In the sanctuary and on the streets, alleluias and shared bread

Text posted first on Facebook last night.

 

Brewer Fountain, Boston Common

Two profoundly beautiful worship experiences today.

The first in the morning at Emmanuel Church in the City of Boston with Mendelssohn anthem; let's-tackle-this-one sermon with focused biblical analysis by the Rev. Pam Werntz; three baptisms; thanksgiving for 10 years of marriage equality; bread and wine blessed and shared; the final Bach cantata of Emmanuel Music's 2013-14 cantata season, glorious in praise and beauty. Candles and the play of light. Alleluias in hearts and voices.

The second, also with alleluias, a bit later in a very different setting: on Boston Common with Common Cathedral (often spelled common cathedral w/ no caps) in a congregation of mostly homeless men and women with some housed people as well, a dynamic young woman leading worship, and a youth group serving sandwich lunch before the service. A message of God's unconditional love for all and of God's very presence in our midst, a highly participatory service, with a structure but a lot of spontaneity (same structure as the other Sunday Eucharist but much simpler, pared down), and heartfelt Prayers of the People. Ragged at the edges in all the right ways, reverent, raw, with much assurance of forgiveness and comfort. Bread and grape juice blessed and shared. Sunlight, clouds, wind, the play of light.

Communion and contemplation in both places. And welcome. And song. And healing.

Not either/or. Both/and. The Church is a wide, deep, and diverse reality. Alleluia.

Emmanuel Church before the liturgy, 5th Sunday of Easter

Photos here are of parts of the worship space, the physical context. I don't take photos during worship; we do have photographers at Emmanuel who document some of our celebrations;  photographers and writers about common cathedral respect the anonymity and privacy of participants.

This is the night...

Lève-toi, réveille-toi d'entre les morts!

Click photo to enlarge and see detail.

See here and here for more from Kariye (Chora) in Istanbul.
Click the French line above for Resurrection chant from Taizé.

Holocaust map - Europe and the teaching of 20th century theology

The link to this map doesn't work, but I saved the image as a jpg.

I am linking a Facebook post to this since the link is cranky and refuses to show up on Facebook.

Make sure you click on the image to enlarge it. (Click twice and it will get really big and detailed.)

Post on Facebook:

Map for the little darlings to study. Yeah, I'm teaching a Christian theology course and they are also getting a good dose of theological vocabulary & questions. But woe unto those who study European theologies in the mid-20th century & after without looking this in the face. And without asking whether & how this affects the questions & the language. And how we understand God. And how theology & ethics are related. And what responsibilities Christians bear.

End of speech. I'm off to edit the Tome.

An Open Letter to Anne Rice

My open letter to Anne Rice, an essay on the church, its flaws, and why you can't be a Jesus-person alone in a corner, is up at the Episcopal Café.

Feel free to circulate prn.

Cross-posted on Facebook.

A brilliant new book: geeks and prayer types please note

A Californian acquaintance of mine by the name of Sistertech has written a truly brilliant, not to mention humorous and touching, book of prayers.

Sistertech transmits her spiritual writings via my friend Pamela Hood, Ph.D., a professor of philosophy in San Francisco, and I recently received a copy of this Book of Uncommon Prayer. Here are a few samples from it.


1.1 Prayers for Morning

1.1.1
May The One in Charge bless us this day, keep us from evil viruses, and bring us stable wireless connectivity. Amen.

1.1.4
Dear One In Charge,
You have brought us in safety to this new day:
Preserve us and our tech devices
with your mighty power,
that we may not fall into sin,
or be overcome by phishing scams, spyware, viruses,
or other adversities;
and in all we do, direct us to the fulfilling of your purpose.
Amen.

1.1.5
A Morning Psalm for Social Media Users
Open my _____ (state name of social media program or website),
O One in Charge,
and my tweets shall proclaim your praise.
Create in me a clean cache
and renew a right spirit of updating within me.
Cast me not away from my Twitter stream,
take not your holy inspiration from me.
Give me the joy of sending tweets again.
Sustain me with bountiful followers
and plenty of content to retweet.
Amen.

