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Flowered by Christ

Posted on March 29, 2016 | Leave a comment

Easter St. Peter's with family (2)We have a lovely tradition in our local parish church. The Sunday School children and staff “Flower the Cross.” Shortly before the sermon in our Anglican liturgy, during the “sermon hymn,” we process up the central aisle carrying flowers to the chancel steps where a thick white cross, about six feet tall awaits us. The cross has deep holes that penetrate the beams and we insert the stems into the holes. Soon the white cross is covered in brilliant color.

This year as I helped small hands reach for the cross to add another flower, I thought how each of us was like those flowers and stems and bits of green. We each had our own colors and characteristics and we carried them to the cross. We each had our own talents and treasures and we offered them to the cross. We each had our own joys and sorrows and we slipped them into the deep holes of that wooden cross.

The white cross welcomed us, pulling us into its wood, and in some way we became part of that cross of Christ. And with the flowering we were flowered too, changed, reborn into new life.

For Easter celebrates new life, not only spring and its seeds bursting into blossoms, but our own new resurrected life. For forty days and nights we have been dormant seeds buried in the dark soil of Lent. We waited and we watched and we prayed for this glorious Easter morning when death dies and life lives, rising from the tomb, Christ’s tomb, our own tombs.

There is no point to Christianity if one does not believe in the resurrection of Christ and its revolutionary effect upon us all. In the resurrection, suffering and sorrow change into love and joy. Darkness becomes light, and the words of the psalmist are fulfilled: 

“If I say, peradventure the darkness shall cover me; then shall my night be turned to day. Yea, the darkness is no darkness with thee, but the night is as clear as the day; the darkness and light to thee are both alike.” (139:10-11)

Today we are covered by darkness. We hear of wars and rumors of wars, of new horrors, new terrors. Brussels, Paris, London, San Bernardino, Boston, New York, Fort Hood. Evil robs youth of innocence, prompting massacres in schoolyards or classrooms. Darkness spreads across the face of the earth.

And so we reach for the light in the darkness that enshrouds our world, entombs our people. We look to God, the author of love and life. We look to the only man who claimed to be God, who rose from the dead, the one whom St. John describes as “the true Light that lighteth every man that cometh into the world.” (KJV, 1:9)

Why I believe in the resurrection and its challenge and others do not, I do not understand. For the evidence is there, clear as the light of day. But I suppose one must seek it, desire it, even long for such belief. For believing costs us. Believing means turning toward the light of love and away from the darkness of self. My bishop often said, “all doubt is moral.” I’m not sure if all doubt is moral, but I’m beginning to agree that belief requires a change of heart, an honorable discipline, a code of ethics that challenges us to change our ways. It is sometimes tempting to doubt, when belief accuses and demands our time, talent, and treasure. Demands our hearts and souls and bodies.

And so Easter’s resurrection message is a radical one. It says to our world, as Father James Martin writes in the Wall Street Journal, “Listen!” Listen to what the resurrection means for us! For the resurrection demands that attention be paid to a man who conquered death. Attention must be paid to his words, his deeds, his miracles of healing and feeding and calming storms and walking on water. Attention must be paid to his claims to be God, and to his Church’s claims after his ascension to Heaven. For the Church he founded, a stepchild of the Jewish temple, witnessed to Christ’s life, death, and resurrection, again and again, in word and deed. Christians died tortuous deaths for their belief in Jesus Christ and who he was. They did not invent him. They knew him. And the witness continues.

Today Christians die daily for their belief in this God-made-man. They cannot deny Christ, cannot deny his light, his joy, his glory. They have been changed, reborn. They cannot go back to the darkness of self.

On Easter morning I thought of these things as I handed a flower to one of the children and helped her shove the moist green stem into the deep dry hole, into the wood of the cross. In that moment, she was part of the cross. She stood back and smiled, satisfied, and reached for another. Our baskets empty, we recessed out to the Sunday School.

We had given ourselves to Easter’s resurrection cross, and Christ had returned the gift a thousand fold. The dead wood had been reborn. So had we. For each of us had been flowered by and with Christ.

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Wonderful Words

Posted on January 17, 2016 | Leave a comment

birdIt’s been a week of words, words, words, and more words. 

Some words were heated such as those between Mr. Trump and Mr. Cruz in the Republican debates. Some words were measured and thoughtful, such as those of Mr. Carson and earlier Ms. Fiorina in those same debates on Thursday. If words had trajectories, the former words were missiles launched; the latter words were birds circling and weaving.

I’ve been thinking about words and their power, particularly this last week of Epiphanytide when the Church celebrates the Word made incarnate in Bethlehem, Christ manifested to us, the world, the Word alight in the darkness. 

Words continue to light the dark, to beam bright epiphanies into despair and loss and confusion. Words comfort and heal and explain and judge. They forgive. They love.

The Bible is called the Word of God, and I’m glad the Gideons still supply hotels with free copies in nightstand drawers. The Gideons, a society of Christian businessman formed in 1899, has distributed over two billion copies of the Bible in two hundred countries in one hundred languages, today printing eighty million copies a year. Lately I’ve noticed the Bibles sitting alongside the Book of Mormon and sometimes the Teaching of Buddha. I wondered about the rarity of the Koran in these rooms but understand there is a concern about disrespect. One imam said that Muslims don’t need a copy of the Koran for they have memorized the first chapter, prayed five times a day.

