By Rev. Jimmy Pickett We have a choice to make – as a people, as a community, as a nation. That choice is played out in this morning’s Lessons from Scripture. I’m not talking about a choice about party alliance, or political issues or ideologies, I’m taking about the choice between violence and mercy, between hatred and grace. In our Gospel from Mark this morning, we hear of the martyrdom of John the Baptist under the corruption of King Herod. A birthday party that sounds like an episode of Game of Thrones stands in stark contrast to the abundant Grace and blessing upon blessing that we hear in the Letter to the Ephesians and the joyful dancing that comes when God’s people gather together to bring the Ark of the Covenant, the footstool of God, into the Holy City of Bethlehem. Although, there are a few short words that come just after King David is dancing with joy – “she despised him in her heart”. In our Gospel we hear of grudges, and scandal, and greed leading to a gross display of power and disregard for the dignity of another human being – the head of John the Baptist on a platter. This morning, I wear this orange stole, a symbol of lament that is inspired by the Bishops United Against Gun Violence, because there are too many stories in our world today that sound too close to this scene. There are too many innocent victims in the world because anger and fear are allowed to have the upper hand while mercy and justice are seen as weakness. Just yesterday, two people were killed and two others critically injured at a political rally in Pennsylvania. We have a choice. Will we let hatred for the other win the day or will we lean on the Beloved and allow the way of non-violence to show the world the Mystery of Grace revealed in the God we follow? Elsewhere in the Gospels, when talk of division comes up among the disciples about who is the greatest, Jesus immediately stops that debate and calls them to instead love and serve each other during the Last Supper as Luke tells us. And then in the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus tells Peter to put away his sword when he tries to protect Jesus. As Christians, we are called to live in a new way of loving our enemies – the freely given gift of the Grace of God working in our hearts can uproot the hatred, the grudges, the grief, and the fear that leads to spiritual and sometimes even physical violence. Hatred hurts the one who is hated, the one who hates, and the whole of society. Grace and Mercy heal wounds, bind up and build up relationships, and cause communities and Creation to flourish. As Episcopalians, we have two Great Sacraments that help us to feel in our hearts and hands the Grace of God which passes all understanding. In our Baptism, the words of Ephesians ring as we are signed, sealed, and delivered by the Grace freely bestowed by the abiding presence of the Holy Spirit. We also have the Baptismal Covenant to help guide us as we live into our calling – “Will you strive for justice and peace among all people and respect the dignity of every human being?” (even the ones I really don’t want to) I will, with God’s help. In the Eucharist, we are caught up in the Life, Death, and Resurrection of Jesus, who descends to hold us by the hand, to nourish and strengthen us in our calling to be the Body of Christ, loving and healing, in the world around us. Grace is freely offered; all we are called to do is lift up our heart and then go in peace to love and serve our neighbors in Jesus’ name. May God mercifully receive our prayer and give us the Grace and power to beat our swords into plows and our spears into pruning hooks, that the Good Fruits of the Gospel of Love Incarnate may grow in the soil of this land.
0 Comments
By The Rev. Ted Thornton From the Gospel of Mark Chapter 6: verses three and four: “Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary and brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon, and are not his sisters here with us? And they took offense at him.” How do you respond when someone close to you abruptly changes course and you either aren’t sure or you just plain don’t like what you see? When your son or daughter says to you one day, “Mom or Dad, I want to spend my life working at vocation A,” when what you’ve wished for in that person you gave birth to and raised all those years is that they will work at vocation B, how do you respond? When your grown son or daughter chooses a life partner very different from the one you were expecting and invites him or her to dinner, how do you respond? When your son or daughter says one day, “Mom or Dad, I’m gay,” or, ”I don’t identify with my birth gender,” how do you respond? It*s easy to assume we’re living through an era when identities of all kinds are in flux. Advertisers call it “rebranding.” More and more companies and individuals are “rebranding” themselves: leaving behind old identities and putting on new ones. But, has it ever been otherwise? I grew up in a small town in Delaware. When I was ordained, some people who remembered me from my college summers working as a carpenter’s helper building homes throughout town shook their heads in astonishment. I had been a full partner in a rough bunch of guys on that construction crew. Some of my buddies on that crew remembered me cussing with the best of them when I made mistakes or when I hit my thumb with my hammer. And, some fellow sailors in the Navy who knew me well and