slowly now, serious in our quiet, hearing the tap of our feet, the newness of our action worn off, the moment suddenly becoming heavy with reality, yet a heaviness born along in a great tide. The cathedral appeared at the end of the block.

It was a simple stone church, built along the river, framed by shade trees. I thought of villages in England and, had there not been a factory silo over to the right and a Walgreen’s Drugs kitty-corner, I could have fancied I was in the Cotswolds. We crossed the bridge over the stream, and approached the cathedral

The stairs led up to curved red-painted doors, and we followed the flag inside. There, dark wooden angels burst from the side rafters, peering as we found our seats. I knelt and gave thanks as the white-robed priests took the first pews, the crimson bishops moved into the chancel, and the acolytes took their places, candles burning. Today, we, the people, formed the choir.

As the first anthem soared into the vaulted ceilings of carved mahogany, sturdy stone, and stained glass, the notes pairing with the light in a kind of dance, I thought of the Church School Conference. The day after the Clericus, that solemn gathering of our missionary priests, all of us, lay and clergy, met in the hotel banquet hall to talk about our children, how to educate them in the way of Christ, how to teach them sanctity. Perhaps even the sanctity of Bishop Grafton.

 We wanted to breathe the breath of life into our young, to give them the spiritual slap on the back of their rebirth, clearing the path for the wind of the Holy Spirit to blow into their hearts. We listened, and spoke, and shared: we sought the secret of passing on the fire, keeping the torch alight, our hearts and minds empty and longing to be filled with wisdom, the wisdom of the teacher of God. We took notes on paper, and questioned and debated, bound together by the love of Christ and the mystery of teaching children. Somehow, each of us knew that in our children lay the life of our world, the life of Our Lord on this earth. It was up to us to link the generations, to bond history with the Communion of the Saints, a communion blown into the hearts of our babies. As each one spoke, I knew it could not be done alone, that each of us would be an integral part in God’s plan, that through each of us he would speak to the rest, that somehow we formed together a giant jewel, each facet reflecting a different color of God’s purpose among us. And so the jewel moved in his light, flashing and crashing about us, inspiring us with his breath, his wisdom, indeed his hagia sophia.

Two priests passed out candles with circular paper holders to catch wax, but we set them aside for now, resting their bases in the book holders in the pew-backs, next to the heavy red hymnals and modern missals. The ancient Mass began, our group living out a rite once home here in this cathedral, but no more, a kind of prodigal returning with no welcoming father. The rite of this modern Episcopal Church no longer celebrated mystery of form and language and deity, but sought the earthly and trendy, having thrown out the anchors of history and creeds. A different wind blew here, a wind of nothing, of no-thing, of whatever, whichever. So we pilgrims returned Bishop’s Grafton’s legacy, after all these years, his legacy of Anglo-Catholicism, the desire to worship God as he has been worshiped for nearly two thousand years of Christianity in the West. We sang the ancient prayers and creeds; we confessed our sins, for we found so many to confess. We accepted our bishop’s absolution, the Church’s absolution, God’s absolution. In this re-found freedom (and indeed, momentary perfection), we joined Christ in the Bread and the Wine, uniting with the Eternal, fed by Heaven, nurtured by God the Son in the mystery of the Mass. We returned to our pews whole, holy, sanctified in our present moment of time, pilgrims at the celestial banquet of the Church on earth.

Last night at our Pilgrimage Banquet we reached our hands in greeting, clasping our other selves, the many people of God, and felt his breath on our cheeks as we kissed. We dined on salmon and beef, in a great and loud celebration after two days of meetings. Warmed by wine and coffee and cherry pie, we looked to the podium to our speaker, a man we hoped would fan the fire and light up the dark corners of our confusion. And yes, with love and with humor, he led us to a greater sense of mission in our world, a sense of being the very flame we so long hungered for. He spoke of History and the strange coincidences, the odd victories, the appearance of forces no-one could rationally explain, the accumulation of facts and the lack of theories. He spoke of God in History, and God in us. And he spoke of our place and time, that the ignorance and lack of faith of today’s people created a great frontier for us. He challenged us and filled us with awe, and perhaps, a little dread at such responsibility. Would we return to Rome to be crucified? Or would we persist in denying Our Lord in our apathy? How many times would the cock crow before we wept? We gathered here to walk together, to talk together. We traveled miles to seek the light, or perhaps to atone, this millennium year, but did we really want to see more clearly or to hear our penance?

