Prayer 4025: Inspired by John 5:1-18 in the Daily Office

God of Compassion,

we praise you and bless you,
tuning our hearts to sing your praise and presence
in all that we do or say this day.

Lord Christ, you healed whenever there was a need,
seeing the suffering and acting without hesitation:
may we also fill our hearts to overflowing
with the desire to act in the name of love and restoration
giving of ourselves freely for the healing of the world.

Make us steadfast in our commitment to your gospel,
and faithful to your example of compassion and generosity,
inspired by your faith in us to live lives of grace,
walking in paths of mercy and joyful service.

Grant your benediction over all who call out to you,
O Worker of Wonders,
and place the kiss of your blessing
upon those we now name.

Amen.

Fiercely Compassionate: Sermon for Proper 17A

Have you ever had an enemy?

I know I have had a few people in my life who I have realized did NOT to put it mildly, have my well-being at heart. The worst ones have been relatives, or better, “frenemies”—people who to your face pretend to be your friend, but behind your back undermine you and work against you at any opportunity.

The problem is, how can you avoid granting them power in your life?

What if the first step is refusing to allow them the position of “enemy” to begin with?

I ask this question, because this may be the nub of so much of the division we suffer from in our lives.

And this ends up being something our readings are asking us to consider this weekend.

Last week, in our epistle from Romans 12:1-8, Paul urged us to offer our bodies as a living sacrifice to God.

This week, in urging us to bend over backwards being kind to those who seek to hurt us, it almost sounds like Paul is now demanding our sanity.

In 205 words in Romans 12:9-21, there is a rapid-fire list of 27 specific commandments about how we are called as followers of Jesus to live in relationship with others. Twenty-seven! And seven of those begin with either “do not” (six times) or “never” (once). All the rest are stated positively, centering around the words “love,” “bless,” and “rejoice.” Under all of this are commands to give: to “contribute to the needs of the saints (fellow church members),” and to give your enemies food and drink if they hunger or thirst. There’s a lot there that absolutely sounds doable, though.

Until we get to that last bit there.

It is obvious that Paul himself understands that the standards of behavior here ARE incredibly demanding. Probably the most difficult is being not only not vengeful, but actually kind and solicitous to your enemies. Perhaps that’s why he includes that little bit that, if you are loving toward your enemies, it will actually “heap burning coals upon their heads.” We used to call it “killing them with kindness.” And that’s a pretty bizarre collection of words, if you stop and look at them. Are we really being kind if we are also “killing them?”

But then that brings up a conundrum: do I gain anything by doing these kindnesses, if that “heaping of burning coals” on their heads is then something I can’t avoid enjoying? I think that Paul is trying to toss us, and our human nature, a bone there. I also think this lines up nicely with our earliest view of Paul back when he was the Pharisee and persecutor Saul, and he held everyone’s coats when they stoned the first martyr of the Church, Stephen, to death in the Book of Acts. Paul definitely loved himself some vengeance.

And of course, Paul assumes that our enemies even HAVE consciences or feel healthy shame, which is a big assumption, then or now. Too many people have made selfishness and contempt their real gods.

This section of the letter to the church in Rome emphatically urges us to live into a paradox as people of faith. We live in a world that we believe is based largely on punishment and negative reinforcement, or motivation out of fear-- but we pray (at least when it comes to ourselves) for a God that uses a different accounting method; listen closely when we pray the Lord’s prayer, and you will see what I mean. Many of us know that we fall short of doing what we ought to do in all our relationships. Most of us believe we could be better children, better parents, better friends, and better Christians. Knowing our faults and failings, we also want to believe in grace for ourselves—but all too often we want to believe in judgment and condemnation for others.

The point is not to heap burning coals upon our enemies but to be kind and loving to them—it’s the kindness and love that should be emphasized. If we’re not careful, enjoying heaping burning coals on the heads of those who have wronged us approaches schadenfreude—a great German word for the phrase “enjoying another’s misfortune.” Satisfying as that may be, it also is antithetical to a real spirit of compassion and forgiveness. Schadenfreude leads us right back to contempt and dehumanization.

Remember the command that began chapter 12 in this letter: to not be “conformed to the spirit of the world” around us, because the spirit of this world—one WE humans have created mind you, and keep reinforcing by our willing participation in it—is one of misery for the vast majority of people. Even to just begin to live by the golden rule would be a radical act of defiance against this cruel calculus. We are, through our baptism and discipleship, called to be better people through Christ who strengthens us, and models for us this kind of self-giving love.

Being a Christian cannot ever be about oppressing anyone—that’s the party the gospel demands we leave. It’s part of making generosity and grace a true part of our lives. Christianity should make loving others the central act—no matter what we think of their behavior, rather than only loving those who conform to our notions of belief. Just like Jesus, we are in the “never give up on others” business.

We live awash with messages of hatred and fear. We live in a time of name-calling and dehumanization of anyone who is different from you.

And I think, at the root of it, is not just a lack but an attack on empathy, which is then an attack on compassion. Think on it. And that’s the first step in defeating this terrible division in our world, which transcends national barriers. Because the minute you think about who is pushing the division, and then ask yourself why, you take the first step toward defeating them.

I love the work of Brene Brown, a teacher and social worker (and Episcopalian!) who works to help people live wildly compassionate, brave lives. I ran across an interview where she discussed the work of Dr. Chris Germer and Dr. Kristin Neff (1). They are psychologists who study compassion, and they name the enemies of compassion, which is a vital step in defeating the forces of division that seek to divide us. Germer and Neff identify two kinds of compassion: soft compassion, and fierce compassion. Both are necessary to effect change not just for ourselves, but for others, especially groups being marginalized.

Soft compassion is gentle, nurturing compassion, and God knows we need lots of that. It’s the kind of compassion that many of us need to practice for ourselves: giving ourselves a break when we fall short or mess up or struggle. It’s acknowledging where we ourselves are hurting and giving ourselves grace, so that we may do the same to others.

Fierce compassion is more active, more filed with agency. And it is this compassion that fomenters of hatred fear the most, because it leads to not just weakly accepting injustice as they “way things are” but urges us to action. Real action. Even if we have to start off slow, like feeding our enemies and giving them something to drink, so that we can realize they aren’t our enemies after all.