with whom I shared some questionable off-base escapades were struck dumb when at the end of my four year enlistment they watched me head off to divinity school (“Divinity school? You? Really?”). Some years later in Jerusalem, I studied with Hebrew University Professor Shmuel Safrai, considered by many the world’s leading expert on Jerusalem’s Second Temple period during which Jesus lived. He argued that Jesus wasn’t just a carpenter. He was also a very highly trained rabbi who worked closely with Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek (the language of the Greek Bible, the Septuagint, composed in the third century BCE). In fact, he had memorized huge portions of the Bible: his Bible, the Hebrew Bible, the “Old Testament.” He either studied in person with prominent rabbis such as Hillel or was deeply influenced by them. He was trained to adjudicate Jewish law in civil disputes. Expertise in that alone was and still is among orthodox Jews a skill that requires years of training. So, how do we square Jesus the rough and ready carpenter with Jesus the rabbi? This is the problem confounding the Nazarenes, the folks who watched Jesus grow up. The general fact is that rabbis in Jesus time often did work in more than one vocation, so apart from how he’s received in his hometown of Nazareth, it wasn’t a big deal. Saint Paul, also a rabbi and an expert in rabbinical scholarship and reasoning, earned his living making tents. There are only two passages in the New Testament that explicitly refer to the Jesus’ his neighbors thought they knew as Jesus the carpenter: today’s (Mark 6:3) and Matthew 13:55. The Greek word in both cases is τέκτων (tektone), a word better translated as “master builder,” not just a carpenter, but a person skilled in many of the building trades, especially limestone, of which there has always been an abundance in Palestine compared to wood which has been quite scarce since Greco-Roman times when whole forests were cut down to build Greek and Roman mercantile and naval vessels. In Jesus’ case, his hands were rough and calloused with labor and his mind was quick with Jewish law and philosophy. But, our problem today begins and ends with the fact that Jesus is no longer a “good ol’ boy” from Nazareth. His neighbors don’t like what they’re now seeing and hearing. And so, we are drawn into the vehemence and the violence with which Jesus’ Nazaene neighbors respond to his new life as a rabbi. Vehemence and violence! There are two passages that shed a poor light on Jesus’ Nazarene neighbors: Luke 4:14-30, where in verse 29, the townspeople drove him out of town and tried to throw him off a cliff. And, John 1:46, where we hear Nathanael saying to Philip, “Can there any good thing come out of Nazareth?” Nazareth was a tough town in a hardscrabble region. The problem of how we should respond to radical change in the personal life of someone we have known and loved cuts to the heart of one of the most vexing aspects of our human nature. Aristotle said human beings are political animals. He regarded politics as even more important than ethics, the realm of individual behavior and standards. His focus was on society, especially the rules by which communities govern themselves. Contemporary historian Keith Michael Baker defines politics more broadly as “making claims...the activity through which individuals and groups in any society articulate, negotiate, implement, and enforce competing claims they make upon one another and upon the whole.” Baker’s definition tracks closer to the kinds of politics Aristotle advocated for our individual lives. He taught the “golden mean.” The golden mean is the goal we should aim for in our dealings with others, the “happy medium,” many call it. Happy? Sometimes, it’s a pretty unhappy medium, isn’t it? Compromise? How many know the meaning of that word anymore in our society? What claims are Jesus’ neighbors in Nazareth trying to assert upon him? What claims do you and I make upon others, especially those close to us? Are these claims all fair? Do they aim for Aristotle’s golden mean? What happens when they don’t? In our personal lives? In our lives as a nation? We like to speak of these claims using the softer word: “expectations” when the harder but more truthful word is “claims.” The golden mean is a value that has been sought for millennia across a variety of world religions. Confucius called it chun yung (“the middle way”). The Buddha also taught the middle way using the Sanskrit term madhyama-pratipad. Muhammad used the Arabic word iqtisad advocating moderation in all things. The ancient Greeks carved the inscription μηδὲν ἄγαν- meden agan - “Nothing in excess” - on the lintel of their Temple of Apollo at Delphi, right next to the more familiar one: “Know thyself!” (Greek: Γνῶθι σεαυτόν, gnōthi seauton) Striking the golden mean, the middle way is often very hard. Giving one another time to adjust to change is among the best ways to begin. But, ‘fact is, as we all know, relationships can be permanently broken. And, where repair is possible, it can take a long time. One way to begin is to examine ourselves for signs of narcissism and nostalgia. Narcissus is the dandy of Greek myth who falls in love with his reflection in a pond and thereby becomes stuck, unable to grow, unable to live in genuine community with others, so self-absorbed he’s unable even to acknowledge the existence of others. Narcissism may be an obstacle