It is good there are other faiths represented in these nightstands. Inclusivity protects the Bibles from the charge of exclusivity when guests complain of religion in their room. Americans are a freedom-loving people. We believe in freedom of religion, freedom of speech, freedom of thought and conscience. It is why we debate conscientious issues before choosing our president. It is why we fearlessly use heated words, or words launched like missiles across a stage toward our opponent, missiles targeting other words.

I enjoy the politically incorrect Republican debates. They show that America still has a pulse, her arteries are flowing, her heart beating, in her celebration of free expression. Some pundits have complained there are too many candidates in the field, but I laud the number. Let us encourage this multi-faceted discussion and be proud of the raucous, boisterous conversation. Let us appreciate the talented and articulate candidates who give of their time, talent, and treasure, of varying gender and generation, race and ethnicity. This is America at its best. This is how we elect our governors.

And we use words, words, words. Let them fly through the air, circle and weave, and come home to roost in our hearts and minds. Let the words win and lose, as they become forged in debate, fired by truth.

Lots of words. I’ve been sorting our late bishop’s words, his sermons, scrutinizing the yellow lined pages, the brown parched sheets, scraps from hotel stationery scrawled with words, handwritten, prescient ideas pressed onto paper, words written in the purple ink the bishop favored. Staples or  clips join some pages, linking sermons back to 1951, his year of ordination to the priesthood. I’ve come to see an order in the pages, and the words, how they fall naturally into Church Year seasons and feast days within those seasons. There are also speeches given at dedications, ordinations, baptisms, synods, pilgrimages, retreats, and funerals. Dates, places, and occasions are recorded in the pale pencil script of his loving wife. 

Hundreds, thousands, hundreds of thousands of words. “He was a mystic,” a friend said recently. But then, all sacramental Christians are mystical by definition, for we believe in the mystical and mysterious action of the Holy Spirit among us in this hard world of matter. We believe in the mystical change in the bread and wine as the Word once again becomes flesh and dwells not only among us but within us in the Eucharist. We believe in the Spirit mystically flowing through the waters of Baptism and the oils of Unction and the words of absolution given by a priest to a penitent in Confession. The Spirit mystically weaves into the vows of bride and groom as they say committing words before a priest who, in the name of the Body of Christ, blesses their marriage, and the Spirit works mystically through the hands of a bishop in Ordination and Confirmation. 

As I study our bishop’s words, his purple script on yellow paper, I pray that God will enter my mind and heart and speak to me just as he entered my bishop’s mind and heart and spoke to him, that I might share these words bridging heaven and earth, spirit and flesh. One day, God willing, the words will flow onto pages bound into a book to be held and read, words that will instill the greater Word.

This last week, before the political words and the sorting of the words on the yellow lined pages, I sent off my review of Michael D. O’Brien’s Elijah in Jerusalem to CatholicFiction.net. In this end-times novel, Bishop Elijah confronts the Antichrist in Jerusalem. Like his namesake, the Prophet Elijah, Bishop Elijah listens for the still small voice of God. I too am listening for it, hoping to hear those huge words spoken by the little voice, whispering in the stillness of heart and soul. I often observed my bishop listening, listening to all of us with our many words and opinions, hopes and fears, but also listening to something else, someone else, trying to catch the quiet voice that wove among us as well. 

With the many threats at home and abroad, threats to freedom and faith, to liberty and law, let us celebrate free and faithful words, expressions of who we are and who we are meant to be, as Americans, as believers in God who became the Word made flesh.

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All Hallows

Posted on November 1, 2015 | Leave a comment

all saintsHallowe’en comes from the contraction of All Hallows Eve. To hallow is to make holy, and October 31 was (and is) the eve before All Hallows Day, or the All the Holy Ones Day, All Saints, honoring Christian saints. The celebration is followed by Allhallowstide, in which all of the Christian dead are remembered. This coming week churches all over world will remember their dead, their loved ones, calling out their names on All Souls Day and, in this ceremony of love, hallowing them. The evening before, Halloween, sees the last of the unfriendly spirits roaming the night, for they are vanquished by the light of Christ in the morning, and fear is vanquished by joy.

Sometimes fear is good. It is an intuitive instinct that signals danger. Gavin de Becker, an expert who evaluates potential threats to famous people, titled his invaluable book on safety, The Gift of Fear. And in this sense, fear is a gift, a survival signal, a warning that lights the dark.

Children are afraid of the dark. And we should be too. Novelist Jake Halpern writes in the Wall Street Journal about fear of the dark:

“Since the dawn of man, night has been a time when we were in danger, when we were vulnerable – to lions, club-toting men and giant chasms into which we could fall… it was evolutionarily advantageous for us to be afraid of the dark. Those of us who feared the night and cowered from its dangers, survived. Those who went for strolls in the dark ended up as snacks for lions.”

Today with electric light we laugh such fears away. Yet we are ambivalent about fear itself, sometimes denying it, sometimes welcoming it. We flirt with it, tease it, to see what happens when it draws near, for we have banished most survival fears from long ago such as hunger, shelter, wild animals. We are curious, enticed by darkness.

A friend of mine once claimed that she liked the feeling of fear, of being on the edge of danger, secondhand fear experienced in a book or movie. There are many words for this feeling of excitement. We shudder and shiver, chilled to the bone. A frisson gives us goosebumps. A ghost walks over our grave. We are on the edge of our seats, waiting to be safe again. What is the lure? Why flirt with the dark, with falling into the abyss? Are we rehearsing our future? Our death?