But there are many things that stand in the way of us practicing this kind of compassion. They list these as both far enemies and near enemies of fierce compassion. Far enemies are opposite of what we are trying to cultivate, and they include:
Anger and Fear (emotional reactivity, as opposed to attention and mindfulness
Demonizing (Other-ing, as opposed to empathy)
Hostility (versus kindness)

Near enemies are more tricky, however. Near enemies seem harmless, but are meant to roadblock any real change. The near enemies of practicing true compassion include:
Complacency (can’t we all just get along?)
Sameness (the claim that we are all the same—the “all lives matter argument” or “I don’t see color” claim that blocks the acknowledgement of oppression)
Pity (feeling bad for someone in a way that makes you also feel superior) (2)

I would probably add here avoiding shame, like when some leaders claim that truths and facts that might inspire “feeling bad” should be suppressed in school.

I wonder if what Paul is getting at here is the same thing Germer and Neff are talking about. If we refuse to allow ourselves to dehumanize our enemies, and instead refuse to react to them in ways that cedes to them our own power, we free ourselves from the endless cycles of division and vengeances that weakens us all.

I know it sounds hard. To change this cycle of reaction and vengeance requires incredible mindfulness, empathy, and compassion—compassion for both ourselves, and for those around us. But here is a universal truth: hurt people hurt people. Breaking that cycle of hurt is a gift to ourselves beyond price.

Maybe THIS is the cross Jesus is urging us to take up in order to follow him in our gospel. I think we flinch when we hear that commandment from Jesus because we literally associate the cross with death and pain. Of course, that is why crucifixion was invented. But for Christians, the cross means something different. It means emptying ourselves of all our privileges, just like Jesus did, and reacting to those who have hurt us with the grace that we ourselves do not deserve but receive a million times over from Jesus. 

This not only is a gift we give to ourselves, because there is nothing worse than allowing someone who has hurt you to live rent-free in your head and heart. It also denies our enemies their power to hurt us in the ways that matter most—inside our own hearts and spirits.

To be clear: neither Paul nor Jesus are telling us let people abuse us. Instead, we are being given the power to refuse to allow ourselves to be defined by those who attempt to hurt us. Instead of sinking to the level of our opponents, we expose their injustice, and free ourselves from carrying the boulders of hatred they are attempting to place on our backs.

The heaping burning coals upon their heads thing is just a bonus.

We are seeing a lot of hateful acts being perpetrated right now by people who claim to be Christian, and that cruelty and contempt is part of why so many people are turning away from religious belief of any kind, as we discussed last week in the result of the “Jesus in America” survey the Episcopal Church commissioned a year ago.

The cross is not just a symbol of torture—if it were, why would we place them over our hearts or wear them on our clothes or hang them over our altars?

The cross, instead, is a symbol of fierce compassion—the compassion that didn’t just see the injustice and the violence of the world, but met that violence and injustice with love—and with ACTION. The kind of action Martin Luther King Jr called “soul force.” The kind of compassion that refuses to conform itself to the world but actively seeks to change the world to relieve the suffering of others—because when one person suffers, we are ALL diminished. Even if they are so-called “enemies.” That’s why wars happen.

The cross we are being urged to take up is a sign of victory, and a sign of enlightenment on the path of love.

And there’s no time like now to rededicate ourselves to living in the Way of Jesus.

And that doesn’t just involve believing, but doing.

“Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind” and your spirit. Let us take up our crosses and learn from Jesus. To take up our cross, we put down the burdens of fear and division that paralyze our souls.

The world will know we are Christian by this fiercely compassionate love. Then we will carry the cross of Jesus with honor.


Amen.



Preached at the 505 on September 2 and the 10:30 Principal Holy Eucharist at St. Martin's Episcopal Church, Ellisville, Missouri.


Readings:
Jeremiah 15:15-21
Psalm 26:1-8 
Romans 12:9-21
Matthew 16:21-28

Citations:
1) “Interview with Dr. Chris Germer on the Near and Far Enemies of Fierce Compassion, Part 1 and 2,” on Brene Brown’s Unlocking Us podcast, November 2022, found at https://brenebrown.com/podcast/the-near-and-far-enemies-of-fierce-compassion-part-1-of-2/

2) Dr. Chris Germer, “The Near and Far Enemies of Fierce Compassion,” October 22, 2020, at Mindfulness Teacher Training, https://mbsr.website/news/near-and-far-enemies-fierce-compassion

Prayer, day 3650 (Tenth Anniversary Prayer)

Beloved Creator, Amazing Grace,

who holds us tenderly

like sparrows in Your hand:
we turn into your embrace today,
joining with creation singing your praise.

The music of the spheres rings out
from highest heaven to the slumbering earth
as we rejoice in the song of your abundant love:
your mercy is the ground which bears us up
as we seek to walk in your ways.
Strengthen us in faithfulness
as we reflect your light within us.

Keep watch, O Shepherd of Our Souls,
that we may not stray from your side,
and grant us compassion
as we seek out the lost and hurting.
May the brush of angels' wings
dry the tears of the suffering and those who mourn,
and the tenderness of the Almighty
rest upon those we now name.

Amen.

The Caryatid Set Free: Sermon for Proper 16C

The first time I eve saw her was in Room 19 of the British Museum, a tentative foot stepping forward. A basket was atop her head, supposedly in imitation of the maidens of Sparta who would dance with baskets on their heads in honor of the goddess “Artemis of the Walnut Tree,” Artemis Karyatis. So these sculptures were called “caryatids.”

Once she and her sisters had stood in formation on the Acropolis. In Greek and Roman architecture these slender maidens were given the job of holding up enormous weights and bearing up under incredible force and pressure as a cross between engineering necessity and artistic detail. Together, they bore the weight of the stone roof of this enormous temple and other huge stone structures. The baskets on their heads served as capitals, and their bodies, draped in graceful tunics called peplos, served as pillars. Six of them stood in formation originally at the Erechtheion.

The idea of depicting young women as bearing this incredibly heavy weight offended me at first sight—it reminded me of the typical instruction to young women in cultures everywhere to “Sit still, shut, up, and look pretty.” From a practical standpoint, it seemed delusional to expect anyone so delicate to bear such weight on top of their heads and slender spines-- especially with such apparent ease, their perfect posture denying the laws of gravity and physics.