1.4 Prayers for Sleep

1.4.1.
O One In Charge,
while our bodies and computers rest
from the labors of the day
and as our RAM, caches, and our souls are released
from the thoughts of this world,
grant that we may stand in your presence
with tranquility, quietness, and peace.
Amen.

1.5 Prayers Before and After Meals

1.5.5.
O One in Charge,
bless this caffeine to our use
and us to thy service.
Amen.

1.5.6
Bless the bunch that munch
this lunch.
Amen.

1.5.7.
O One in Charge, Giver of all good things,
may this food and drink restore our strength,
giving new energy to tired limbs,
and new thoughts to weary minds.
Amen.

2.0 Traditional Prayers (Fran, you will love this one)

2.2. Hail Holy External Drive

Hail, holy two terabyte storage drive,
mother of mercy,
Hail keeper of our life's work,
our sweetest digital files,
and our hope of promotion.

To thee do we cry,
poor banished children of incessant computer crashes;
to these do we send up our sighs,
mourning and weeping
in this valley of infected and corrupted files.

Turn, then, most gracious defender,
thine eyes of mercy toward us;
and after this, our exile,
show unto us the blessed repository of our files:

O clement, O loving, O sweet
terabyte drive.

Pray for us, O perfect external drive,
that we may be made worthy of thy promises of safety.
Amen.

There are prayers to various appropriate saints as well.

There is also a wonderful rendition of the Prayer of Saint Francis, but I will not reproduce it here. You'll have to buy the book!

4.0 The Collects

4.6.2.
For Those Who Offer Technical Support

O One In Charge,
we pray that your grace may always precede and follow
those who offer technical support on their service calls.
May they continually do good work
and not make matters worse.
Amen.

Under 5.4, Ministration to the Sick, there are prayers for sick computers, for the restoration of a hard drive, for computer repair personnel, and so on.

There are also Various & Sundry General Prayers & Thanksgivings including a System Administrator's Prayer for Wellbeing and a prayer For Victims of Gaming Addiction and, of course, For Tech Devices We Love.

I particularly like the Reconciliation of a Penitent, which includes the following:

Penitent:
I confess to The One In Charge,
to geeks everywhere, and to you,
that I have sinned by my own fault
in thought, word, and deed, in things done and left undone;
especially for
__________
__________
__________
__________
___________

(attach digital file if more space is needed.)

For these and all other transgressions which I cannot now remember,
I am truly sorry.
I pray The One In Charge to have mercy on me.
I firmly intend to get a grip,
wake up,
and smell the coffee,
and I humbly beg forgiveness of The One in Charge
and all tech devices,
and I ask you for counsel, direction, and absolution.

Here the witness may offer the penitent counsel, comfort, absolution or a hard time.

Witness:
Chill out.
Everything's copacetic.
The One In Charge has deleted all your sins.

Penitent:
Whew! Thank God!

And just in case one of your machines has a birthday today...

6.11 For a Birthday of a Tech Device
Watch over this device, O One In Charge,
as its days increase;
bless and guide it wherever it may be.
Strengthen it where it is turned on;
comfort it when it receives error messages;
raise it up if it is dropped;
and in its memory
may thy peace which passeth understanding
abide
all the days of its life.
Amen.

And there are, of course, Sistertech's Ten Commandments. Do not drink coffee while reading them. Especially when you read the Sixth Commandment:

"Thou shalt not kill thy laptop by spilling within it half-caf/half-decaf, 2%, extra tall, double mochas or any other fluids."

The Sabbath-keeping and no-adultery commandments are good, too.

The Faith FAQ is terrific.

Now this is a book that "prays well."

The book is on sale at 15% discount till August 15 and it is also available as an e-book in pdf form if you prefer.

I know I've posted two pieces of book p.r. in a row, but it's summer, a good time for reading. You will also need this tech-y prayer book when fall comes along, or long before that if you have anything to do with a computer. Yes, you.

