Our intuition is the fruit of our innocence

Our intuition is the fruit of our innocence. If we have dread in our heart we expect nothing but turmoil; if we have pain from our past we expect nothing but harm in our future. Hope is not a prediction of the future, it's a declaration of what is possible. We clean objects when they become soiled, but are we meticulous to cleanse our spirits as well? How can we expect joy and love and peace from others and the future if we do not come at the world with a pure heart? Our purity depends on the luggage we're carrying. We need to consciously daily concentrate on and enjoy whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable and wholesome, whatever brings peace. We need think continually on these things, and center our minds on them, and implant them in our hearts. Meditation is nothing but taking a mental shower. Meditation is when we empty ourselves and let the universe come in us and bathe us in its innocent beauty. If we are happy, happiness will come to us because happiness wants to go where happiness is. The same is true of other emotions, so be careful. We need to remember that enlightenment is just a state of perfect peace. Enlightenment should be something very ordinary.

Which is the story you tell ...

People tell stories on us and we have a narration of ourselves, probably one we tell others and certainly one we tell ourselves. God has a story about us too. In God’s eyes we are right and good and worthy. God proclaims that we are filled with courage and determination because, in God’s eyes, we were born in to an unbroken home, and we were raised in an environment filled with acceptance, encouragement and unconditional love which overflows with all the possibilities a doting guardian and lover can provide. With God we have strength to do all things. May we work to make our stories about ourselves reflect those that God tells on us, so that we might proclaim with God a story of love, compassion, and care. <I will kindle my fire this morning in the presence of the holy angels of heaven; without malice, without jealousy, without regret, without envy, without fear.> <God of strength, with each thought and action we are telling ourselves and the world a story. Help us to know and to share your goodness. Give us ears to hear you whisper the story about each of us, the one that is filled with your pride in us, and and is laced with love, compassion, care, and grace.>

Easter Sunday is Redund-ie-poo

Placing Easter on Sunday, imho, is a little redund-ie-poo. It's like Passover falling on a Friday ... Every week the Sabbath meal re-enacts the Passover tale but just with HIGHlights (#‎HamiltonDamage); The Holy Eucharist re-enacts Jesus on his last night on earth re-enacting the Sabbath meal which re-enacts the Passover Tale; The Great Vigil of Easter re-boots our entire life by chucking everything old and stale and worn out and making everything new and fresh and revived; and Easter is really just another Sunday where we celebrate The Holy Eucharist.

I love years ago the always delightful, ever brilliant Rev'd Dr Elizabeth Kaeton saying, <It’s always so wonderful to see the church filled on Easter Day. Everyone looks so wonderful, all decked out in their Easter finest. If you haven’t been to church in awhile, please consider coming back. We do this every Sunday...>

The two most important parts to remember for me are: we must gather in community in sincerity and truth, and we must show up time and again, to remember the story, and to imitate the example of laying down our lives, as a sacrifice for God's glory and a sacrifice to our fellow humans, being; sharing our troubles, our cares and concerns, and sacrificing our lives, on and around that altar, all for the Glory of God.

Once, For All

Bless the Children by Alix Beaujour, http://bit.ly/1UgyiwM

Whether you buy in to this belief system or not, our tradition is that it existed, so work with me a little here. My problem with the whole thing is, though, that some people keep acting like it's not done with and hasn't been taken care of but guess what, IT'S DONE WITH AND IT'S BEEN TAKEN CARE OF SO STOP MAKING PEOPLE PAY FOR IT OVER AND OVER AGAIN. I feel better now. The reason that I pay so much attention to these days of remembrance is because I think this sage we call Jesus once, for all time and for all kind, became the propitiation in the divide between us and God. This divide existed because of a berserk set of laws, and those laws actually defined the division between us and God. When those laws were broken reparation was required. Instead of supplying endless offerings, a personage stood in place of those offerings and fulfilled, once, for all, every debt owed for every law written. Since that moment, everyone has been encouraged to live life to its fullest as we were, at that moment, made emancipated spiritual beings with no encumbrances between us and the bounties of this universe. Whether this tradition is true or not, one thing I do know: the history I have, believe, and hold dear is that this terribly wise man came in to this belief system, saw that most people were getting it all wrong, and tried to show us that the root of all peace and an end to all trial and strife was the practice of a coupla things: don't point a finger at someone because three are always three pointing back at you; forgive yourself then others quickly; and, since we're all in this together, be quick to love and try to give of yourself freely and tirelessly. I sure as shootin' fall short of these practices most moments of the day, and it's hard not to be judge-ie and stingy, but I find it a delightful way to live. Join me, won't you? xoxo