Halloween has in many ways become a rehearsal as well, as children (and adults) don costumes and pretend to be someone or something else and venture into the dark. For some the choice is innocent role playing, choosing to be princes and princesses, musicians or athletes. Still, others choose to be witches and goblins. Some choose the light and some the dark. Some choose life and some choose death: skeletons, ghosts, and grim reapers, desiring to scare.

Our nation too seems on the edge of darkness, in the dusk of its day, playing dangerous games with life and death, slaughtering generations of unborn innocents. We survivors look away, pass on the other side of the road, just as we do in the world theater of wars and rumors of wars, withdrawing and allowing the dark to swallow the light, whether in Moscow or Tehran or the borderlands of the West.

Light and darkness, life and death. The line between them is not often clear, sometimes smudged into dusk and dawn. And so it is in our hearts, where good sheds light and evil darkens.

And so I’m grateful that the dark of All Hallows’ Eve is banished by the light of All Hallows’ Day and the light of Sunday resurrection. This morning I gazed upon six thick white candles on the stone altar of St. Joseph’s Chapel near U.C. Berkeley. The candles flamed brightly, the fiery wicks drinking in the air above, flickering their tips toward heaven. A roughly carved crucifix rose above the tabernacle, beyond the suspended Sanctus light. We stood and turned toward the entry as five student acolytes processed in, carrying torches and crucifix, followed by the white-robed clergy. The organ bellowed through the vaulted domed space and echoed over the russet-tiled floor as we joined in songs of praise to God for his saints.

Halloween would not exist if it were not for All Saints, the holy-day that gives the costumed evening its name. After the night of darkness, a weak sun broke through this morning and bathed our world in light. We sang as one people, giving thanks for those men and women who chose the light and turned away from the dark. Martyred for their choice, and today still being martyred, we honor them. History has known a world without Christ, a world of impenetrable darkness, one rightly feared. We peer through the dusk of our days, keeping our candles lit, sharing the love of God, the light of Christ, looking to the morning of resurrection.

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The Fire Trail in Our Hearts

Posted on June 28, 2015 | 2 comments

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My good friend Bishop Morse often said, “God wins in the end.” As I age, my years and my tears tell me the same thing, for I see darkness exposed by light more and more often. 

Each of us has a border that runs though our hearts, dividing the dark and the light, the evil and the good. Only when we illuminate that dark side can we become whole as we are meant to be. It takes courage to shine light on the cancer growing in those corners, the red raw wounds of deeds and misdeeds, that done and that left undone. It takes God’s spirit to embolden us to confess our sins. 

And so as I write and rewrite The Fire Trail, a novel in many ways about that line running through each of us, between the uncivil and the civil, I am reminded that I am not immune to the dark encroaching on the light, to the barbaric crossing that border in my heart. None of us are. 

Our culture does not encourage us to be humble, since humility lowers self-esteem. But true humility allows God to wash our hearts clean, and even if the soap stings, only then can we begin to heal. C.S. Lewis said, “True humility is not thinking less of yourself; it is thinking of yourself less.” And what a relief it is to think of others and not oneself, to turn outward and not inward, to dwell on the miracle of each of us, of all creation, and not just the miracle of me. Such turning toward the light strengthens us, doesn’t weaken us, as our culture claims mistakenly. Turning toward the light, toward the commands of God and the demands of true sacrificial love, makes us larger and more real, pulls us toward certainty and sanity. 

And so when I repeat the forceful and almost-embarrassing words of the General Confession in our Book of Common Prayer each Sunday, I am encouraged to admit I have not loved enough this last week. I have withdrawn my heart when I should have opened it wide. I have forgotten my prayers, and particularly my intercessory prayers. I have squandered time, that precious gift on loan to each of us, the gift of life itself: 

“We acknowledge and bewail our manifold sins and wickedness, Which we, from time to time, most grievously have committed, By thought, word, and deed, Against thy Divine Majesty, Provoking most justly thy wrath and indignation against us. We do earnestly repent, And are heartily sorry for these our misdoings; The remembrance of them is grievous unto us; The burden of them is intolerable.”

Is the burden truly intolerable? Must I bewail my wickedness? The dark part of me says no, I didn’t really do anything wicked this week. The light part, on the other side of that fire trail through my heart, says that because I know God and have the benefit of scripture and sacraments and the Church I am held to a closer accounting, a higher mark. To whom much is given, much is required. God is, indeed, wrathful and indignant because I did not say my prayers, because I squandered my time and treasure, because I know better. They may be venial and not mortal sins (no murder involved), but even these “little” sins allow festering in the dark corners of my heart. And one sin leads to another, like cancer. 

A terrible crime is committed in my novel, The Fire Trail, near the Berkeley hills Fire Trail, the wide break that protects the town from wildfires. Other crimes cross the trail and hurt the townspeople, destroying the peace and setting fires in neighborhoods once safe. And we hear of worldwide breaches, of wars and rumors of wars, of beheadings and bombings and massacres, of eruptions of lava and ash spilling into our communities. 

Humanity will always carry that scar, that jagged line running through its heart; it will always need to tend the firebreak so that the wild will not devour the tame, so that the fires do not breach the lines, do not leap into our towns, countries, and world. 

I suppose my little novel is merely a reminder that this is true, that we must not fall asleep on this crucial watch. The guards in our towers must be awake and alert so that they can spot the first flames coming over the hill, before our people are engulfed. 