More than 2000 years later, the great French sculptor Auguste Rodin created a sculpture protesting the impossibility of the caryatid’s task. His work was entitled Fallen Caryatid Carrying Her Stone. And when you know that he pulled and expanded her figure from a detail in an earlier work of art known as The Gates of Hell, looking upon her becomes even more poignant.

Rodin reveals the pathos and the hidden strength in his sculpture. The maiden has crumpled under the weight she has been expected to carry. She is seated, her head turned to one side resting upon her crossed arms as her left hand still cradles her stone as it rests on the curve of her shoulder and neck. Her feet are both still touching the ground, making it clear that eventually her body was driven straight down by the weight she carried, leaving her to rest upon her hips. Her tunic has fallen off her shoulder and lies pooled upon the one leg bent along the ground.

And her delicate face…. Eyes downcast in exhaustion, sorrow, and heartbreak. She wearily rests against her right wrist crossed over her left bicep. Her shape has been remade from a stately column to a crumpled, box-like frame. Yet she steadfastly, diligently refuses to put down her stone. Perhaps out of shame. Perhaps out of determination that she will soon gather the strength to rise again and resume her lonely duty.

Her unlined, youthful face suggests this is the first time she has fallen—and that she may have fallen, but she has not been crushed. She is bent by the load she has been expected to bear, and yet she is never broken. The Fallen Caryatid is a therefore nonetheless a depiction of the darkness before the dawn, of the reserves that lie beneath the surface of one who once danced as lightly as a shadow when asked only to bear a basket, but who is determined to never surrender when asked to do the impossible.

In my mind, I guess I always associated that fallen caryatid of Rodin’s with that lonely caryatid in the British Museum, missing her five sisters. Caryatids are not meant to be alone. There is absolutely no way they can bear their terrible loads, unless the force, the pressure, the weight is shared. I think of that fallen caryatid, and I think there is another point in Rodin’s: with enough kindred to bear the collective weight, she would never have collapsed. Six caryatids upheld the roof of the Erechtheion. One, alone, cannot.

Most of us have experienced weights too heavy for us to bear alone, burdens that nearly bend us double. And yet, dutifully, we too often refuse to put down our stone, or to seek help to share the load.

In last Sunday’s gospel from Luke 13:10-17, Jesus spots a woman bent double by an unknown weight or source of suffering she has been carrying for 18 years. The fact that the people know how long she has been unable to stand up shows that they have observed her suffering for all that time. And yet no help or cure has been found to help this poor woman find relief. Perhaps her pain and suffering have rendered her invisible—or have caused others to look away because they don’t know what to say, or do, or they see in her situation their own worst fears of illness and mortality brought to life. They perhaps have chosen to look away, even though, like the fallen caryatid, her burden is visible and tragic. And so she has persevered simply because she must, for these 18 long years.

She has been carrying on, refusing to be crushed by her burden, just like the fallen caryatid of Rodin’s.

In our gospel, Jesus looks across the synagogue and sees that unfortunate woman bearing her burden with quiet determination. He sees her, sees the real person disguised by the burden she carries. He sees her as a “daughter of Abraham,” worthy of dignity and relief. And he heals her and relieves of her burden.

Jesus sees us, too, and is our companion and comfort in times of suffering and stress. Some of the burdens that try to bend us double—loneliness, a feeling of disconnection, anxiety, hopelessness—can be alleviated by Christ, especially in the Body of Christ in the world, in his disciples joining together and themselves “seeing” and acknowledging the needs of each other, and of the greater world around us, and joyfully responding to our obligation as people of faith to not just see, but respond, as Jesus does. Others of those burdens can be alleviated by the Body of Christ advocating in the world against injustice, poverty, homelessness, war, and racism. That’s where we, as the Body of Christ, join in his healing, transforming mission.

What burdens have you carried that tried to bend you double? Where do you see others suffering?

Let’s look for ways to share the load, for the sake of each other, and in the name of Jesus.

Preached at the 505 on October 20, 2022 at St. Martin's Episcopal Church, Ellisville, MO.

On the Jericho Road: Speaking to the Soul, August 4, 2022

Luke 10:25-37

 

 

On the Jericho road his luck ran out.
The air above the beaten track shimmered
and hissed like a snake. One sandal
lay in the center of the road, vanquished—the thieves
had left that, but all else was gone. 
Its forsaken foot curled up into the lip of the ditch,
disembodied. The man laid there,
arms flung wide, like a fledgling who had
fallen to earth; astonishment curtained 
his inert mouth. He floated
in a sea of dust, blood
pooling in tracks from his wounds. A buzzard
clasped a crag, sensing promise.

 

Perhaps the road would bring a savior.

Face toward Jerusalem, the priest 
placed each foot delicately after the other, and then
drew the drape of his robe
across his face at the sight, blanched,
and muttered charms to ward off evil
as he moved to the other side, eyes averted. 
A prayer of thanks rose skyward,
congratulating himself for his own righteousness,
to preserve him from such a fate. So too
the Son of Levi--he clasped his ewer by the handle,
suspicion of ambush and 
contempt seizing his heart like a fist,
edging away on his holy business.

A buzz of flies eddied in his wake.
The buzzard snorted humorlessly 
and shrugged. 
Not long now.

There was no one to see, they thought—
but behind the blue veil of sky
the stars blinked 
and spun in protest.

The sun mounted higher.
A Samaritan approached, 
fresh from shunning by the priest and Levite,
who’d made him walk around them.
But at the sandal he slowed, his donkey
shaking her head, skittish at tang and echo of violence
in her nostrils and ears, at the glare
that glowed off sunburned flesh. 
Her master crouched beside
the discarded sack of a man, 
leaking like a burst wineskin. 
He could still walk away.

 

                                    “Cursed be
the one who leads the blind
on the road astray, or distorts
the justice and mercy owed a stranger,”
the Samaritan murmured.
The donkey breathed the amens.

A trumpet blare of mercy
echoed in his soul’s chamber; the 
walls of the Samaritan’s heart lay in rubble.

With gentle hands he shifted the donkey’s load until
he found wine and oil,
anointing the wounds 
and cooling the stranger’s brow.

Like a mother, tenderly he drew 
the fevered body to his chest, arms beneath 
neck and knee, and raised his neighbor
from ditch to donkey delicately,
claiming the stranger as his brother, 
whose heartbeat was an obligation, whose face
so closely resembled his own,
and only the buzzard turned a baleful eye,
a grudging witness.