Just Remember Me

The middle paint is Janet McKenzie, "Jesus of the People"

Do me a favor please? I knew this precious gorgeous little priest who used to serve a simple, quiet re-enactment of the "Last" Sabbath meal, and he would very specifically hold the bread up, hold the wine up in turn, make sure each of us saw it and met his eyes, then he would say quietly, "Whenever you do this ... just ... Remember Me." It's 30 years later, I still think of it daily. So-wuh simple and I had never thought of it like that until then. So, please? put aside anything any Christianists have ever told you about their Jebus, all the crap about some religious exclusionist white man who didn't smell and never went to the bathroom ... and I'm not talkin' right now about an idea of Jesus-as-Deity ... I'm asking you to remember Jesus as Hippie, this simple dude in a dress and sandals wandering around saying, "you've got to be SHITTING me ! THIS is what you came UP WITH ? THIS isn't what this stuff means AT ! ALL !" ... Please put aside any damage anyone has ever inflicted upon you or your psyche about this simple teacher and guide. He's one of my best friends all my life, one of the reasons I never went insane because I'm in constant running inner dialogue with him, my first lover, my pillow book, the only reason I think I'm still alive ... over the next coupla days, Just Remember Him and the simple things you know about him: How he himself was surrounded by asshats, how he loved little kids to come around his skirts to giggle and play, how he would see the unseen, stop and touch the untouchable, how he would just fix things and disappear, how he encouraged people to have faith in themselves and that all things were possible if we just asked, if we just believed, if we just got up and walked in our certainty; how love, self-forgiveness first and the forgiving of others second, were the most important things of all; and especially the faith that he had walking in to each new day, having nothing, trusting the provision of the universe, he actually had all things, and in abundance. Thank you !

Dear People of God:

Saint Nicholas Greek Orthodox Church, Grand Junction, CO.
Icons written by Anthanasios Clark

I hope everyone is having a meaningful Lent. It’s Holy Week and it’s time to hunker down, to press in, and to show up.

We hear echoes of tales Jesus told, and one of the themes which strikes me most at this time of year is the one where Jesus implores us to reinvent our relationship with God, and encourages us to talk to God like a friend, like a lover, sharing secrets, dreams, and cares. Henri Nouwen writes:

[He] came to us to help us overcome our fear of God. As long as we are afraid of God, we cannot [wholeheartedly] love God. Love means intimacy, closeness, mutual vulnerability, and a deep sense of safety. But all of those are impossible as long as there is fear. Fear creates suspicion, distance, defensiveness, and insecurity. The greatest block in the spiritual life is fear. Prayer, meditation, and education cannot come forth out of fear. God is perfect love, and as John the Evangelist writes, “Perfect love drives out fear.” Jesus’ central message is that God loves us with an unconditional love and desires our love, free from all fear, in return.

It’s interesting to me, there are a couple of times in the Church Year when we are directly addressed from the altar: For Lessons and Carols, whether at Advent or Christmastide:

“Beloved in Christ, in this season of [Advent], let it be our care and delight to prepare ourselves to hear again the message of the Angels, and in heart and mind to go even unto Bethlehem, to see the Babe lying in a manger…”;

then the biggie, on Ash Wednesday:

“Dear People of God: The first Christians observed with great devotion the days of our Lord’s passion and resurrection, and it became the custom of the Church to prepare for them by a season of penitence and fasting…I invite you, therefore, in the name of the Church, to the observance of a holy Lent, by self-examination and repentance; by prayer, fasting, and self-denial; and by reading and meditating on God’s holy Word…”

Other than private devotions or going to a daily Eucharist or communal Daily Office, it’s odd to me that in the Western tradition we have this empty space between the emotional high of The Sunday of the Passion (TWO services in ONE! Props! Anthems! Hymns! Collects! Sprinkling! Salutation! Procession! “Let us go forth in peace,” but don’t go ANYWHERE ! ‘cause we got a Eucharist ! WHEE ! “Ride on, ride on, in majesty! The angel armies of the sky look down with sad and wondering eyes to see the approaching Sacrifice”), and then nothing until Tenebrae (Latin for "shadows" or "darkness"), if that service is offered, or Maundy Thursday, and there are no further instructions, no additional bidding from the altar for services which are crucial, not only to our faith and our tradition but to our very spiritual survival, and nobody says a thing, it’s just listed in the service leaflet.