And so it is with the making of laws, good law that builds upon good law, laws that our children may in turn build upon. We in the present carry this great burden, responsibility, and honor, to watch – even demand – that this happens. We must weave the good and the true of the past into the present, so that our children may one day do the same with their inheritance. What we do, how we vote (each one of us), matters. History matters. Liberty matters. The Constitution, the rule of law, our three branches of government, all matter. Who we are as a free people in a world of unfree peoples matters. 

We will be answerable for our inheritance, whether we have squandered it, whether we have hidden it, or whether we have increased it with goodness and wisdom. 

One of my characters seeks goodness, beauty, truth, and transcendence. A reader of my manuscript, The Fire Trail, an Anglican priest, explained this week to me (forgive my paraphrasing, Father) that goodness (virtue) can only come from truth (veritas), truth being God, that without God goodness denies itself, for it becomes self-serving and proud, no longer good. It is union with God that allows the fruits of virtue to grow and flourish. St. Maximus the Confessor (580-662) wrote about this. 

This is the question of our time. Can we be good, virtuous, civilized, without God? Or if all of us cannot manage belief in God, can those who do not believe see the need to respect those who do, support those institutions that will bear virtuous fruit through the building of schools, hospitals, and other endeavors devoted to the common good? 

In the early 1980’s Father Richard John Neuhaus wrote a book called The Naked Public Square, pointing out this great need in our nation’s public conversation. Os Guinness has written The Global Public Square, pointing out the need for such conversation in the world, the need for the Judeo-Christian perspective on culture creation.

But it begins with and in our own hearts. It starts with that line dividing the dark and the light. It begins with Sunday worship and confession and union with God. Only then can we turn to our communities and countries and world and shine the light in the dark corners. 

And, as Bishop Morse reminded me, God wins in the end. We need merely be faith-ful.

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Law and Order

Posted on May 3, 2015 | 1 comment

If we can’t police ourselves, others will police us. History, that long forgotten study of cultural, social, and national memory, is a clear witness that this is so.

And so I weep when I see Baltimore burn with such division, so inflamed by looters who discredit and dishonor the peaceful protestors of their community. Then, to see the city government allow this to happen, as though sanctioning it. For when law is not ordered, enforced by the state, disorder is seen as lawful.

We live in a democracy, a glorious, messy mix of peoples of all races, classes, ages. We are an experiment, according to European observers, and I often think the experiment is on the brink of collapse at moments like Ferguson and Baltimore. We have grasped a delicate balance between state and individual, between no speech and free speech, between public and private spheres. We are a family of passionate beliefs and ideals, often opposing, thrown together in a whirlwind we call society.

How are we to we get along? How do we express our deeply held opinions and beliefs? How do we protect property and individual freedoms? Provide for our future as a free people? Ensure our defense and care for the poor and innocent, the least among us? We do all of these things through laws, good laws.

Without law, we become slaves, property owned by the strongest among us. Without law to protect us, we allow might to make right. We hide in fear waiting for the looters who will, in the end, rule us.

I am looking forward to reading Os Guinness’s book, The Global Public Square: Religious Freedom and the Making of a World Safe for Diversity. As Christianity is marginalized in our culture, so are the Judeo-Christian virtues of tolerance, self-restraint, and brotherly love, among many other values supporting democracy. To be sure, Christians and Jews do not always practice what they preach, but ideals must still be preached, they must still be heard and honored in the public square.

We can differ as Americans, but we can continue to converse. We can respect one another’s right to speak, to believe and live in peace, as long as we keep the peace. One group of color or creed need not dominate; but all must keep the peace.

And so as the looters set fire to their own community in Baltimore, and as others smashed car windows in our neighboring Oakland, I thought back to our inaugural lecture on Sunday night taking place at our new Center for Western Civilization, near UC Berkeley. It was well attended by young and old, from many racial backgrounds, and we were told by one speaker that each of us had lit a candle with our presence, adding to the light of freedom. There were also many words of encouragement at the reception afterwards: “So glad you are doing this,” they said again and again as I recalled the Center’s mission:

“Ignorance is the greatest threat to our civilization. Departments of Liberal Arts are shrinking in our major universities. Courses in the Western Tradition, history, literature, art, poetry, philosophy, and ethics are no longer required. Few students have enough understanding of the origins and principles of Western Civilization to maintain or advance our democratic institutions. The absence of this critical knowledge threatens the future of our personal freedoms. It is our responsibility to support every effort to keep the lights of freedom burning before we descend into darkness.”

The lights of freedom – our flaming candles – must help us see where we have come from in order to know where we are going. Fire is good when tamed and used constructively by man. It warms us when we are cold. It cooks our food and burns our garbage. In even turns our flesh to ash to be buried when we die. It lights the dark of the past, the present, the future. Each of us present on Sunday night on Bancroft in Berkeley was lighting a candle in and for our world; each of us was eager to keep the flame burning if only for another lifetime, another year, another day.

And in the end, each of us is only that, a single voice in a sea of voices and one soul in an ocean of souls. I carry, like my neighbor who sat next to me on the hard folding chair in that YWCA hall, a hope within me that my single voice matters, and that my neighbor’s voice matters too. The Baltimore looters matter, each one of them. All of us form America, and we can all carry a flame – our voice – into the public square of our nation, and of our world.