--This was first published at Episcopal Journal's Speaking to the Soul on August 4, 2022.

 

Prayer 3334: On the First Full Day of Spring

O God,
as Earth turns in wakefulness
from the slumber of winter
to the rising dawn of spring,
as geese arrow southward overhead,
we too turn our thoughts to home,
the sunlit home we offer us in your kingdom.

Help us gather
beneath your shining countenance.

Help us sing out your love;
let halting harmonies
become intricate tapestries of grateful praise,
for your love is steadfast and true.

May we release the stones of our cares
in the deep well of your abundant grace,
casting all our burdens
upon the promise of your mercy and care.
Teach us to walk in paths of compassion
to share from the bounty we have received
of charity, forgiveness, and holy wisdom.

O God,
cast your finest net beneath our seeking hearts
that we may be gathered when our way turns to wandering
as we long to be drawn
within the sheltering wing of your loving-kindness,
and extend your sheltering hand
beneath those for whom we pray.

Amen.

The Wisdom of Vulnerability: Sermon for the 15th Sunday after Pentecost (Proper 18B)

A group of rabbis gathered one day after a long day of studying the Book of Bereshit, which we call the Book of Genesis. The question that was before them was this one: Why had God waited until the sixth day of creation to create human beings?

Rabbi Rivkah said, “God wanted to make sure the universe was well ordered and operating smoothly, so that we could make use of creation, made for our benefit.” Several of her companions nodded in agreement. Certainly the marvels of the universe had been made for the use of human beings, who had been given dominion over all things on Earth.

Rabbi Chaim said, “Perhaps, perhaps. But God started with animals so that God could learn from God’s earlier attempts. God waited to make humans so that God wouldn’t make the mistakes God made with the various animals and their weaknesses.” Other rabbis nodded in agreement with him. Surely human beings were the crowning achievement of creation, with the ability to talk, and to think, unlike stupid animals!

Rabbi Susan, known for her humility a well as her wisdom, arrived a few moments into the meeting, apologizing profusely. She was running late because she had been engaged in prayers before the sun set. She asked what they were debating about so intently. “We are discussing why God waited until the sixth day to create human beings,” Rabbi Akiva told her. They repeated the two premises put forward by Rabbi Rivkah and Rabbi Chaim.

Rabbi Susan thought for a moment. A dog whined outside in the street, and a mosquito whined past the ear of one of the other rabbis, and he swatted at it forcefully. “I wonder if the answer is more simple. I think it was so that when we were filled with pride, we would remember that even a lowly dog and the annoying mosquito were awarded priority in the grand scheme of the Divine Creator.” And all the other rabbis took what she said, and pondered it for the rest of their lives.

Our readings today focus on two qualities: humility, and wisdom. We begin with a brief collection of verses from the Book of Proverbs. The backstory behind this collection of sayings was that they were written by King Solomon himself. As you know, Solomon was crowned with power and honor: he had hundreds of wives and concubines; he lived in a magnificent palace, and he was the son of the great King David.

Yet, if you remember three weeks ago, when he ascended to the throne, Solomon prayed to God for help in governing God’s people. In a dream God appeared to Solomon and told Solomon to ask God for what he wanted God to grant to him. Solomon could have asked for untold wealth, or military power, or an exceptionally long life and reign. Instead, the new king humbly compared himself to a little child, not up to the task of leading so great a people. Solomon therefore asked for wisdom, so that he could be a good king to protect the people and lead them. God was pleased not just by the thoughtfulness of the answer, but by its humility. Solomon didn’t ask for things for himself, but for a gift that would benefit his people. So God granted Solomon wisdom, and his sage judgment was famous far and wide. Solomon’s humility, his openness to admitting his lack of perception and knowledge, was the beginning of his wisdom.

The proverbs before us are likewise focused on wisdom and humility themselves. Specifically, they depict the wisdom of being generous, just, and hospitable in one’s relationships with others. The wisdom of being open to each other. In the social system of the early Mediterranean world, social division and status was very important—much like our society today. Just like now, there were many ways to close oneself off from those considered lowly or unclean. All these centuries later, we too have the same many ways to separate ourselves from each other—by race, class, ethnicity, ability or disability, wealth and poverty. Those who are considered to be “less-than,” like the poor or immigrants, become invisible—if they are lucky. If they are not lucky enough to be invisible they become objects of scorn, exploitation, and scapegoating.

You’ve seen and heard this done over and over by people around you—some even claiming to be leaders. Businesses that pay starvation wages complain that they can’t find workers, and so smear all of them as lazy rather than consider that the wages they pay do not allow for a person to make even a modest living and pay all of their bills. Lately there’s even been the claim that the $300 a week jobless benefits are actually rewards for laziness. There are public school districts ending breakfast programs because they claim it will make children dependent on handouts for the rest of their lives. The reasons stated for this decision runs like this I guess: Better for seven-year-olds to suffer from the pain and distraction of hunger right now than to expect that the wealthiest country in the world owes them anything. 

I’ve always appreciated the humility and wisdom of leaders who actually try to walk a mile in the shoes of those at the bottom of the income scale—like when members of Congress try to eat for a week only on the benefits given through food stamps, or try to find an apartment for 25% of the income of a minimum wage job. I hope that, on this Labor Day weekend, as we all enjoy our time off, we remember a prayer often said in the Compline service, and humbly pray that we honor the labor of workers, no matter how humble, who make our common lives together possible.

Thus we hear the author reminding us that whether we are rich or poor, we are all children of God, created in God’s image. We are told not to exploit the poor or take advantage of them, or for those who sit at the gate—which is where people would plead for justice if they had been treated unfairly or unjustly. Applied to our own time, one in which so many people are behaving without regard for anything, but loudly proclaim their own grievances, their own rights to do as they please, regardless of the harm to others, our proverbs remind us to remain humble as the foundation of our relationships with each other and as a reflection of our relationship with God.

Likewise our psalm urges us to another set of characteristics that are the basis of wisdom and generosity: trust and honesty. Once again, gifts that seem to be in short supply these days. Our psalm reminds us that the ability to trust and be trustworthy is a sign of strength, not weakness. The letter of James urges us to treat every person with honor—not based on what they can do for us, but based on the love we are called to bear for each and every person, which includes taking care of those who have needs as much as we are able—and we often have more ability to do this than we might like to admit.