Now, in this historic cathedral, one of the priests walked down the aisle lighting our candles, and we continued the flame along our row, bending the candle deftly to catch our neighbor’s wick. We stood, holding our white rods of fire, waiting. Then, slowly, we followed the procession around the church, under the jutting angels, slowly placing one foot in front of the other, chanting the Litany of the Saints: O God the Father of heaven: Have mercy upon us. O God the son, Redeemer of the world: Have mercy upon us. O God the Holy Ghost: Have mercy upon us. O Holy Trinity, one God: Have mercy upon us. Holy Mary: Pray for us…Saint Michael: Pray for us.  Saint Gabriel: Pray for us…The voices boomed through the cathedral space, this sanctuary of God. I thought of the abortion pill. I thought of the large coven of witches here in Wisconsin. I thought of Saint Michael throwing Lucifer out of Heaven. We held our candles firmly in this dark space, a band of ragtag lovers, lighting the darkness with God. We moved down the side aisles to the Shrine of Bishop Grafton.  There we placed our candles in troughs of sand. There, below his carved stone effigy, lying spread out over his tomb, the flames burned brightly, and we prayed to this bishop of faith and order, the saint who knew the life-giving importance of the Blessed Sacrament.

We prayed for intercession. We prayed that this saintly bishop would add his prayers to the many prayers of the saints, that he would pray for God’s people on earth to not forget. To not forget Our Lord, to not forget his love and his healing power in the Mass. 

Outside, the wind rushed through the trees, and as we left the cathedral, full of God’s grace and power, the leaves burned a bit brighter, catching some of the promised fire of fall.

I have long admired the work of the Clare Boothe Luce Center for Conservative Women, founded and led by Michelle Easton in the WDC area. They mentor, network, and unite women nationwide with a refreshing and traditional message, one that needs to be heard and supported:

“Founded in 1993, the Clare Boothe Luce Center for Conservative Women is one of the most unique organizations in America.  Our mission is to prepare women for effective leadership and to promote leading conservative women.  We strive to advance America’s women by promoting and preserving conservative principles.”

Given my admiration for such a brave mission, perhaps today’s “mission impossible,” I was delighted and honored to meet face to face the redoubtable Michelle Easton and her lovely assistant, Cindy Rushing, this last week for lunch in Berkeley. Not only did I hear first hand about some of their work, and not only did they kindly listen to me babble about my (conservative) novels, but I found a welcome sense of peace in their sisterhood, keeping company with likeminded ladies, (under cover of course) here in the Peoples’ Republic of California. We used to say the Peoples’ Republic of Berkeley, but it’s time to admit the virus of tyranny has spread statewide and jumped coasts to New York (with stops in Illinois, Michigan, and Pennsylvania). It is our challenge today to inhibit the spread of this contagion nationwide. This is a true pandemic, a Pandora’s box of threats to democracy.

The CBL Center’s Mission Statement explains their many programs and materials, so educational and encouraging, giving hope to the rest of us who share these values and fear our nation is under attack from within. The threats to free speech, to freedom of worship, to parental rights – to name a few – command headlines today. Free and fair elections have been hijacked. The chilling effect of these developments on family, faith, and freedom, the fear and self-censoring, especially here in California, portend ill for the future of democracy in America and thus in the world. Speak to immigrants who have fled here for refuge. They see the trends, when other Americans seem blind. Immigrants are speaking out and telling their stories of escape to (not from) the United States. We must heed their warnings.

The CBL Center answers these threats, especially in academia, by marshalling a secret weapon the U.S. has ignored to its peril: conservative women, strong women, women who love their families, love their freedom, love their faith; women who love and protect their children, who speak out like lionesses roar. After wearing masks for the last two years, I have often wondered at those women required to wear masks in public, those women scarved and robed and hooded and told they cannot be educated, they cannot have an influence in our world.

Enter the CBL Center for Conservative Women.

The Institute hosts well known women leaders to speak at gatherings of female interns from universities across the nation to produce young women inspired, trained, poised, confident, and given the tools to make a difference on their campuses, or simply to navigate the rough waters of silencing in this brave new world. They offer a sisterhood as well, something I experienced at lunch the other day.