to our ability to accept change in ourselves and others. Narcissism begins when we become frozen in our attitudes toward ourselves and others, when, like Peter Pan, we think it’s possible to make time stand still, to live in an eternal childish past, stuck in our ways and wishing everyone around us would do the same. Paul knew the challenges of people having trouble living together in harmony. In First Corinthians 14:20, he writes to his divisive congregation in Corinth, "Brothers, do not be children in your thinking. Be infants in evil, but in your thinking be mature." Narcissism and its cousin nostalgia are signals that part of us is still locked in childhood, that we are resisting changes somewhere in our lives where change may be necessary and more healthful. William Golding’s novel, Lord of the Flies, is one of the best fictional depictions of Paul’s notion of “infants in evil.” A nineteenth century Polish rabbi named Simcha Bunim offered this aid to his followers: write “The world was created for me” on one piece of paper and keep it in one of your pockets. Then, put a different piece of paper in the opposite pocket, with “I am but dust and ashes” written on it. This, he proposed, is a necessary tension. There are other guidelines we could put in our pockets. What would you put in yours? For example, I could write on pieces of paper things to remind me of my human condition: “I am capable of kindness” on one piece of paper and put it in one pocket, then I could write, “I am capable of cruelty” on another and put it in the opposite pocket. Muslims like to put it this way: Everyone walks through life accompanied by two angels: one angel sits on the right shoulder and records all good deeds, while the other sits on the left shoulder and records all bad deeds. In one pocket we might write “Be open to change.” In the other pocket, we might write “Don’t be too open minded.” That latter saying reminds me of something Arthur McKinstry, Bishop of Delaware in my early childhood used to say, “Don’t be so open minded that your brains fall out.” Notice that none of this is about striking a balance. Balance is not the right word here: it’s tension, not balance, isn’t it? We deceive ourselves when we think of the golden mean, the middle way, compromise as a balancing act. We live our lives in tension most of the time, not balance. That’s why life is hard and faith and prayer are so important. Another way to read Paul in that passage from First Corinthians is that once we grow up and leave our childhood behind, we realize that you and I were made to love the world, sometimes even when it hurts; the world was not made to love us. That’s the meaning of sacrificial love. That’s the meaning of the cross. I think in the end, the best way to tolerate the discomfort of tension in our lives is to strive for inclusivity. This doesn’t mean sacrificing our core values, but it does mean giving space where possible for others to live out theirs. In her opening remarks at General Convention in Louisville the other day, House of Deputies President Julia Ayala Harris perhaps said it better than most: “Inclusivity,” she said, “is the sacred work of recognizing the image of God in every person. It means honoring the beautiful diversity of the human family.” And, as Bishop Michael has been telling us over and over again, that’s the center of Jesus’ “m.o.” In which areas of your life will you strive to become more inclusive in the coming weeks and months? Amen. By Rev. Heather J. Blais, Rector Earlier this year, I promised to offer a teaching sermon on the Lord’s Prayer. Today we’ll focus on: how this prayer was introduced; its use within the service of Holy Eucharist; the evolution of the English translation; and finally, how the wider Church interprets this prayer today. And yes, there is a handout (see below), especially designed for the English geeks amongst us. Introducing the Lord’s Prayer Right out of the gate, there was no ‘original’ version of the Lord’s Prayer.* The prayer is presented in two different gospels: Matthew and Luke. The text of the prayer, as preserved in the gospels, is in Greek, and are themselves translations from Aramaic or Hebrew. The versions presented in Mathew and Luke are similar, but quite different. Luke’s version omits any reference to heaven or God’s will being done, and both versions omit the doxology we are familiar with. Liturgically, the Church has generally drawn upon Matthew's version. Fairly early in his gospel, as part of Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount, he tells the disciples: “Pray like this” (CEB6:9). After teaching the Lord’s Prayer, he adds: “If you forgive others their sins, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you don’t forgive others, neither will your Father forgive your sins” (CEB 6:14-15). This might lead us to speculate - is God’s forgiveness conditional? If we want to think in binary terms, sure, that’s one way to read it. But we know God is the original expansive thinker, always nudging us to open our hearts, minds, and souls to see a bigger vision; a deeper understanding of meaning. Our Presiding Bishop Michael Curry once preached: “Mutual forgiveness and repentance, healing and reconciliation are hard work and they often take time. Healing and reconciliation do not happen quickly. But it happens, if we are willing, to allow God’s grace to work in us, for God’s grace is sufficient. God is able.”