Look, it’s easy for us to forget sometimes that we have the power to make the lives of those around us better or worse, often by the simplest recognition that here, around me are other people all beloved of God and beloved of their families and friends. All precious.

Even Jesus has to be reminded of this sometimes. In our gospel reading today, we have two stories of healing. One is of a man unable to hear—Jesus commands his hearing and his speech to be “opened.” There is Jesus, the miracle worker using his divine power to help someone on the margins of society toward full healing and restoration. But if you look carefully, the story before it informs this command to be open. In the story before this healing, Jesus himself had to be goaded into being open to another. We just for a second get a glimpse of Jesus as a human being—prone to all the weariness and challenges we all face.

Jesus has entered Gentile territory to the north hoping for a little R and R, his own version of Labor Day. Maybe if he goes up into Tyre and Sidon, no one will recognize him, and he can move about anonymously for a while until his batteries recharge. Yet no sooner does he get there, and settles into a house to cocoon for a bit, than some woman approaches him and bows down at his feet, cringing like a dog. And so, frustrated and exhausted, he looks on this woman from a wealthy region coming to dare ask him, an impoverished Jew, for healing, and he calls her just that. He calls her a dog, and declares her outside his mission to God’s chosen people. The bounty of his mercy is reserved for his own people, who have hard enough lives as it is. For a moment, his tiredness gets the best of him, and he claims that there’s not enough to go around. There’s not enough of Jesus to go around. And here this woman is, a cross between a mosquito and a dog, annoying Jesus with her request and her refusal to be shaken off.

Here it is the woman who displays humility and wisdom. Even as he tries to belittle her, to cast her as an outsider and unworthy, still she presses on. Maybe because she is not asking out of need for herself, but need for her beloved daughter. Still bowed down at his feet, she responds immediately: Yes, I may be a dog-- but even dogs get to eat the scraps that fall from the table. And that image of a table is a reminder of the abundance and mercy that Jesus has been proclaiming and enacting just so people won’t miss the point that God’s generosity and love for us is unlimited and life-giving. She reminds Jesus of the same thing our proverbs did: that we are called to be open, and generous with each other, rather than try to draw lines around who is worthy and who is not.

Even the wisest people lose sight of what is important from time to time—it’s part of being human. Jesus was fully human too—we are going to say that again in just a few moments in the creed. If Jesus can benefit from a reminder to be more open with others, there’s good news there for us all, as fallible and prone to pride as we can be. Through the woman’s humility, Jesus is reminded that God truly does mean that the table will be wide enough to hold everyone, and that all are not just worthy but are beloved—as beloved when they are in the wrong as when they are in the right. God’s table is open to all, to be accepted, valued, and cared for. And when people feels accepted and valued, they feel secure. And from that security, we can feel brave enough to treat each other with mercy and compassion. This is the purpose God displayed in sending Jesus to us, and in reminding Jesus and us of the wisdom that relationship is woven into the very fabric of our existence. Jesus is opened to that reminder by the woman, and that gift of understanding, of connection, of caring for each other in generosity, grace, and compassion.

And that is the beginning of wisdom.




Preached at the 10:30 am Eucharist, held online and in person, at St. Martin's Episcopal Church, Ellisville.


Readings:
Proverbs 22:1-2, 8-9, 22-23
Psalm 125
James 2:1-10, [11-13], 14-17
Mark 7:24-37

Making Jesus Visible: Sermon for 5 Lent B

People came from all over for the festival of the Passover. They came to Jerusalem to be reminded of the way that God not just freed but formed a people. The festival of the Passover is the most solemn and community-building days in the Jewish calendar in the Jewish religious calendar. It is a festival centered around community, family, and the shaping of a ragtag bunch of former slaves into a people—a specific people singled out by God and preserved over and over again from death, even the literal angel of death who swept across the land of their captors, and whose savage reaping finally convinced the Pharaoh of Egypt to, in the words of the famous spiritual “Go Down, Moses,” to “let my people go.”

And according to the Christian calendar, we are eagerly awaiting next week’s pageantry, with Jesus triumphantly entering Jerusalem to shouts of Hosanna and declarations of his rightful claim to be the Messiah, the anointed one appointed by God to liberate the captives. Jesus will ride triumphantly into Jerusalem in the name of liberation during the festival which celebrates the liberation of the people of Israel from bondage. That’s often what we ourselves are called to remember. Jesus didn’t come to support the status quo, but to proclaim the power of God—a God who reveals Godself through the life of Jesus.

But there were two processions parading through the streets of Jerusalem at that moment we will celebrate and re-enact next Sunday. As Jesus and his band of followers come in from the east, a much more impressive procession would be entering from the west. The Roman governor would himself put together a huge military display and ride through the streets of Jerusalem with rows of infantry and a powerful show of force of cavalry.

Each year, as the people of Judea started dangerously talking about their freedom and about the power of their God, the Roman authorities would put on their own show of force, reminding the people that they WEREN’T free, that they were still enslaved under the relentless forces of empire. As Jesus’s followers proclaimed him the heir of King David and dreamt of a return to the glory days of Israel seen through the lens of myth and legend, the Roman governor would remind the people that they could be crushed at a moment’s notice. That he represented someone who also claimed to be God’s son on earth—the Roman emperor.

But those Romans aren’t the Gentiles we hear about in today’s gospel. The Gentiles who approach Philip with their homely request are probably “God-fearers,” and they attempt to contact Jesus through the two disciples whose names are Greek. But who ARE these two strangers? What significance do they have at the time in this story? They show up, and then they disappear. One of my Bible-study compatriots asked me that this week, and I didn’t have a good answer for them.

“Sir,’ they say as they approach Philip, ‘we want to see Jesus.”

Don’t we all? How many of us resonate with that request? We want to see Jesus, too.

Maybe their appearance is a throw-away detail in the story at the time. And yet, I keep coming back to these two Gentiles who screw their courage up and approach these two disciples who also have “Greek names” and ask to see the infamous wandering rabbi. Do they get to see him? Or do they get turned away in the hustle and bustle of the festival and all the demands upon the disciples’ and Jesus’s time and attention.