But the flame must not burn others; it must light their way. It must not destroy; it must give life. But how do we keep our candles lit in this darkness?

We keep them lit by respecting law and order; by enforcing peace in our communities. We keep them lit by understanding who we are – where we have been and where we are going.

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Damascus Light

Posted on January 25, 2015 | Leave a comment
The Conversion of St. Paul by Nicolas-Bernard Lepicie, 1767

The Conversion of St. Paul by Nicolas-Bernard Lepicie, 1767

January, although the days are short and, at least in California, winter chills the air, is a month of light and promise, a curious turn around time.

There is the promise of spring, of course. We are past the winter solstice and we know the days are lengthening and growing warmer.

January also brings us the New Year, and whether we make resolutions or not, there is a sense that we could if we chose to, we could change our ways if we desired to, we could repent and move in a new-year-direction. So January offers us hope that we and our world can be better.

And so does the Church Year, with January festivals that enlighten the already hopeful, promising month. Epiphany lives in these weeks and days, recalling wise men who follow a bright star to a child king born in a manger. We too can follow the star, we are told. We too can kneel before the Son of God born of woman, the God of all creation who took our flesh upon him. We can, if we choose.

Epiphanytide lasts two-to-six Sundays. It is a flexible season, moving with the date of Easter. When Easter is early, as it is this year (April 5) Epiphanytide shrinks. When Easter is late, it expands. So this year there are only three Epiphanytide Sundays, three celebrations of the manifestation of God’s love through his son to the world.

Epiphanytide’s Scriptures reflect great moments of change, moments of illumination, moments of vision that might effect our own change. They are meant to enlighten us, show us who the baby born in the manger was and is. We hear about Jesus as a boy in the Temple of Jerusalem, when he identifies himself as the Son of God. We hear the account of Jesus’ baptism when God identifies him as his beloved son. We hear about the changing of the water to wine in Cana, the first recorded miracle Jesus performs, identifying him as divine.

January moments, Epiphany moments, of light, of illumination. But sometimes light can be be blinding. How appropriate, I thought, that today we celebrated the Conversion of St. Paul as well, since January 25 lands on Epiphany 3.

The story of St. Paul’s conversion has entered our literature and lexicon, a powerful image in Christendom. We speak of a Damascus moment, or a Road to Damascus experience and understand we are talking about a blinding, sudden illumination, a 180-degree turn.

I hadn’t noticed before that this festival often lands in Epiphanytide. I’m sure it’s by design, for the Conversion of St. Paul is a perfect distillation, essence, of Epiphany, as though all of the manifestations we talk and read about are pulled into that sudden single blinding flash of light, light holding the voice of God.

Paul used to be Saul, of course, a righteous Jew who actively sought out the heretics who believed in this Jesus of Nazareth. He tracked them down. He arrested them and brought them in for trial and punishment. But that day – that Damascus day – changed him forever; that Damascus day changed the world forever. St. Luke recounts the event in Acts 22:3-5:

“And as he journeyed, he came near Damascus: and suddenly there shined round about him a light from heaven: And he fell to the earth, and heard a voice saying unto him, Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me? And he said, Who art thou, Lord? And the Lord said, I am Jesus whom thou persecutest…”

The greatest witness of truth is action, a true about-face, a reversal in one’s calling and one’s life. Conversion. Saul is converted from persecutor to preacher, and in a highly public and dangerous forum. Saul knew this Jesus had been crucified. He was dead. He was buried. How could this Jesus now blind him with this light that appeared to be one with him? How could he be alive; how could he speak to Saul from the heavens? And to Saul of all people who was the least likely to believe the vision, knowing all too well the cost of such belief? And yet Saul does believe, he changes course, turns around. He even changes his name from Saul to Paul, and becomes in time the greatest theologian in the Christian world, melding Platonic ideas with Jewish and Christian theology. Paul explained the Gospel to the rest of us. He, like the wise men, manifested Christ to the world.

January too is Right-to-Life month, a time when our nation is called to repent and change. As I read about the many who marched through their cities and towns this weekend, I thought of that road to Damascus. I prayed that our culture would have such a blinding epiphany, a Damascus moment, that our nation would see that this is not who we are, that we are not a culture of death, that we do not kill our children. With each year, as another generation is lost to abortion, the protesting crowds grow in number. With each year, more help is offered to those with unplanned pregnancies, as networks of support crisscross our land.

I have found that the Christian life is dramatic and adventurous, a life of millions of epiphanies, moments of light. Sometimes the light of God shines on my own heart, revealing my sins, a painful illumination but a necessary one. Only in the blinding glare of such Damascus light can I truly see. So we are always repenting, changing, moving toward God, catching, reflecting, refracting light from him like facets of a shining jewel or brilliant star.

As January 2015 comes to an end, light lengthens and we see ourselves as we are. We travel the road to Damascus. We are ever repenting, turning around, yet ever sure of our destination. We travel into February, into penitence, into preparation for Lent’s lengthening and illuminating light. We look to the life of Easter, for we are on the road to resurrection.

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Gaudete Sunday

Posted on December 14, 2014 | Leave a comment

???????????????????????????????The heavens opened early Thursday morning, and rain poured upon our California soil, slaking the thirst of the earth but soon bursting gutters and filling low places with floodwaters. In drought-plagued California, we didn’t dare complain, but were thankful.