Postcript to the Adorable Godson: Don't you dare buy this: I'm sending you one as a new-tech-job present.

Thoughts on church, change, and living the Gospel: more from Sölle and Naudé (1985)

A follow-up on yesterday's post.

From earlier in the 1985 interview with Beyers Naudé and Dorothee Sölle:  

Naudé:
 
... If we mean by the church mainly the institution, the structure, the visible, traditional symbols, then I believe that the church, in that sense, will experience one crisis after another, until it comes to the recognition, understanding, that the church, in the real sense of the word, is where the people of God are, where life is being discovered again, the true meaning of love, of human community, of mutual concern for one another, of caring of people, of seeking true meaningful relationship, understand between people, not only between Christians but between all people. Therefore, in that sense I am very hopeful about what is happening, not only in our country [South Africa], but also in other countries, because there are new perspectives, of the Christian faith and of truth, which are being discovered and which are being, as it were, agonized about by so many small groups of people... If I think of South Africa, what encourages me is the fact that sometimes the most meaningful revelation about a new understanding of Christian faith and about the Christian church and about Christian community comes from the poorest, comes from those communities which are normally not seen to be the ones with authority or with power, or comes from those who normally never believe themselves to have any real message. But when you begin to listen to what they are saying, it is absolutely marvellous ... to discover how little I know and how much I need to be constantly converted, in my whole understanding, in my whole willingness, therefore, in true humility to sit at the feet of such people, and learn and hear. ...In that sense I believe there is a tremendous future for the Christian community in the world.

Sölle:

I agree... I think the growth of the true church today comes not from within but from the outside, from the peace groups, from the women's groups, from those groups who in certain fields of post-Christian culture live and think and understand more and more the meaning of the gospel, rather than those who claim to be masters of the gospel, namely those white male, middle-class theologians. ... I think that there is a growth of faith in new forms all over the world, and some of the signs of it are very classical signs, it's base communities..., it is martyrdom, which is one of the classical signs of where does the church live and grow. We in the first world, in relative freedom, don't experience martyrdom in the strict sense of the word. But I think we have to prepare ourselves and others in our midst for more restrictions, discrimination. The price to be a Christian will be higher in the next twenty years, will become higher and higher; it will be much tougher, if you really want to be a Christian. ...I think Christ didn't promise us victory. I think that would be an illusion. Christ promised us life, and that includes death. Christ didn't tell us that we would win. Other people tell us that all the time... We hope to win; we fight to win; we give our blood and our lives... but I think we cannot understand our own struggle in terms of success and non-success.

Hope for Faith: A Conversation

jointly published by Eerdmans and the World Council of Churches in 1986

A post on a related topic (Sölle on the church), from last summer: click here.

This post is especially in response to Claire's comment in the previous post.

Taking the long view

C.F. Beyers Naudé and Dorothee Sölle, at the end of a long interview-conversation in 1985.

(Published first in Dutch --the conversation took place in the Netherlands-- the interview came out in English as Hope for Faith: A Conversation, jointly published by Eerdmans and the World Council of Churches in 1986.)

Sölle:

I think Christ didn't promise us victory... Christ promised us life, and that includes death. Christ didn't tell us that we would win. Other people tell us that all the time... We hope to win; we fight to win; we give our blood and our lives... but I think we cannot understand our own struggle in terms of success and non-success.

Naudé:

Well, the question that I would like to put to you would be this: Do you, in yourself, have the strength to endure whatever may come to you by way of disappointment, by way of rejection, by way of non-recognition, by way of waiting, perhaps your whole life, without being able to participate in the victory of the truth that you are standing for? Do you believe that you will be able to sustain yourself through these years up to the very end?

Sölle:

I am thinking of a friend's answer to that when I was in a state of despair, and had this sense of meaninglessness and never reaching anything, and then he talked about the cathedrals which were built during the Middle Ages. Most of them were built over 200 years, some over 300 years even, and some of the workers in those cathedrals never saw the whole building, they never went to pray there, they never saw the glass and all the beautiful things they gave their life for. And then this friend said to me: "Listen, Dorothee, we who are building the cathedral of peace, maybe we won't see it either. We will die before it is complete, and yet we are going to build it. We are going on even if we won't live in that building." 