The Gospel lesson this morning, this Sunday after Easter, reminded us all of the message of the Gospels, the message of the risen Christ to his disciples hiding in fear. He gives them peace, the peace that passeth all understanding, the peace that reconciles God and Man, the peace that unites the human family, rather than divide them by skin color. He gives to them, and he gives to you and me, his peace, a love without limits, a love we are called to share with all mankind, a love that banishes fear.

Eastertide is a time of sharing these great blessings. And so I was glad to reflect on my time with my new sisters at lunch. For as my bishop of blessed memory often said, “Peace!” Then he would add with a smile, “All is grace!”

Indeed, all is grace. Indeed, peace.

We celebrated the resurrection of Christ this morning in our Berkeley chapel. We proclaimed, “Christ is risen!”, and we replied, “He is risen indeed!” Each year on Easter Day I am profoundly touched by this litany as if I am hearing it for the first time and enjoying that delight of sudden knowing and sudden joy. It’s like raising a bouquet of roses to your face and inhaling.

The fragrance today was from lilies, and it filled the space – lilies on the altar and around the Easter Paschal Candle, to remain lit until Pentecost, the fiftieth day of Eastertide. Incense billowed, mixing with the scent of lilies, and our vicar in his white robes seemed to float about the altar. The medieval crucifix above the white tented tabernacle and altar was draped in white too, and the weathered Christ gazed upon us as we sent our praises tumbling high into the air. Victory over death is no small thing, and we are thankful. Such love is no small thing, and we are thankful.

We had family members in attendance, making our grand total twelve faithful! Our cantor chanted and our organist played. We sang until we could sing no more, with many Alleluias and many Christ Is Risens and many He Is Risen Indeeds! Need I say, it was a glorious, wondrous Easter, and I mentioned to one of our grad students, it was a morning not to forget. For the liturgy, with all its sights and sounds and scents, and yes, even touches and tastes, was food for our souls. “Remember,” I said to the young man who just received his doctorate in Chemistry, “this morning. We can recall it in the dryer times, the times of famine and drought, the times when beauty isn’t quite so splendid. We can recall we were here on this day and what we experienced. “I will,” he promised. “I will always remember this Easter.”

Earlier, as we arrived in the parking lot, a familiar face peered through my car window. It was one of my Sunday School children from forty (!) years ago, now middle-aged (!). She pulled out her phone and scrolled excitedly through photos as I stepped outside the car. “A new baby born this morning! To my brother and his wife!” I grinned. Her brother was one of my students too. And now he was a father. And Maya arrived in San Francisco on Easter Day at 7 a.m., weighing seven pounds. Thanks be to God.

There are times in one’s life when words are not enough. (I never thought I would write or say this.) The heart fills, the mind pauses as though lost in thought, speech splutters (is that a word?). All you can do is praise God, grin, and hug. And now we are mask free and can see one another again, the smiles, the full expressions. The joy spills out in the splutters I would guess, and I gave thanks for my family of God, that in my faithfulness, such as it is, I have sisters and brothers and children, in this great and glorious family of God, who are faithful too.

As we entered the chapel and took our seats, I realized another family had re-united with their children home from college. There were several families there in our precious space this morning, several to witness to the love of God on this bright, sunny Easter morning. We precious few, along with other faithful, celebrated together new life, in a newborn baby, in eternal life given in the resurrection of Christ, and in the reborn life given to us in the Eucharist. As each of us received the Real Presence of Christ, once more we knew it was all true, that there is an Infinite Love that turns the Earth through our galaxy and universe, an Infinite Love that took our flesh to die for us, an Infinite Love that wipes away not only our selfishness, our sin, but wipes away every tear from our eyes.

And we flowered the cross with bouquets of many colors. We pushed the stems into a crown of woven reeds placed on the cross itself, turning the cross of death into the cross of life.

And we will remember this bright morning in the dry times, in the pandemic times, in the underground times, in the persecuted times. We will remember that Christ is risen: He is risen indeed!

I’m pleased to announce that American Christian Fiction Writers (ACFW) published my post today, “Living the Story of Jerusalem’s Gates.”