[Speaking of which … please, PUHLEASE ! try and make it to Saint Thomas Church on Fifth Avenue at 53rd Street for The Office of Tenebrae Wednesday, March 23, 2016, at 5.30 pm and, if you can’t, do listen to the podcast (http://bit.ly/1S0jA7e).

(I posted about my experience once here http://bit.ly/1I2cM8T).

The service feels very monastic and is treated with great reverence and it’s hard to describe the awe I feel sitting in that landmark building erected in 1911. As you’re listening to the plainchant of the Psalms, you’re staring at the 60 figures of the magnificent reredos which is 80 feet high, with every Saint and Angel imaginable standing over you. You marvel at the vaulted ceilings which disappear in to the heavens like the enchanted ceiling in the Hogwarts refectory, and you realize the building is stone on stone, without any steel reinforcement, and then all you can see is a blue-you’ve-never-imagined-in-the-sunset-blue stained glass windows as the church grows darker still. One year, during a particularly difficult Lent, I remember coming out of the service and yelling, “I believe ! I get it ! I believe it all !”]

Anyway … it’s odd, to me, as we’re hanging here between Palm Sunday and the Easter-Holy-Paschal Triduum (Latin for “three days”) which begins with the liturgy on the evening of Maundy Thursday (the vigil of Good Friday) with the Foot Washing, the Reserving of the Sacrament, the Agapé Supper, the Stripping of the Altar, and the Vigil at the Altar of Repose; then the silence and contemplation, with the Solemn Collects, of Good Friday; then another sort of empty day with Holy Saturday prayers; and then the The Great Vigil of Easter which, seriously, how beautifully do we do that service, huh? and how GLORIOUS ! when we get to ring them bells, that there are no supplemental instructions. Until now …

On Sunday, March 20, 2016, in this silence with no official bidding from the altar, there came such a roar from the pulpit with preaching “so good that it knocked my socks off and right in to the washin’ machine down the hall,” as they say where I’m from, our very own Mother Posey Krakowsky issued some instructions. It took everything in me not to stamp my feet and scream when she finished. It put me in mind of something our Presiding Bishop, The Most Rev. Michael Curry, says in A Call to Follow Jesus:

 “…being a Christian is not essentially about joining a church or being a nice person, but about following in the footsteps of Jesus, taking his teachings seriously, letting his Spirit take the lead in our lives, and in so doing, helping to change the world from our nightmare into God’s dream.”

Here is part of Mother Posey’s bidding:

 “…We are … complicit in the Christian Hope. We are called to bear witness to God’s choice to share our human nature – to be deeply embedded in all of it – the joy and the grief of human life … what we will be doing this week is not performance art. It is not a theater event. It is not an historical re-enactment. We are not an audience watching a show. We are participants. We are involved. What this week IS is a chance for us … to intentionally encounter God’s loving embrace of the world. It is a call to no longer accept our systems as “how things are.” A call that offers us different ways to imagine how things can be. Join in the three-day liturgy of the Triduum as fully as you can. Make the choice to intentionally explore how Jesus is active in our lives right now, at this moment … Please, this week…Dive in. See where it takes you. Allow yourself to experience how Christ is present and working in your life – right here, right now.” (note: the entire sermon will eventually appear here: http://www.stlukeinthefields.org/sermons)

I will, with God’s help. Will you join me?

This post originally appeared on the Blog of St. Luke in the Fields

I went to a funeral yesterday.

photo: picture: S.Shull @ flickr

I went to a funeral yesterday.

When I tell people that they sometimes get sad for me or wonder how that could have any deep joy for me, spending my time that way.

Going to church is easy and it smells good and it sounds purdy and it's a nice contemplative break from a busy noisy world.

Following The Way as Jesus laid out, however, means showing up; being an active participant in a congregation; being present and prayerful in the lives of others; that's the chore, that's the task, and it's the hardest part: living in community.

When one of my dearest heart's marriage ended, she was reluctant to return to the altar because she felt like she had made promises on that altar she found she couldn't keep. Wuhl, sometimes that happens, and isn't that why we're always repeating our vows? pledging to help one another live those vows?

Thing is, you gotta walk that aisle and you gotta show up at that altar and you gotta lay down your broken life on that altar day after day in order to be healed and restored, refreshed and renewed. We're gonna help one another get up that aisle week after week and hopefully, one long healthy day away from now, someone is going to love us enough to help us take that last important walk and place us lovingly in our final resting space, and continue our memory by telling tales of our love and participation among the other Travellers in that parish, forever.

So ... yeah ... I went to a funeral yesterday ... and I'm'a go and walk up that aisle today ... I will, with God's help. Join me, won't you?