XXX

xxx

Good news re: the Adorable Godson

The Adorable Godson has a job!  Hurrah for him.  It didn't take long for him to find it.  He graduated with his second bachelor's degree in May (physics - the first bachelor's was a couple of years ago with a double major in computer science and math) and received the job offer about a month later.  He will be doing Serious Tech-y Things for an Interesting and Useful Company beginning in July.  The company is in California, so off he goes ten days from now.  I --and we in his little congregation-- will miss him, but we are all very happy for him and proud of him.  

In addition to this, he got a haircut for the job interview (not a short short one, mind you; he has much too beautiful hair to go for a buzz cut, but the hair was a little too much in his eyes and down toward the shoulders to look professional, even for the high tech world) and looks very handsome. 

Of course this is all very first-time-ish and scary too, so we welcome both your prayers of celebration and your prayers for a smooth landing in the world of full-time employment.  I haven't yet asked him whether I can use his real first name here, so for now, you can just pray for Jane's Adorable Godson and Godde will know quite well whom you mean.  Thanks!

"Photos of a Prophet" - a Romero retrospective and tribute

Andy, in the comments to the previous post, recommended this wonderful pdf-format slide show. It's actually a book available in exhibit form available in slide show form. The wonders of technology!

These are archival photos of Monseñor Romero and his people, from Romero's childhood to the days after his death. Well worth a look.

The exhibit is currently at Grace Cathedral, San Francisco. Information here.

Priests carry Archbishop Romero’s coffin out of the Metropolitam Cathedral of San Salvador, March 30, 1980. Photo: Private collection of the Photography Center of El Salvador

Last year's sermon for Advent I

In the process of working on Sunday's sermon, I looked back at last year's sermon for the First Sunday of Advent.

The theme of mindfulness will be there this year, too. Beyond that, well, we'll all have to wait till Sunday to see what else comes up. Still pondering.

Beware, keep alert; for you do not know when the time will come. ... And what I say to you I say to all: Keep awake. (Mark 13:33, 37)

Greensboro and Triad area folks: you're always welcome to join us at St. Mary's House, 11 a.m. Sundays.

Icon: Our Lady of the New Advent, by William Hart McNichols

Sölle on limits, transcendence, and the Communion of Saints

At a peace gathering

We’re not only ten thousand I said
there are more of us here
the dead of both wars
are with us

A journalist came and asked
how could I know that
haven’t you seen them
i ask the clueless guy
haven’t you heard your grandmother
groaning when they started it up again
do you live all alone
without any dead who drop in
for a drink with you
do you really think
you are only yourself

****--Dorothee Sölle

******The Mystery of Death

******2007 (posthumous book - Sölle died in 2003 with the manuscript in draft)

The English version of the poem is by the book's translators, Nancy Lukens-Rumscheidt and Martin Lukens-Rumscheidt. The German original, "Auf einer Friedensversammlung," appeared in Dorothee Sölle, Loben ohne Lugen (Berlin, Wolfgang Fietkau, 2000).

Photo by the blogger New York Portraits, 2008.

Dorothee Sölle on the church

As promised in the post below.


I believe in jesus christ
who was right when he
like each of us
just another individual who couldn’t beat city hall
worked to change the status quo
and was destroyed
looking at him I see
how our intelligence is crippled
our imagination stifled
our efforts wasted
because we did not live as he did
every day I am afraid
that he died in vain
because he is buried in our churches

from "Credo"

in Dorothee Soelle

Revolutionary Patience

translated by Rita and Robert Kimber

Maryknoll: Orbis, 1977

*****In the face of the Christian church and its role in the First world, I feel alienation, aversion, disgust, and sometimes even shame. I see this empirical church as a structure "from above," based on injustice and continually betraying it s own truth. I often think that the church is like Judas, who handed Christ over to the established religious authorities. Sometimes I think that the church is like the other disciples who, discouraged and defeated, left Jesus alone and fled. And then there are times when I think the church is like Peter, who denied that he had ever known anything about peace and justice. Very seldom do I see the church, like Peter, shedding bitter tears.