We live in the foothills of Mount Diablo, and while our house is on bedrock, our northern hillside falls steeply into a ravine. Friday morning we noticed part of the fence was missing, and it had taken some of the landscaping with it as it slid to the bottom of the hill. I thought, as I have thought many times, how suddenly nature makes short work of man’s efforts to tame her, shattering our pride.

The earth is drying out now, and this morning we headed for church, bundled up for temps are in the low fifties (cold for us). The skies had changed from threatening to sudden beauty, with white clouds scuttling against brilliant blue patches, the low sun clarifying the air as though trying to fit more light into shorter days.

And in this winter-scape we prepare for the light of the Incarnation, to me always a stunning event, one repeated in a different way on humble altars in glorious Eucharists. It is Advent, and we prepare for Christmas, the coming of the Christ Child, God becoming one of us, with us, Emanuele. We celebrate the love, sacrificial and humble, of a God who loves his creation so much that he would do such a thing, that he would be born in a manger-cave, among animals, to a poor, devout Jewish couple who believed in his angel messengers and obeyed them.

And so, stepping into the warm nave of our parish church, the symbols of the space textured this story of miraculous birth. The Virgin Mary and her holy Child stood to the left, Gospel side, a bank of votives flaming at her feet. Three of the four Advent candles in their bed of greens had been lit (two purples and one rose). The American flag stood proudly, a testimony to our freedom of worship. Against the red brick apsidal wall, the white marble altar was draped in purple, and six tall tapers burned on either side of the purple-tented tabernacle. A crèche set in greenery, to the far right, Epistle side, told the humble story of glory, this huge contradiction, one of many fascinating ones in our faith, of glorious humility. Somehow true glory can only be found, we are told, in true humility. Somehow true joy can only be found in true sacrifice. Somehow the Creator must become part of his creation to save it from itself.

I love Advent III, called Rose Sunday, Gaudete Sunday. We light the rose candle along with the first two purple candles. Today is Gaudete Sunday because of the opening prayer, the Introit: Gaudete in Domino semper, or Rejoice in the Lord always… Rose Sunday is a break in the penitential purple of Advent, and this is the only Advent Sunday we have flowers on the altar. We emphasize the joy of anticipating Christmas rather than the penitence of preparing for Christmas.

In the daily readings of the Morning and Evening Prayer offices, the mood is definitely one of penitence and preparation. Most of the readings have been Old Testament prophecies, warnings, and judgments in Isaiah and the Psalms. We read the early chapters of the Gospel of Mark, of the beginnings of Christ’s ministry, but not the Christmas story, not yet. But most fascinating are the chapters in Revelation, or The Apocalypse, the great vision given to St. John on the Island of Patmos, detailing the end-times, the last days, the Second Coming of Christ.

We have been immersed in these daily prayers, not reflecting the coming of Christ to Bethlehem but reflecting the Second Coming of Christ in Judgment. We are “woken up” with these future realities, these warnings and visions, given a “heads up.” Are we ready for Christ to come? How will we fare when judged? Have we loved enough? Have we cleaned out our hearts to receive him? For he will not enter a cluttered heart fettered with sins, the detritus of selfishness and pride, envy and greed. There will be no room for him in such a heart. We need to make room for him.

So Advent, often called “Little Lent,” reminds us of the four great events, the adventures, to come to us: Death, Judgment, Heaven, Hell. How will we – our lives – be measured?

This morning I entered the nave of our warm parish church and knelt in a pew, giving thanks for the clergy, the people of the parish, and the freedom to worship. I asked God to clean out my little heart, to remove all the obstacles to his advent in my soul. My gaze fell on the purple-draped tabernacle and knew that this weekly ritual, this rite, would set me right with God. I knew that the habit of confession would serve me well in the time span of my life, would ensure that I have the time of my life, ride the waves of glory in this great adventure. I knew that, encouraged by the words of the liturgy – confession, absolution, the great action of the Mass, Holy Communion – I would unite once again with Christ, in bread and wine placed on my tongue. I knew that each Eucharist prepared my heart and soul, mind and body, for the great Feast of the Lamb that would await me in Heaven. And I wanted to be ready. I wanted as many Eucharistic feasts as I could manage before then, readying my heart and soul. I want to sing with the angels and the saints.

I also love Advent III because we usually practice (after Mass) for the Christmas Pageant. Young and old gather together to portray our story of redemption, beginning with the Fall of Adam and Eve and ending with the Nativity of Our Lord, the beginning of our salvation, the antidote to the Fall. Lessons are read and carols sung. We rehearsed today; next Sunday we don costumes and prayers and wings (I get to be an angel, and yes, even with wings…) We have a five-year old Mary and an eleven-year old Joseph.

The days are wintry and short. We prepare to celebrate Christmas, the year of our Lord, Anno Domini, A.D.  Some of this sense, this pairing of season with humble glory, has been captured by the poet Christina Rossetti:

In the bleak midwinter, frosty wind made moan,

Earth stood hard as iron, water like a stone;

Snow had fallen, snow on snow, snow on snow,

In the bleak midwinter, long ago.

 

Our God, Heaven cannot hold Him, nor earth sustain;

Heaven and earth shall flee away when He comes to reign.

In the bleak midwinter a stable place sufficed

The Lord God Almighty, Jesus Christ.

 

Enough for Him, whom cherubim, worship night and day,

Breastful of milk, and a mangerful of hay;

Enough for Him, whom angels fall before,

The ox and ass and camel which adore.