** I think what Jesus was flagging for us is that the very act of seeking to engage in a process of forgiveness, repentance, healing, and reconciliation requires us to keep ourselves open and willing to receive God’s grace. To trust God is at work within us and within those we seek to forgive; that God’s grace is sufficient and able. Especially given forgiveness is often not a one time thing; it can be hard to give and sometimes, even harder to receive. Forgiveness is an ongoing journey of trust in God’s grace. If our hearts remain hardened, we end up closing ourselves off from God’s grace and forgiveness. Not because God is unwilling to forgive us, but because we have put up a ‘do not enter’ sign, closing ourselves off from God’s grace, of the possibility of giving and receiving forgiveness. Luke offers his version towards the middle of his gospel. “Jesus was praying in a certain place. When he finished, one of his disciples said, ‘Lord, teach us to pray, just as John taught his disciples’” (CEB 11:1). You might even say, they wanted a formula, and so he gave them one. But after teaching them to pray, he goes on to indicate God is always there. Jesus says: “And I tell you: Ask and you will receive. Seek and you will find. Knock and the door will be opened to you. Everyone who asks, receives. Whoever seeks, finds. To everyone who knocks, the door is opened.” (CEB 11:9-10). I think it’s fair to say, Jesus offers them a liturgical prayer, but also makes a point to emphasize, God answers whenever we seek God out. This may explain why so many of the phrases within the Lord’s Prayer are also found in Jewish liturgy, including prayers like, “Our Father, Our King”, the “Amidah”, and “Morning Blessings”.*** And this was quite possibly my favorite part. It means our beloved Jesus, was also a liturgist, drawing upon sacred prayers from his religious tradition and creating a new prayer with fresh language to help his followers expand and deepen their prayer life. Jesus modeled liturgical renewal from the beginning of his ministry, recognizing we can appreciate the beauty of tradition while also enlivening our prayer life with fresh language. The Lord’s Prayer within the Service of Holy Eucharist In the early Church, it was common for members to bring home eucharistic elements from the Sunday celebration. Much like today, when Kathryn Aubry-McAvoy will bring the eucharistic elements to one of our parishioners, except at this point in time, everyone could bring home the bread and wine to consume during the week. Before consuming the elements during the week, they would say the Lord’s Prayer to prepare their hearts and minds for receiving the eucharist. Which is one reason why early Church fathers believed that when the Lord’s Prayer references ‘our daily bread’ the prayer was not referencing basic daily nutrition.**** Rather they believed these words referred to the sacred meal of the eucharist. Around the time Constantine adopted Christianity, the act of saying the Lord’s Prayers as a form of personal piety was incorporated into the eucharistic service. The Lord’s Prayer has remained at this place in the Eucharistic service ever since, though the people’s involvement in saying the prayer was quite an evolution. More on that in a moment. The Evolution of the English Translation In the late fourth century, the Roman Empire split, and this led the Roman Church to transition from using Greek to Latin. While initially plenty of folks spoke Latin, the language died out around the seventh century, though it remained the required liturgical language in the Roman Church until the mid-1960s. ***** This means the early Church began using the language of the people, and slowly evolved into a language that most people did not understand. It invited and exasperated clericalism, insisting the priest was a required intermediary between God and the people. Which doesn’t exactly line up with Jesus' mission and ministry. But alas. On the very distant edges of the Roman Empire, in the Kingdom of Northumbria, which consisted of what we now think of as Northern England and the Scottish Lowlands, the Lord’s Prayer was first translated into English around 650 A.D.****** We didn’t really see other English translations, until the Protestant Reformation when the King of England, Henry VIII, left the Roman Church to found the Church of England. We know Henry’s motivations were mixed, and his decision caused a lot of political and religious upheaval. I had always been taught that this change more or less immediately led to the worship being spoken in the language of the people. But no - not the case. While Henry instigated the change, the liturgy kept being prayed in Latin for another fifteen years! Yet when the first Book of Common Prayer was published in 1549, all of that changed. A sidebar about prayer books: It’s interesting to note that the Church of England produced four different prayer books between 1549 and 1662. Because the Anglican Church is the state religion in England, prayer book revisions required government involvement, which quickly became challenging. (I mean, could you imagine trying to get prayer book revision through the American congress???) This resulted in the Church of England shying away from any further prayer book revisions, and instead creating a great deal of supplemental materials. The Episcopal Church in the United States has essentially done the same thing, producing four different prayer books between 1789 and 1979. At our 2022 General Convention, we memorialized the 1979 prayer book, and have opted to move in England’s direction of approving many supplemental materials that they expect churches will incorporate. When the Church of England first produced a prayer book in the vernacular, they also did a wild thing, they slowly began to include the laity in the prayers. Now during the service, when the Lord’s Prayer was spoken by the priest, the people concluded: ‘But deliver us from evil. Amen.’ In the 1552 revision, people were given a bit more empowerment in the liturgy and were invited to repeat each line after the priest. This remained the pattern in the two other prayer book revisions in England, and the first two prayer books for the Episcopal Church. It was not until the publication of the 1928 prayer book that the priest and the people began to say the Lord’s Prayer together. I found this to be particularly wild, that we’ve only been praying this prayer together for a little less than 100 years! While the English language and spelling norms evolved, there were relatively minor changes to the substance of the Lord’s Prayer. In 1662, England followed the Scotts in incorporating the doxology into the end of the Lord’s Prayer and it has been around ever since. The 1789 prayer book substituted minor changes like ‘which art in heaven’ to ‘who art in heaven’; and ‘in earth’ to ‘on earth’; and ‘them that trespass’ to ‘those who trespass’. The most significant change to the Lord’s Prayer took place in the 1970s when the contemporary language for the Lord’s Prayer was introduced. In many ways, the change was a long time coming. There had been a lot of change in how people spoke to one another in general. Marion Hatchett observes in his Commentary on the American Prayer Book: “In the sixteenth century ‘thou’ in English was equivalent to ‘tu’ in French or ‘du’ in German - the familiar second person singular form used to address one person, intimates, children, servants and God. It was appropriately used by those who knew themselves to be children in intimate relation to God…. The use of ‘you’ as a form of address in the rites and collects in contemporary language is the modern expression of intimacy linguistically equivalent to the usage of ‘thou’ in the earlier editions of the Prayer Book.” In other words, the shift was, in part, to ensure the prayer retained that sense of intimacy between God, our heavenly mother and father; and God’s beloved children. The second reason prompting a change, was the decision of the Roman Catholic Church to no longer require Latin in their services.******* This meant they needed English translations. Up until this point, when other Protestant churches were looking for an English translation of common prayers, such as the Lord’s Prayer, they looked to the Anglican prayer book. You can imagine why the Roman Catholic leadership would not have wanted to use one of the breakaway church’s English translations for their liturgy. So they created their own International Commission on English in the Liturgy. Meanwhile, many Protestant denominations who had long used the Anglican versions, were eager to modernize the prayers. This led to the creation of the International Consultation on English Texts, an ecumenical group charged with crafting English translations of the prayers our denominations have in common. In the early 1970s, they published Prayers We Have in Common: Agreed Liturgical Texts, which included what we think of as the ‘contemporary’ Lord’s Prayer. When the Episcopal Church revised the prayer book in 1979, they made a pastorally sensitive decision to include both the traditional and the contemporary version used by many other denominations. Today, the Episcopal Church belongs to the North American Consultation on Common Texts, which is a member of the English Language Liturgical Consultation, groups that continue the important work of giving us a common language in our core Christian prayers across denominations.*** How the Wider Church Interprets the Lord’s Prayer Today Let’s walk through how the wider Church understands the Lord’s Prayer today - briefly. “Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as in heaven.” Scholars believe this part of the prayer could mean a couple of different things, and generally recommend leaving enough space for both interpretations. One thought is that this petition is urgently seeking the action of God - something along the lines of “...[Creator] show yourself to be the Holy One; bring in your kingdom; establish your will, on earth as in heaven.”* Another thought, is when this prayer is compared to Jewish prayers, it makes a solid case that the petition is praying for human action so God’s name may be sanctioned, God’s kingdom established, and God’s will done.* “Give us this day our daily bread;” Similarly, scholars suggest there are a couple of ways to interpret this petition, and again, recommend keeping enough space for both meanings.* The Greek word that is translated into ‘daily’ is actually a bit vague.* It may mean ‘bread for tomorrow’, as in ‘the great tomorrow’, referring to a heavenly banquet.* It also can be understood as ‘the bread which is necessary’, and given the amount of hunger in our world, there is a solid argument for this perspective too.