*****Nevertheless, I have never regarded myself as post-Christian. I have also experienced something other than what I have just described. I have seen the church in a group of women who did not flee, who stayed, and on Easter Sunday went to the tomb because the one who had gone was not dead for them. However, my overwhelmingly bad experiences have changed my image of the church. It is not a house for me any longer; instead, it is a tent for the wandering people of God. Then tent is not always where I am, but sooner or later I encounter the tent people again --on the street or in the courtroom. The sacred is not so much a building or an institution as an event, something that happens. Not long ago Daniel Berrigan, in conversation, employed the image of an umbrella that shelters us from the cold rain. Sometimes it opens too slowly, and we are left standing in the rain. Sometimes it is not very effective. Still, it is there, and I would not want to be without it. But the image of the church that continues to impress me most is that of an old woman looking for food in a garbage can --an unmarried mother with bent back, unattractive, unhealthy, of indeterminate age-- my older sister, whom I need and who needs me.

*****I suspect that the post-Christians do not want to have anything to do with the dialectic of a religious institution. But it is just this self-contradictory experience of the church as traitor and the church as sister that stares me in the face, and I have to live with it. Post-Christianity seems to me like a slick formula that covers up the two-sided encounter with the church and reduces it to the "church from above." Then the church from below is forgotten, and with it what tradition has identifies as the "mystical body of Christ."

Dorothee Soelle

The Window of Vulnerability: A Political Spirituality

Translated by Linda M. Maloney
Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1990

Photos:
Homeless woman and bicycle, Oslo, Norway (BBC)
Dorothee Sölle

Prayers for Deenie, who moves closer to death

The friend who keeps me posted on Deenie's condition writes that Deenie is getting weaker and is in greater pain. She says that Hospice has not been on the ball with the pain meds. Presumably she is now advocating for better palliative care. There is a private aide on duty with Deenie at her home, originally trained as a nurse on another continent, and she is great. Another friend says Deenie feels ready to go. She knows we are praying for her.

I had been thinking of Deenie more intensely the last two or three days and was not surprised to receive this news.

Deenie received the anointing of the sick from the Hospice chaplain a few days ago in the presence of several friends and a neighbor (who is also a friend). Today two women will visit her, including a mutual friend of ours who is a poet -- very glad she will be there, as she will be able to find the right mix of song, word, and silence.

Please pray in accompaniment of Deenie as she moves into her final days and hours.

Almighty God, look on this your servant, lying in great weakness, and comfort her with the promise of life everlasting, given in the resurrection of your Son Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

A Prayer for a Person near Death, The Book of Common Prayer

I'm still here, just writing...

... and editing, in those rare summer moments of quiet and solitude of which I get so little during the year.

Also mowing the lawn, griping about muggy weather, and enjoying being with my cat and my congregation again.

On Saturday, I chaired my last meeting (as Chair - I'm staying on the committee) of the Bishop's Committee for Racial Justice and Reconciliation of the Episcopal Diocese of North Carolina.

And then of course there are naps. And the bureaucracy ye shall have always with you.

I still plan to write here about Halifax, about which I continue to think fond thoughts.

Patience, my turtledoves.

Hiroshige, "Tree of Good Writing." More info here.

Are we having fun yet?

Friends of this blog will recognize (or see for the first time) the faces of some notorious bloggers.

L to R:

The not-so-blushing-but-quite-radiant bride, Doxy, whom I know both on blog and IRL (we are both in North Carolina and trouble-mak... er, active in the same Episcopal diocese);

the Canon to the Extraordinary, humble servant to +Maya Pavlova, FBE;

and FranIAm.

Yes, that is an empty glass of Shiraz. Photo by the Byzigenous Buddhapalian. (Click to enlarge.) For more photos, see his blog and Fran's Facebook page. Peace out.