I am haunted by these two unnamed seekers, because I wonder how many times someone has approached us, and asked US to help them see Jesus. Oh, I am not talking about directly asking us—that would be too easy. But what about all the people who look upon us as we are going about our days—acquaintances or strangers. They may be able to tell that we claim the identity of Christian. Maybe they see a cross hanging around our neck. Maybe they saw you with an ash cross on your forehead on Ash Wednesday. Maybe they see the pet-blessing sticker saying “My pet was blessed at St. Martin’s” that I keep hoping eventually all y’all will place on the bumpers of your cars—even those Corvettes and Lexuses that you polish with an old baby diaper like Cameron’s dad in Ferris’s Bueller’s Day Off. But maybe you didn’t even notice them. Maybe they didn’t ask out loud.

Maybe they were the person who was having a bad day near you last week. Maybe they were angry, or close to tears. Maybe it was a dad in a grocery store with a screaming three year old who is screaming because dad didn’t let him eat the strawberries out of the carton before they were washed. Maybe it was the kid with the lip piercing and neck tattoo who made you a smoothie, who had been awakened that morning by having a parent call them ugly and lazy and flick a lighted cigarette at their head and demand they get up and fix step-mom breakfast before a full day of school and work. Maybe they are an ex-convict hoping to get a second chance, not be sneered at for their past.

But the thing is, we brush up against people all throughout each day who may not be able to put it into words, and may not even be aware of it, but who are hungry to see Jesus. The Jesus-on-a-cross thing possibly scares them, or confuses them, and makes no sense, so that’s not the Jesus they are ready for right now.

No, they are looking for the Jesus in us. They are looking for the flash of recognition—for each of us to look at them, to see them as an individual despite our differences. They are looking for a smile, a small kindness, a dropping of pretenses and aloofness and a demonstration of compassion and really seeing people for who they are: beloved children of God, made in God’s very image.

The topic being circled about oh so delicately here in our gospel today is Jesus’s coming crucifixion. When discussing the cross, John’s gospel is different from the other gospels. Jesus’ suffering on the cross is downplayed, in favor of the concept of the cross being a means of glorifying God— witness the “lifted up” reference from last week’s gospel passage from John 3:4-11. All through this gospel, Jesus is a heavenly figure who comes to us to reveal to humanity the true way of faith, and hope, and love, and then will ascend -- be lifted up-- bringing glory to God. In this gospel, Jesus is very clear about his divine origins, so he doesn’t engage in a lot of tap-dancing around his status as the Messiah. This view of Jesus is of one who is in charge.

And now—NOW--Jesus is going to be exalted—lifted up—on the cross and beyond the cross, held up to bring all of the world to see—to see so that the world can not just see, but come to KNOW the amazing healing power of Jesus and his message of hope, healing, community, and redemption. Jesus makes this clear when he says: “I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself”. In the gospel of John, this is the point where Jesus moves from his ministry toward his exaltation-- when we come to Jesus. Victory can push through to us at the darkest of times. For John, the crucifixion brings victory, because the cross brings the world to God. We don’t usually think of it this way, but the metaphor of the grain of wheat helps us remember this too. Jesus speaks again in paradox. In order to live we must die. Those who die to themselves will finally have a full life.

The metaphor of the solitary grain of wheat falling to the ground is a homely, pastoral image, one that many of Jesus’s followers could relate to. That single gain must fall to the ground to be buried before it can bring spring to life abundantly and anew; otherwise it remains a single grain—BUT in the original Greek the term actually means “remains alone.” There is a message here for us as well. Unless we are willing to be transformed—to let go of our old life of suspicion, and hardness of heart, and fear, we can have no trust in the love Jesus has for us, and we cannot be true servants of Christ. We have to break through the rocky soil of our own hearts to allow the seed of the promise of God’s love to grow.

And that image is one that often gets all the attention. We can all relate to it if we have ever planted any seeds of watched them sprout—heck, even if we’ve left a bag of potatoes or an onion around for too long out on the counter, we have seen the tendency of plant matter to drive toward regeneration and new life, no matter how removed we are from farming or gardening we ourselves are.

But what I also see being emphasized is the idea of Jesus being made visible throughout this passage, appoint that has been building in our readings steadily in the last few weeks. What I also being insisted upon is that Jesus was never meant to be a “personal savior” only. Too often, having a “personal relationship” with Jesus ends up being just that—a solitary, individualist pursuit, in which the focus ends up on the individual rather than on the community. We see that being addressed her as well in this passage. What Jesus actually says about that single grain of wheat is not that it remains a single grain—that’s our translation choices again running beneath what we ourselves see and hear. No, in the original text we have handed down to us, Jesus says that unless the grain in planted and tended it “remains alone.” Jesus calls us to move beyond our own self-centered ways and embrace our unity with those around us, calling us to be willing to love each other in deed and embrace each other as kindred despite our differences.

As we head toward the passion story of Christ in the next two weeks, we need to open our ears to the multiple meanings of the words in front of us. Because despite Mel Gibson’s incredibly bloody retelling of Jesus’s tortured last week on earth being one meaning of passion, there is another meaning for passion, as theologians Marcus Borg and John Dominic Crossan point out in their own book on the last week of Jesus’s earthly ministry. They remind us that “passion” is a term for suffering in Christian theology, yes. And especially in some branches of the Christian faith, that suffering is emphasized intensively. But if Jesus’s suffering for us becomes the core of Jesus’s message, the gospel message he embodied the other 32 years and 51 weeks of his earthly ministry to us itself gets overlooked. That’s why we have to remember the multiple meaning of the word “passion,” and remember the energy and the joy that passion can give to all life.(1)

Because a “passion” is also something that is your love, your focus, your reason for being. So Jesus’s passion is not just about Jesus’s suffering on the cross. Jesus’s passion is about us examining the focus of his life, his words, and his example, which was the preaching of repentance so that we would be citizens of the kingdom of God.

Jesus’s passion was in healing those who were sick or isolated, in looking for those he could help, in confronting injustice and oppressing, of which there was plenty, just like there is now. Jesus’s passion was drawing disciples to himself who would themselves share in that work and not be miserly or reluctant about it. Jesus’s passion was that the abundant love of God would be made visible to the entire world—a world awash in suffering, fear, and cruelty already.