 

Angels and archangels may have gathered there,

Cherubim and seraphim thronged the air;

But His mother only, in her maiden bliss,

Worshipped the beloved with a kiss.

 

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 my heart.

 Christina Rossetti (1830-1895), “In the Bleak Midwinter”

 

 Yes, Advent is a time to give him our hearts: clean, ready, and open.

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The Light of Candlemas

Posted on February 2, 2014 | Leave a comment

It was with some surprise and great thanksgiving that I received word yesterday that my novel The Magdalene Mystery received First Place in the Feathered Quill Book Awards for 2013. 

I was surprised again when I woke this morning, recalling this bit of news, and when I saw that it was raining, however lightly (our first real rain in California for months), I became deeply grateful, thinking that perhaps the drought was lessening. But later as I entered the warm sanctuary of our parish church, leaving the cold outside, and stepped up the thick red carpet of the central aisle, I sighed in wonder. 

I knew today was the Festival of Candlemas, the celebration of the presentation of the baby Jesus in the temple in Jerusalem. I knew it involved candles and I even recalled we in the pews held white tapers that would soon be lit by acolytes, and we would light our neighbor’s, fire catching fire. But I wasn’t prepared for the brilliance of the candles on the altar as I entered: two large candelabra, each bank holding seven flaming white tapers, framed by eight giant candlesticks aflame. I had entered a holy home, this bright house of God and his fiery love. I was cradled by the warmth and light of the space, as the clergy and acolytes processed in, swinging incense and holding the crucifix high before the burning torches, the celebrant gliding royally toward the high altar with his royal gold and white cope. We sang with many voices joined together as one, “As with gladness men of old/Did the guiding star behold; As with joy they hailed its light, Leading onward, beaming bright; So most gracious Lord, may we/Evermore be led to thee…” (52).

The nave and sanctuary shimmered in the candlelight, a contrast to the dim and wet cold outside. And so we celebrated this moment in history, when God the Son moved from the private space, the home, and entered the public space, the temple. The light of heaven entered the darkness of our world. And thus we celebrated with light, the flame from the altar lighting our tiny wicks, the candles held so carefully, so hopefully, and we turned to light the next. 

We held our flaming candles as the Gospel was read from the central aisle. In this passage, Luke 2:22+, the elders Simeon and Anna witness the appearance of their Messiah. They had waited and prayed; they had been promised this moment. Simeon took the child in his arms, blessed God, and said, 

‘Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace, according to thy word: for mine eyes have seen thy salvation, which thou hast prepared before the face of all people; a light to lighten the Gentiles, and the glory of thy people Israel…’

These words, “Simeon’s Song,” have become a treasured part of our Evening Prayer Office. We re-affirm that we too have seen this salvation, we have seen this light that enlightens, we too know this glory that came to us from the People of Israel.

Today we ended the season of Christmas, forty days after this most holy birth-day, a time span set by Jewish law, the “law of the Lord.” Today we re-affirmed that the light of the world has come and continues to dwell among us, with us, enlightening us.

The Magdalene Mystery is largely about affirming that light. How do we know this remarkable God-story is true? How should we treat those first-century documents we call the Gospels? How do we know that the account of the empty tomb is an accurate witness? Did Mary Magdalene even exist, let alone see the risen Christ?

From Dan Brown to the Jesus Seminar to the “New Atheists,” folks have spent a good deal of time and energy trying to prove the Incarnation and the Resurrection did not happen. There must be much at stake. And there is. 

My little novel has been roaming the world since June 2013 when it first was released, when it was born. As an author I feel like a mother who has given birth and sent my child, my words, out into the world to fare one way or another, to hopefully provide a flickering flame to lighten some of the darkness.

So it is a sweet moment of delight that I experience this weekend, a time in which The Magdalene Mystery has been honored on this weekend of Candlemas, when Mary presented her son to the temple, and thus to the world. 

And now, as I glance out my window, I see the sun has burst upon my watered garden, turning the grays to greens. And I believe I see a dusting of snow on the top of Mount Diablo. 

Deo Gratias.

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The Light of the World

Posted on January 5, 2014 | Leave a comment

My Christmas tree is falling in upon itself. The branches no longer reach out. They bend down, spilling an even deeper sweetness into the room. As I gazed upon the tree last night, with the mini-lights still multicolored and twinkling, it was as though the tree had become solid and whole, no longer made of many parts, many decorations. The tinsel garlands had merged into dim shadowy beds of green needles. The miniature Raggedy Anns that I had strung across the apron of the tree, slept silently in their soft nests. One ornament had been batted down by one of our cats and its shards long ago swept up. But the others had sunk further into the dark hollows and had moved in. Even the star with its sideways tilt seemed happy with this home. The tree was nearly alive. 

I have become used to the Christmas tree occupying a corner of the room. My evening routine included lighting the tree so neighbors could see it through our arching windows. But the Twelve Days of Christmastide are nearing an end. I shall have to take the tree down soon. I shall have to remove the mini-churches dangling precariously from bits of wire, the red and gold balls with their fine filigree, the cut glass baubles with their Victorian fringe. I shall pause over each one, thinking when and where it was found or who gave it to me. The tree holds much of my family history, much of my past. 

With the turn of the year, as we round the corner and find ourselves in 2014, we turn our hearts and minds as well. We have pondered the old year and now embrace the new. We look ahead; we resolve to be better. We put away childish things, as St. Paul says, and don garments that bear the weight of adulthood, the resiliency of responsibility, the solemnity of choice. How shall we spend our numbered days in 2014? 