A reminder from the feline bishop, for your health

People are often tired and overwrought at this time in the spring. The resident feline bishop thus begs to remind you of her pastoral letter, "On the Necessity of Naps." Read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest.

Note: The bishop is currently napping, but the Canon to the Extraordinary, who is posting this note, is not doing so because she slept almost all morning. This exempts one from napping in the afternoon, though in cases of major necessity one can make exemptions to the exemption.

Grace, peace, and purrs to you from the Right Reverend and Right Honorable Maya Pavlova, Feline Bishop Extraordinaire. Now go and have a nap. Or two.

Cecilia's Sunday sermon

Read it.

This sermon is the Sunday worship follow-up to this and this.

I have two words in response: wow and amen.


Music for the occasion: Four movements from the same piece (Bach's Magnificat) from which I posted in the last two updates on Cecilia.

This is out of order since it is the 2d movement, but it is appropriate: Et exsultavit.

And the next two movements: Quia respexit and (especially) Omnes generationes.

And this, the 11th movement: Sic locutus.

Cecilia coming-out-to-congregation update

Cecilia, about whom I posted an update two nights ago, has more news now about her coming out to her congregation.

Things have gone well so far. The congregation loves and knows Cecilia and appreciates what a good pastor she is. This is guiding the congregation's response.

There will be tough times ahead since the denomination to which Cecilia and her congregation belong is one that does not allow out lesbian and gay people to pastor. Pray for Cecilia, for her Beloved, for the congregation, and for the church, that the love of Christ may lead and surround them, that Godde may remind them daily that they are beloved and created by Godde, that the Spirit may guide and sustain them.

I am remembering also what many lesbian, bisexual, and gay friends have told me -- that coming out is not a one-time event but a process, and that coming out happens many times over time. Still, this event for Cecilia is perhaps the most important. She came out to close friends, to her children, and more recently to her father (see follow-up with her dad here) and to a few colleagues before telling the congregation.

Some music for the occasion, following up on the music selection from the previous post on Cecilia's coming out. Same piece, different movement, one of the most powerful.

Cecilia's meeting with the congregation leaders

Here's an update from Cecilia on her meeting. It went well!

A little music for the occasion.

Prayer Posse request, part I

It seems, in this annus horribilis (yes, it has been, on and off, a horrible year, in academe and elsewhere, in largely unbloggable ways) as if I have not offered much spiritual nourishment here except for a few sermons and icons of both human saints and the fabulous four-legged feline bishop. But perhaps making intercessory prayer and requests for intercessory prayer public is a ministry in itself. I thank you for yours. And again I offer mine, in the form of requests. (By the way, the year wasn't entirely horribilis. My friends and family are the best. Things could be much worse. So stop worrying, already.)

This first request is for my friend and colleague in ministry, Cecilia. She is a member of a different church from mine, one that could impose serious sanctions on her and her ministry for coming out as a lesbian. She has been blogging for quite some time at Closeted Pastor. She did not start blogging with the conscious intention of coming out. Those of us who commented and joined her circle of conversation did not urge her either toward staying in the closet or toward leaving it. We accompanied Cecilia. In her time and Godde's time she made the decision to come out, and tomorrow she will come out to her congregation's governing board, and Thursday to her congregation.

Please accompany Cecilia in prayer if you feel moved to do so. I pray for her, in thanksgiving for her deeply pastoral ministry and for her courage, for her Beloved, and for her church. She is peaceful and has prayed through this decision. If only the Church in all its manifestations were as loving as Jesus, we would have nothing to fear. But even with fear, we have with us an Advocate. In Godde's Holy Spirit, which is the Spirit of Jesus, we go forth.

As a straight ally, I pray that I will keep faith with my lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgendered friends and that I will not step back from standing with them as they bravely go forth, wanting only to live and love as Godde created and called them. Pray for Cecilia. Pray for the Church.

_______________
Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, "At the Moulin Rouge: Two Women Waltzing"