We want to see Jesus. And Jesus calls us to make him visible. Jesus asks us to lift him up each and every day. That’s what we are here to do. We are here to show that Jesus is OUR passion, our center, our model, our teacher, our guide.

Let us live our lives so that we DO see Jesus, every day, in ourselves, and in each other.

Amen.

Preached at the 10:30 online worship from St. Martin's Episcopal Church in Ellisville, MO.

Readings:

• Jeremiah 31:31-34
• Hebrews 5:5-10
• John 12:20-33
• Psalm 51:1-13

Citations:

1) Marcus Borg and John Dominic Crossan, The Last Week: What the Gospels Really Teach About Jesus's Final Days in Jerusalem, preface.

Prayer 2913: In union with all that is

God of the Sparrow,
God of the Infinite,
You hold all that is within your light.
All that you have made is beloved,
fashioned through your wisdom
by the skill of your hand.

May we be beautiful instruments in your hands, O God,
and may you draw from us
the melody of true justice, mercy, and peace,
fed by our communion within You.
May we ever seek your wisdom,
and humbly extol your mystery and infinite compassion
that we may seek these qualities within ourselves,
and witness to you in all our ways.

Your eye is upon us
like the bright eye of the nuthatch and wren,
who trust in your providence
and call us to do likewise.
You draw the universe together
through the force of attraction,
galaxies, nations, families
all drawn together by your call to love and communion.
and the gravity of the life we share.

Guide us now, O Light and Love Everlasting,
that we may walk in the way of peace and hope
standing alongside each other and all creation
in fellowship and affinity to your precepts.

Grant the shade of your peace
to all who seek You,
to all you who hunger for justice,
and to all who long for healing and rest,
especially those whom we now name.

Amen.

Loving God- A Beginner's Guide: Sermon for Proper 25A

One of my favorite movies of all time—favorite because it can lift my spirits more than almost any other movie, is The Princess Bride. I love its blend of, as one character lists at one point, “Fencing, fighting, torture, revenge, giants, monsters, chases, escapes, true love, and miracles.” I am one of those people who can quote scene after scene from this movie, and apply lines from this movie to almost every situation, just like my friend Shug Goodlow can do with The Godfather.

The movie centers around a grandfather coming to read a book to his sick grandson. The grandson is skeptical, but the grandfather talks him into it, and off they go. Only a few pages into it, though, the boy stops his grandfather, who is describing how the main characters meet and fall in love. “Hold it, hold it—are you trying to trick me? Is this a kissing book?” he asks with disgust. The grandfather urges his grandson to let him continue reading. (1) Sure enough, soon there’s plenty of fencing, fighting, giants, miracles, and torture. There’s even rhymes. But in the end- literally, the book—and the sharing of the book-- is about love. All kinds of it.

The entire book is distilled down to the idea that love is the greatest thing in the world—and that there are many ways to show love. 

You can show it by doing whatever you can to make the one you love happy, even in as small a thing as handing her a water pitcher she could have gotten herself but that she asks you for just so she can be near you. 

You can show love by never giving up on rescuing the one you love even if you think they’ve forgotten about you. 

You can show love by never forgetting the beloved father you lost in childhood, and doing anything you can to seek justice for him. 

You can show it by spending an entire day sharing a special book with someone you love, even if you have to convince them repeatedly to stick with you. 

Truly, there are dozens of ways love is demonstrated in this sweet, funny, fairy tale. Love sums it up.

In The Princess Bride, the hero, Westley, faces all kinds of opponents, and he overcomes or wins over every one—even the giant. Looking backward from today’s gospel reading from Matthew 22 over the last several weeks, Jesus has now come full circle in being confronted by nearly all the major factions and parties of the day within Israel. The scribes, chief priests, Pharisees, Herodians, Sadducees, and now the Pharisees again, but this time adding in a lawyer—they all have now confronted Jesus and questioned him and his authority. 

And these are groups that usually would not be seen as allies. The Herodians were secular Jews who supported a puppet king of the Roman empire. The chief priests and scribes possibly included both Pharisee and Sadducees. Pharisees were those who acknowledged the power of traditional teaching of the rabbis alongside scripture, while the Sadducess didn’t—they were like the fundamentalists of their time in giving authority only to what was written in scripture. But one thing all these groups could agree on—that Jesus posed a threat to their power and their understanding of themselves as being “right.”

Today, they put the lawyer forward with a question to engage in a battle of wits with Jesus. Looking over the entire span of scripture, the lawyer asks a deceptively simple question, with a smirk calling Jesus “Teacher” when they have just spent several chapters challenging that. The question is this: which law in Torah is the greatest?

With supposedly 613 separate laws in the Torah (365 of them negative), this had been a subject of debate for centuries. And many attempts had been made to distill these various laws down to an easier number. 

Jesus once again puts a twist on his answer. The Law, he says, can be summed up in two things. First, he quotes Deuteronomy, a statement known as the Shema, a prayer that Jews were required to recite morning and night every day: Hear, O Israel: The Lord is our God, the Lord alone. 5You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might.

But Jesus doesn’t stop there. He goes back to Leviticus and pulls this lesser-known verse out and sets it alongside the Shema: you shall love your neighbor as yourself. And he says this is the same as the first.

Jesus boils down the essence of the Law down to love.

Think about this as what he DOESN’T say the law is about.

He doesn’t say it’s about believing certain things- especially ones that Christians nowadays often argue about..

He doesn’t say it’s about who will get into heaven or “personal salvation.”

He doesn’t say it’s about casting out folk you don’t like or don’t approve of.

He doesn’t say it’s about being RIGHT. He doesn’t say it’s about God being vengeful or punitive.

He says it is about LOVE. And further, he states very clearly that the best way to put your love for God into action is by loving those around you—your neighbors, whether you even like them or not, your political opponents-- it doesn’t matter. He equates those two things as being the same.

Think about that! And then wonder at how revolutionary an idea this still is, 2000 year later! Love that isn’t about individual, personal relationships with Jesus so we can escape punishment, but love that is grounded in forming a community in which all are welcome—what Matthew calls the Kingdom of Heaven, or Dr. King called the Beloved Community.

Jesus repeatedly emphasizes that everything in the Law and Prophets is meant to create a community in which justice and peace prevail—what we would call “heaven on earth.” The heart of God’s kingdom on earth and in our hearts, which was considered to be the seat of a person’s will, is LOVE. That is what makes Jesus’s message so compelling, then and now.