Today is Palm Sunday, the day we recall, and re-enact, Christ’s entrance into the Holy City of Jerusalem, riding a lowly colt, as was prophesied. Many lay palm branches before him, crying “Hosanna in the highest!” As we follow him through the gates of Jerusalem, we invite our readers to enter the gates too, into our stories of redemption.

Our gates of Jerusalem are the words and pages of our fiction. We tell of the New Jerusalem – Heaven – and open the doors to the narrow way which is the path of life through death and into life again. We hope they will come in from the cold and arid world outside the gates. We hope they will say yes to our invitation, to step with us, into a city of words offering hope to all mankind. To read the full post, visit the ACFW Blog: “Living the Story of Jerusalem’s Gates”

We celebrated the Annunciation this last week, Archangel Gabriel’s visit to Mary to announce the grace she would receive, if she consented to bearing the Son of God. “Let it be unto me according to thy will,” she says, assenting, her great fiat. Her “yes” changed the world forever, giving us the Redeemer and showing us how to say yes too.

She teaches us humility, so necessary to see God and listen to his plans for us. 

We have become gods in our own eyes, with eyes that cannot see and ears that cannot hear. We are blinded by our own will, pride, and self-love. All sin is selfishness, a bishop once said to me. We become bound by our own desires.

And so we begin Passiontide, the last days and weeks of our journey to Jerusalem. As I listened to our wise, soft-spoken preacher this morning, sitting in a chair before the purple covered tabernacle, in his purple vestments, I marveled how individuals can age like fine wine. Each one of us, so unique, can make the choice to listen to God rather than be as gods. We can choose to step carefully through our own lives and be responsible for the space and time into which we are born. We cannot save the world if we cannot save ourselves. We cannot save ourselves if we do not cherish life at all ages in all stages.

Our preacher spoke of the Gospel lesson appointed for today and the weaving dialog between Our Lord and the Pharisees (St. John 8:46+). The passage considers the question, who is Jesus? “Who do you say that I am?” he asked Peter earlier, using the forbidden name for God, I am. It is a heartening passage, watching Our Lord’s skill in this debate, as he considers truth, logic, reason, until finally he sums up the conversation with, “Truly, truly, I say unto you, before Abraham was, I am.”

The Pharisees are not of God, Christ says, for they do not recognize who he is. If not of God, who are they? Who do they represent? Who owns them? Our preacher spoke of the darkness that is seen in this passage. It is easy to slip into the darkness, to not answer the question. It is easy to look away, step aside, keep silent, allow our hearts and minds to not hear the question. We either say yes to God, or we say no with our silence. A house divided cannot stand. For or against. There is no inbetween. There will be an accounting.

In the movie, “God Is Not Dead 2,” the protagonist, a teacher, describes how she came to believe in Christ. She was troubled by something, and went for a walk, and she passed by a church with a sign out front that asked the question, “Who do you say that I am?” She didn’t think much about it but for the next few days the question haunted her. She wanted to answer it, and seeks out a pastor to explain it all. The question changed her life. And it is true – “If a man keep my saying, he shall never see death.” She is reborn.

I often have thought that we are reborn again and again, each time we confess, are absolved, and return to God, clean of sin. And with each rebirth, we grow further into who we are meant to be. It is a lifetime of falling and rising, reaching for his hand. It is a lifetime of silence and sudden speech, of filling the void of our lives with the music of the spheres and learning to dance. We empty out and fill up, again and again, and each time we are made whole, more holy than before. It is a time not to be missed, this time of our lives. To know true joy, we embrace the gift of faith, learning and loving, with liturgy and song and prayer. The Church gives us this chance to live out the time of our lives with God – the Father, the Son, the Spirit.

Who do you say that He is?

It’s a question to be answered, today on Passion Sunday, as we journey to Jerusalem to enter the greatest love ever known, the love of God.

And as I journey, I’m revisiting my Lenten discipline, my “Prayer for a Sick Person.” (BCP 45)

“Father of mercies and God of all comfort, we humbly beseech thee to behold, visit, and relieve thy sick servant Francis, for whom our prayers are desired. Look upon him with the eyes of thy mercy; comfort him with a sense of thy goodness; preserve him from the temptations of the enemy; and give him patience under his affliction. In thy good time restore him to health, and enable him to lead the residue of his life in thy fear, and to thy glory; and grant that finally he may dwell with thee in life everlasting; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.”