Those days grow longer, as the thin piercing light of winter takes on the mantle of spring. Already I’ve noticed the extra light, and it’s only been two weeks since the solstice. But the sun is still low in the sky, blinding in the beginnings and endings of the day, as though accusing me with its circle of seeing. I cannot hide in the shadow of winter. I must face the light of Epiphany and the new New Year. 

Shadow. Light. In the thin piercing light of the New Year, in the brightness of Epiphany’s traveling star, I resolve to watch and pray. I resolve to listen with greater care to hear God’s voice, discern his will for me. I resolve to begin my day with the aid of prayer and end it with the light of confession, to peer into my heart and expose the shadow. The wise men followed the star because they watched the heavens. They found the manger with its hosts of angels and dazzling light. They fell on their knees and worshiped, offering the Christ Child gold for his kingship, frankincense for his priesthood, and myrrh for his burial. I too want to follow that blazing star to Bethlehem. I too want to offer gifts. 

Christina Rossetti (1830-1894) wrote in her poem, “In the Bleak Midwinter”:

Angels and archangels may have gathered there,
Cherubim and seraphim thronged the air;
But His mother only, in her maiden bliss,
Worshipped the beloved with a kiss.
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 my heart.
 

Epiphany means “manifestation,” a revealing, and this visit of the gentile kings to the newborn Messiah enlightens the entire world of mankind, embraces all nations and all races. God is made manifest. Now one of us, he gives us a way to partake in his divinity, if we choose to do so. As one of us, taking on our flesh, Christ pulls us to him. With him we rise. With him we open Heaven’s door. 

As I take down my Christmas tree, I know that I have been once again reborn in that moment in Bethlehem. Christ is the star that lights the dead tree of our dying world, so that when our own flesh falls in upon itself on the last of our numbered days, we shall “rise to the life eternal.”

Yet what can I give him as I enter this glorious Epiphanytide? It’s so simple. I can give him my heart.

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New Israel Baptism

Posted on August 25, 2013 | 1 comment

Our rector is Jewish. A number of years ago he converted to Christianity while a student at Cal Berkeley. Last year he accepted our call to become our parish priest. For us, he brings a rich Old Testament background to our community of faithful and we are grateful for his fiery and brilliant sermons. For him, I believe, he finds in our Anglican worship a rich liturgy flowering from Jewish roots in both word and action.

We have other Jewish converts in our midst, folks that came to believe the long awaited Messiah was indeed born in Bethlehem two thousand years ago, lived, died, and was resurrected so that we might be resurrected too. But they also are drawn here by incense, chants, bells, and soaring worship, by the beauty of holiness lauded in the singing of the Psalms.

I was thinking about this as I witnessed baby Joshua being baptized in church this morning. One of Joshua’s grandparents is Jewish, so his baptism added another Hebraic stream to our river of faithful. Through water and Spirit, through the words of the priest and the vows of the godparents, Joshua became one with the Body of Christ, our New Israel.

Our New Israel. For in spite of the horrific conflicts between Jews and Christians over two millennia, orthodox Christianity holds that Christ did not found a new church but was the fulfillment of the old, promised by God to Israel through the prophets. As Christians, we are an extension, as it were, of Judaism. And in baptism those outside the New Israel, outside the Church, are brought inside; those not a part of the Body become one with the Body of Christ. When Joshua is twelve (or so), he will be confirmed by the bishop. He will receive the Holy Eucharist and become one with Christ in an even deeper and more fulfilling way.

The Good Shepherd finds his sheep, no matter how scattered they may be. They may be from older traditions, different traditions, or no traditions at all. They may be clinging to a mountainside of doubt, fleeing a burning forest of anger, lost in a desert of despair and loneliness. The shepherd finds them and brings them home to safety, to love.

Our preacher said today that Christianity provides the map to Heaven, both in this life and the next. Some parents say they want their children to grow up with no faith so that they can choose when they are adults. But why wouldn’t we want to give our children maps to Heaven? our preacher asked. Why wouldn’t we want to give them directions, signposts, lights to light the path? If we know how to get there, shouldn’t we show them the way? 

God gave the Old Israel a map. God’s people journeyed from Abraham to Isaac to Jacob to Joseph to Moses to Joshua, from the kings through the prophets, through wars and persecutions and slavery. They drew close to God and drew away from God, but God always brought them back to him. His people were clearly chosen, clearly set apart. And Christians too, as the New Israel, are chosen. They are sanctified, set apart. This happens in baptism in the miracle of water and Spirit. This happens when the Children of Israel, or any of us who are wandering in the desert, are baptized into the Body of Christ, and we are set on the road to Heaven. We are given a map.

The Gospel today was the story of the Good Samaritan, a parable reaching beyond one’s own people, one’s own tradition. While the story is about love, about caring for a man beaten and robbed and left for dead on the side of the road, it is also about prejudice and fear. Two Jews – a priest and a Levite – pass by on the other side, ignoring the victim, whose blood would make them unclean. A Samaritan, considered outcast by the Jews, stops, binds his wounds, brings him to an inn, cares for him, and even pays the innkeeper to continue the care.

This morning, our Jewish priest poured water on the head of Joshua, saying, “In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.”  Another sheep was brought into our fold. Another child of Israel was made one with God in the Body of Christ through water and Spirit.

And as for me, I am thankful that I too have a map to Heaven.

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