* “Forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us.” We’ve already touched on this a bit. In essence: we are committed to the practice of forgiveness, we forgive others when they wrong us, and we ask God to forgive us when we wrong God. “Save us from the time of trial.” Scholars note two potential misconceptions that often arise. The first is that God would “tempt” or entice people to evil, and the second is to think that the original Greek word that means “temptation” means something different than simply being tempted to not sin.* The original meaning is more akin to not denying or renouncing our faith when tempted, either in the here or now, but especially in that biblical sense of the trials Christians will face during the challenges of end times written about in apocalyptic literature.* “and deliver us from evil.” This alludes to the evil powers of this world; the selfishness, fear, anger, and hate that can separate us from God and care of God’s world. “For the kingdom, the power, and the glory are yours now and for ever.” This doxology, which is a later addition, reflects the normal Jewish practice of concluding prayers of petition with a doxology of praise.* I hope our exploration of the Lord’s Prayer today, and its evolution in the Christian tradition, helps us to have a better sense of why we use the contemporary version in our primary worship service, while each individual always has the choice to pray the one they hold dear either in worship or in private prayer. As we prepare to head back out into the world today, I would invite each of us to keep reflecting on the Lord’s Prayer: How do the words of the prayer inform our understanding of God? How does this prayer bind us with other Christians across the world? Amen. * https://www.englishtexts.org/the-lords-prayer ** https://episcopalnewsservice.org/2017/05/23/presiding-bishop-preaches-on-forgiveness-repentance-healing-and-reconciliation-in-haiti/ *** https://weekly.israelbiblecenter.com/lords-prayer-jewish-liturgy and https://www.myjewishlearning.com/article/text-of-avinu-malkeinu/ **** Marion Hatchett, Commentary on the American Prayer Book, p. 378, 90, 29. ***** https://www.reuters.com/article/idUSL07383020/ ****** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lord%27s_Prayer ******* https://www.encyclopedia.com/religion/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/international-consultation-english-texts-icet The Lord’s Prayer Matthew 6:9-13 Our Father who art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done, On earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread; And forgive us our debts, As we also have forgiven our debtors; And lead us not into temptation, But deliver us from evil. (taken from the Revised Standard Version, as found on English Language Liturgical Consultation) Luke 11:2-4 Father, Hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Give us each day our daily bread; And forgive us our sins, For we ourselves forgive everyone who is indebted to us; And lead us not into temptation. (taken from the Revised Standard Version, as found on English Language Liturgical Consultation) 650 A.D. - Old English FADER USÆR ðu arð in heofnu Sie gehalgad NOMA ÐIN. Tocymeð RÍC ÐIN. Sie WILLO ÐIN suæ is in heofne and in eorðo. HLAF USERNE of'wistlic sel ús todæg, and f'gef us SCYLDA USRA, suæ uoe f'gefon SCYLDGUM USUM. And ne inlæd usih in costunge, ah gefrig usich from yfle. (Bell, Laird D T. Northumbrian Culture and Language) 1549 Prayer Book - England The priest Our father, whyche art in heaven, halowed be thy name. Thy Kyngdome come. Thy wyll be doen in yearth, as it is in heaven. Geve us this daye our dayly breade. And forgeve us our trespaces, as wee forgeve them that trespasse agaynst us. And leade us not into temptacion. The aunswere But deliver us from evill. Amen. (taken from 1549 prayer book) 1552 Prayer Book - England Changed how the prayer was offered. The people would repeat each line after the priest. Spelling evolved, but same words. 1559 Prayer Book - England The people still repeat each line after the priest. Further evolution of spelling, but same intended words. 1662 Prayer Book - England Our Father, which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy Name, Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done, in earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread; And forgive us our trespasses, As we forgive them that trespass against us; And lead us not into temptation, But deliver us from evil. For thine is the kingdom, the power, and the glory, For ever and ever. Amen. (taken from 1662 prayer book; this is still the official prayerbook of England) The people still repeat each line after the priest. Spelling looks more familiar. Added doxology. 