Francis is undergoing an operation on Wednesday. Please pray for him.

We are preparing for our yearly Anglican Synod at the end of April, which will be held here in the Bay Area after two years in Chico and Redding. It will be good to see old friends and make new ones, and be able to attend some of the local events. Our Diocese of the Western States will share the synod with our neighboring diocese, the Diocese of the Southwestern States, which means seeing more old friends from out of state and meeting more new ones.

Our own St. Joseph’s Collegiate Chapel and Seminary in Berkeley will be co-hosting the synod with our Clayton parish, St. Martin of Tours. On Tuesday, April 25, St. Joseph’s is having an Open House with Mass, lunch, history tours, videos, and items from our archives, ending with Solemn Evensong. The Open House is a prelude to the beginning of the Synod on Wednesday and is open to all who are interested.

In preparing a booklet that speaks to the history of the seminary and the Berkeley location, one block from UCB, I have pulled out files from our archives, journeying back to 1960 when a certain Fr. Robert Morse, Episcopal Chaplain at Cal, desired to build a student chapel for corporate worship. A trusting priest, he thought he had the support of his bishop, but not so. Bishop James Pike wanted to derail the project for the local parishes saw the young chaplain as competition. Yet somehow, our faithful Fr. Morse did not give up. He patiently, over the next fourteen years, listened to that still small voice he heard in his prayers, and finally saw the chapel rise from the corner of Durant and Bowditch in 1974. Along the way, I wonder why he didn’t give into despair, but continued on, one step at a time, faithfully. He listened and he waited on God, as individuals appeared in his life who would make all the difference.

In the process of researching this story, it occurred to me once again how unique each one of us is, with unique talents and temptations, no two alike. How can that be? Scientists studying Evolution and Intelligent Design call the genetic code one of “infinite complexity.” It is this complexity that puts the lie to evolutionary theory as being the only path of human development. We are far too complicated and evolution far too simple. We were designed by an intelligent creator and, one might add, designed by a loving creator.

When I am in a group, be it my Curves ladies who exercise with me on machines in a circle, or be it my friendly faithful on folding chairs in church, or be it simply a line of folks at the Post Office, I like to watch each person and delight in their differences, their uniqueness. For we are not robots, no matter the ChatGBT artificial intelligence tool, and each one of us is beautifully intricate, with our own purpose designed by our loving creator. Those who study history know this – the uncanny ability of one person to make a difference, to be in the right place at the right time to enact another chapter in humanity’s timeline, hopefully a chapter of grace.

As a friend at Curves said to me one day, “Everyone has a story. I like to know the story.” Simple and profound. This particular lady has the most beautiful smile I have ever encountered, with curious eyes, and a sweet way of tilting her head as she listens. Yes, listening is a great talent too. I am trying to do more listening and less talking, for when I do, I get to inhabit another’s story for a time. I am never disappointed. It is true I do like to chat, perhaps too much, and I try to resist the temptation and listen, riding the wave of infinite complexity that is on offer in the other.

And so, I wonder in awe, at the many little moments of decision that Fr. Morse made in the early sixties, finally maneuvering to the safer waters of the early seventies, one day at a time. He must have been a good listener, waiting on God, desiring God’s will. For he was led to the right individuals that would protect not only his priestly vocation, but his vision of the chapel on the corner of Durant and Bowditch. He was listening, and he was led. I can see him now, listening to me babble, his thoughtful face absorbing my words and solving my problems of the moment. He would nod, his eyes growing large in recognition of a shared thought or discovery. He was transparent, trusting.

Looking back, as historians do from their high perch of the present, it all seems logical and inevitable. But when I imagine myself in his position, when I imagine what it was like when he realized he had misguided and nearly prosecuted by the Diocese of California, despair would surely have nipped at my heels. To be sure, Fr. Morse was only human, as they say. But I believe he laid his temptations, his worries and his fears, at the foot of the Cross, went back to listening to God, and patiently and prayerfully pondered the next step.