1789 Prayer Book - U.S. Our Father, who art in heaven, Hallowed be thy Name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our trespasses, As we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation; But deliver us from evil: For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever and ever. Amen (taken from 1789 prayer book) The people still repeat each line after the priest. Some words are changed to adapt to language norms of the time. 1892 Prayer Book - U.S. The people still repeat each line after the priest. Content stays the same. 1928 Prayer Book - U.S. The priest and the people now say the prayer together. Content stays the same. 1970 Prayers We Have in Common: Agreed Liturgical Texts was produced by the International Consultation on English Texts, and established the ‘contemporary’ Lord’s Prayer used in the wider church. They created translations used across Roman and Protestant churches, such as: Lord's Prayer, the Apostles' and Nicene Creeds, the Gloria (Glory to God), the Sanctus (Holy, Holy, Holy), etc. 1979 Prayer Book - U.S. Traditional Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy Name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever and ever. Amen. 1979 Prayer Book - U.S. Contemporary Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your Name, your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as in heaven. Give us today our daily bread. Forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us. Save us from the time of trial, and deliver us from evil. For the kingdom, the power, and the glory are yours, now and for ever. Amen. In the name of God our father, Jesus our brother and the Holy Spirit our guide and companion. “Christians are, in their practical life, almost mere ‘monotheists.’ We must be willing to admit that, should the doctrine of the Trinity have to be dropped as false, the major part of religious literature could well remain virtually unchanged.” So wrote Karl Rahner, German Jesuit and major influence of the Roman Catholic Second Vatican Council, in his 1999 classic study The Trinity. This is still true twenty plus years later. My friend, Julie, after reading in the parish newsletter of my preaching today, was moved to say that it was good that I was going to clear up the three persons in one God. I must sadly disappoint her and possibly some of you. The mystery of three persons in one God is exactly that, a mystery. That does not mean that there is nothing to be learned from that mystery, however. Five or six years ago I set out on a mission to understand the Trinity. As I stand before you I am a little more enlightened but far from understanding all that is the Trinity. I have learned a number of things that I think are helpful in living peacefully in the crazy times we are experiencing. I hope to impart some of the that discovery with you. Let me set out by saying that my best guides through my investigation were Fr. Richard Rohr with Mike Morrell and Cynthia Bourgeault. Rohr and Morrell are infinity more understandable than Bourgeault but she is way out front in the complexities of the Trinity. I first heard Fr. Rohr and Rev. Bourgeault speak about the Trinity in a taped seminar they presented in New Mexico. My spiritual director at the time loaned me the tapes to listen to on vacation. Those tapes are out of print but I highly recommend the books written by Rohr with Morrell and by Bourgeault on the Trinity. The Trinity is well founded in scripture. Abraham and Sarah are visited by God in the personages of three angels. Jesus makes reference to his Father in heaven and that he is the Human One, the Son of God. Jesus also makes many references to the Holy Spirit who will be with us to the end of the world. Paul in his letter to the Romans that we heard read this morning makes reference to Father, Abba, and Spirit in describing the Son’s Jesus’, lessons to those who would follow him. Let me read to you that same passage from Common English Bible: “So then, brothers and sisters, we have an obligation, but it isn’t an obligation to ourselves to live our lives on the basis of selfishness. If you live on the basis of selfishness you are going to die. But if you put to death the actions of the body with the Spirit, you will live. All who are led by God’s Spirit are God’s sons and daughters. You didn’t receive a spirt of slavery to lead you back again into fear, but you received a Spirit that shows you are adopted as his children. With this Spirit, we cry ‘Abba, Father.’ The same Spirit agrees with our spirit that we are God’s children. But if we are children, we are also heirs. We are God’s heirs and fellow heirs with Christ, if we really suffer with him so that we can also be glorified with him” Sounds a lot different without all that fleshy business doesn’t it? “Obligation to ourselves” and “selfishness” strike home a lot harder than “debtors to the flesh”. And note that the Spirit leads us to cry Abba to the Father and we become joint heirs with Christ. I think Paul and Jesus clearly expect us to understand that there are three persons in God. Now how that works is not within the skills of this simple Christian standing before you. That it works is something I would like to address. We say authoritatively that God is love. Think about that for a second. Love is a relationship word. Heather and Molly in their last couple of sermons have talked about the relational directives Jesus imparted to his followers in John’s Gospel regarding his final instruction to them. Even if I say I love my pet rock which does not appear to be able to love me back, I need the two of us, me and my pet rock, to have a love relationship. So if God is one person, how can God be Love? God, as love, should be two persons and if two why not three. Russian monk and Iconographer Andrei Rublev created an icon of the Trinity in the fifteenth century. This is that icon. The original is still on display in the Tretyalov gallery in Moscow. In the icon you see three people sitting at a rectangular table. The faces appear to be essentially the same and they all face generally toward the center of the table and each other. Each has a different color robe or sash. The figure on the left with the gold sash is said