Not knowing what the next moment will hold, or the next day, or the next year, can be frightening. And yet with Our Lord in charge of our lives it can be exhilarating. We must follow the Cross, for all is grace, and nothing is lost. Everything counts. Our failures, our missteps, our wrong turns are all redeemed. He picks us up and dusts us off and sends us out once again into the world of infinitely complex human beings, our brothers and sisters, our parents and our children, each creation glorifying the creator. Then we bask in the light of his love.

And we remember to listen. For each one of us is making history in our own time, step by step, prayer by prayer.

OPEN HOUSE FLYER

They say that joy is different from happiness, but it seems to me they are close cousins at least. Happiness grows into joy. Joy is the crowning of happiness. When you are joyful, you are happy. But when you are happy, you are not necessarily joyful.

I experienced an otherworldly sense of joy this morning in St. Joseph’s Chapel. It was not the first time and I hope not the last (aha, hope is woven into the equation, I am certain).

I was not expecting it, and it appeared at once from nowhere and everywhere, a deep sense of being loved and cradled by beauty and glory.

We weren’t sure we would be braving the rain this morning. And we lost an hour with the time change, adding to our fatigue. Indeed, we doubted we would/should/could brave the journey into Berkeley, not between storms. Then there were the kamikaze highway drivers. There were the potholes and floods. But the skies cleared for a time, and we plucked up our courage. We decided to go. After all, it was Lent.

I avoided the potholes and flooded spaces, eyeing the cars speeding around me, crossing lanes, zigzagging, racers determined to tempt fate, or perhaps God, with the thrill of their speed. In California, police are scarce after defunding and riots.

So by the time we arrived, all we wanted was to be safe, to get home after Mass intact. We didn’t have high expectations.

We entered the cold and dark chapel, and I turned on the lights and the heat, lit the candles beneath the Madonna and Child icon. We took our seats. Our organist had arrived and was playing something encouraging, an energetic and charming prelude. Our sexton/cantor waited to begin the chant. Soon our priest, preceded by two Cal Crew residents who served as acolytes, began to intone the litany. They stepped slowly up the aisle, praying “Lord have mercy,” carrying torches alight. We joined in the responses.

As we sang the songs and prayed the prayers, so well known to us that the words live on our lips, we few became one, the clay of our souls sculpted into beauty. The organ boomed, the cantor sang, and the music soared high over the altar and up into the domed chancel and the clerestory windows. Our preacher preached quietly, profoundly. We are all called to take part in the Kingdom of Christ on Earth and in Heaven, he said. Each one of us has a gift that is meant to be offered, as part of the Body. We heard the words of St. Paul written to the church in Ephesus: “Ye were sometimes darkness, but now are ye light in the Lord: walk as children of light: (for the fruit of the Spirit is in all goodness and righteousness and truth;) proving what is acceptable unto the Lord.” (Ephesians 5:1+, BCP 128)

Perhaps it was the sudden thundering downpour on the roof and our warm safety inside; perhaps it was the Lenten purples – the tented tabernacle, the vestments. Perhaps it was the fire flaming from the candles and the sweet Madonna with her Child in the back cradling us as her own. Perhaps it was the Sacrifice of the Mass celebrated by our elderly priest, and the General Confession and Absolution. Perhaps it was when we stepped to the altar to receive the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist, as the cantor chanted the Psalms.

Sometime at some point I realized it wasn’t happiness I was holding in my heart. It was joy, the joy of creating and offering to God our liturgy of love. It was the joy of the Holy Spirit weaving among us, making us one. It was the joy of being a part of a holy family, the family of God. And as our preacher reminded us, each one of us is essential. Each one of us must offer ourselves and our talents. Each one of us then becomes our sister or our brother, our mother or our father, our aunt or our uncle, our children.

For when we create and offer our love sculpted by prayer and song and sacrifice, Our Lord makes us children of his light. And we bask in his joy. We nearly see his face.

Perhaps, too, joy came into the space created by my lack of expectations. I went to Mass because it was the right thing to do, not because I desired to go. I had many excuses, but all were banished. And so, when we least expect it, we are bathed in light. We simply need to pay attention to creed and commitment, to do our little part as a member of the Family of God, the Body of Christ. Then we are surprised by joy, as C.S. Lewis wrote.

And yes, we made it home safely, beneath the storming heavens. And as I looked up to the greening hills, a rainbow shown through the mist.

Thanks be to God.