to be the Father. Rohr and Morrell explain that gold is the color of “perfection, fullness, wholeness, and the ultimate Source.” The figure in the center with the blue sash is said to be the Son. Rohr and Morrell say that Rublev used blue as “both sea and sky mirroring one another — and therefore God in Christ taking on the world, taking on humanity.” The figure to 4 the right with the green sash is said to be the Spirit. Rublev, as cited by Rohr and Morrell, used green for the Spirit because it has “a quality of divine aliveness that makes everything blossom and bloom in endless shades of green.” The fourth side of the table is vacant and is closest to the viewer. The wine goblet that appears the figure representing the Son is blessing, is closest to the empty side of the table. The right hand of the figure representing the Spirit appears to be pointing to the vacant side of the table. There is a rectangle in the vacant seat at the table. Let’s depart from Rublev for a second. Kenosis is a Greek word that is interpreted as self-emptying. We find this word in Paul’s letter to the Philippians Chapter 2 verses 5-11 where Paul says that Christ in the form of God emptied himself to become human. Fr. Rohr carries this idea further in one of his daily reflection. “Kenosis, or self-emptying, is revealed in the Trinity. The Cappadocian Fathers of the fourth century saw that God the Father, who is Love, completely empties God’s self into the Son; the Son empties into the Spirit; and the Spirit empties into the Father. Incarnation flows from this kenosis that is inherent to God’s nature.” Self-emptying is a tough word for those of us who live in the twenty first century. We are our own independent person. We don’t empty to anyone. But I think we do. I do in my relationship with my wife Charlie. I let her know all that is in me. My hopes, my fears, my sadness, my triumphs, my defeats . . . all that I am I give to her. I do the same to lesser degree to my closest and dearest friends. So while we may not empty ourselves to many we do understand the concept. With that in mind, consider Fr. Rohr’s words and Rublev’s image. God called Father empties his love into Jesus the son who empties his love into the Spirit who empties all that love into the Father. And on it goes. God, who is love, pours out love into a flow that circles all three persons of the Trinity. That is the picture I hope you see and hear in Rublev’s icon and this little fountain I have here with me. One vessel empties into the next and all three are full and flowing. Now comes the cool part of the Rublev icon. Do you see this little box? For those of you who cannot see it there is a little rectangle here in the front of the icon where a fourth seat might be. Art Historians have identified what they think is glue in that rectangle. They believe that a mirror was attached to that rectangle so that when a person viewed the icon they would be there at the table with the Trinity and I would suggest in the flow of that love I was just describing to you. And you know what? That spot was not reserved for any one person. It is there for all of us. It does not matter what color your skin is. It does not matter what religion you are. It does not matter how much money you make or where you live. There is a place at the table for you. And if you can see that all of creation has a place at that table, in that flow of love, you can figure out that all of us, even me and my pet rock are brothers and sisters in the sight of the Trinity. The Trinity wants to dine with us. They invite us to join in the flow of God’s love at their table. As you will hear again later in this service, all are invited, no exceptions. Now just in case you think this is a sermon only for Trinity Sunday morning, in our church, right now let me tell you a story. Dennis, Charlie and I have a friend on the streets of Greenfield who I will call Country for this tale. Country has been in the woods in a tent for the nine years I have known him and a whole bunch more. Like decades more. Country likes to drink a lot. He cares about folks who find themselves in the same position he is in so he takes them in for as long as they both can stand it and then they part company always to be friends of some sort. We care about Country and sometimes get him gloves or a jacket in the winter and socks all year round. The thing he values most is our acceptance of who he is no matter how he is. He knows how the rest of the world sees him and he is incredibly grateful for the openness with which we greet and accept him. It is that flow from the circle over here that heads out into the world through Dennis, Charlie and I. A couple of months ago, out of the blue, Country stared over at us at Second Helpings and hollered out “I love you guys. You are like saints to us.” That stopped me dead. In all the years that I have known Country he has alway shown respect but never any show of relationship. That, my friends and fellow believers, is the flow of the Trinity coming back to the table. As you head through your week give some thought to how you can channel the flow of the Trinity into our crazy mixed up world and I pray that you get to see it come rushing back to the circle. Amen |
We are blessed to have a diversity of preaching voices in our parish. Our guild of preachers is a mixture of lay and clergy. We hope you enjoy the varied voices. Meet our Preachers
All
Archives
July 2024
|