Our Presiding Bishop nearly always includes in every one of his sermons this observation: “If it’s not about love, then it’s not about God.” Jesus states the same thing quite clearly here. 

Love is the only thing that can change the world. So why do we have such a hard time doing it?

There is a poverty of real love in the world—and this is true 2,000 years after Jesus’s earthly ministry. We’re too prone to toss off the word love and make it seem common. We love our friends. Most of us love our families, even if that means we have to make our families intentionally rather than by birth. We love our pets. We love Ann and Nancy Wilson of the rock group Heart.

That’s not the kind of love Jesus is talking about, however- love that is a response to something we first get. The love that Jesus talks about is grounded in compassion and generous acceptance. It is what Episcopal priest and humanitarian Becca Stevens talks about when she talks about love healing—and if you listen to her, that healing comes from the inside out as much as the outside in. The kind of love Jesus is talking about is also grounded in self-discipline. It is rooted in an open-heartedness that post-modern culture tries to drive out of us with every effort at distraction at its disposal. 

When I was a kid, there was actually a popular novel whose tag line was "Love means never having to say you're sorry." What nonsense. Our entire culture tries to convince us that love shouldn’t be hard work. The mere fact that Jesus has to keep telling us to do it tells us that it IS.

So where do we begin? One tangible way to step toward this kind of love is by practicing justice for others—to stand alongside those who are often denigrated or seen as “less than” in our society, and to treat them as we ourselves would wish to be treated. Isn’t that kind of fairness the basis for true justice, and isn’t that kind of justice the foundation for true peace?

What if we were to try it?

It’s the kind of love that calls us to reconsider the kind of off-hand cutting remarks that are poisonous to communities. It’s about giving people the benefit of the doubt and offering the grace we would want to receive when people aren’t being their best selves. We can acknowledge our own woundedness, and instead try to see the pain behind others’ actions, rather than lash out ourselves.

And in this time of COVID, we love each other by remembering what true worship of God is all about. I know we all want to be back together to worship like we used to. It was easy. It was familiar. It made us feel good. But to do so would be to endanger each other. I know many otherwise capable people who have either imbibed the dangerous idea that putting the Lord your God to the test against all evidence is somehow a sign of faith (the “God will protect me because I have faith” cohort) OR who view worship as entertainment and social time more than a time of reverence for God and neighbor. Worship is NOT a “right.” Worship is something more important— a state of the heart, mind, and soul. It’s LOVE in action.

We like to quantify things. That’s why stewardship campaigns are so difficult for everyone involved. We are not a part of one of the traditions that flat-out tell you how much it costs to be a member of this community. Some places are upfront, and say, “Ten percent of your income.” Man. That’s a lot. More power to those people who make that commitment. But most of us resist that. However, love IS about giving without fear, but with boldness and joy. 

Especially in this time, the world around us is desperate for signs of this kind of love. The kind of love that blesses us with a grounded awareness of where the hurting is around us, and calls us to minister to those needs in the name of the God we are called to love. That makes visible the God who IS love—unchanging love that seeks to change the world.

It's about living into this blessing from A Black Rock Prayer Book:

The world now is too dangerous
and too beautiful for anything but love.
May your eyes be so blessed you see God in everyone. 

Your ears, so you hear the cry of the poor.
May your hands be so blessed
that everything you touch is a sacrament.
Your lips, so you speak nothing but the truth with love. 

May your feet be so blessed you run
to those who need you.
And may your heart be so opened,
so set on fire, that your love,
your love, changes everything.(2)

What do all the commandments tell us?

Love God. Love your neighbor. Change the world.


Amen.

Readings:

Deuteronomy 34:1-12
Psalm 90:1-6, 13-17
1 Thessalonians 2:1-8
Matthew 22:34-46

Links/Citations:

1) William Goldman, The Princess Bride script, at http://www.dailyscript.com/scripts/princess_bride.html 

2) A Black Rock Prayer Book, used at Burning Man, http://www.ees1862.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/A-Black-Rock-Prayer-Book-2019.pdf, cited by Debie Thomas at Journey with Jesus, 18 October 2020. 

Prayer, day 2721: A Prayer for Believing in the Power of Good

Loving One
we ask that your kingdom come on Earth,
and peace and equity reign throughout this land
and all lands.

Help us to never surrender to contempt,
but instead to believe
that we can choose good over evil,
that we can deny the power
of resentment, division, and indifference.

Help us to lay willing hands to the plow of justice
as we seek to turn the soil of suffering
into a field of hope.

Help us to plant seeds of compassion with each step,
and make our hearts the fertile ground
to bring the common good to life.

Help us to tend the tender shoots of faith
in You and in each other, Beloved Savior,
to create a verdant field of witness
to the love we bear each other without distinction.

Merciful God, lift up those who struggle,
comfort those who mourn,
soothe those who are anxious,
we humbly pray.

Amen.

Prayer, Day 2720: For compassion

Holy One, we open our hearts to you,
welcoming your guiding Spirit into our lives
as we humbly seek to walk in your Way.

Give us compassionate, charitable hearts, O God,
with the courage to name and resist
the everyday callousness and cruelties we see.
Beloved Savior, help us live more fully the gospel of love,
bearing with each other in gentleness and empathy.

God of Mercy, You know our faults and our failings,
yet embrace us as we repent again and again:
grant us the will to live by grace and forgiveness,
releasing ourselves from the wounds that bind us.

Spirit of Hope, spread wide the wings of your wisdom
to lift us above our fears, we pray,
and grant your comfort and healing
to all those for whom we pray.

Amen.

Prayer 2710: Fourth Sunday after Pentecost A

Inspired by Matthew 10:40-42, Proper 8A


Most Merciful God,
with joy we come before your altar 
and gather together 
to praise You and learn from You. 

Light of the World, 
you call us to see the needs of those around us, 
and to welcome and care for each other 
as we would welcome You -- 
to root out our prejudices and fear, a
nd be tender and merciful to all who struggle. 

May we offer the cool water of compassion 
to all who thirst, 
in the Name of the Living Water 
who graces us abundantly in all our paths. 

Spirit and Advocate,
deliver us from hardness of heart,
and fill us with determination
to live in integrity, lovingkindness, and mercy. 

Holy Trinity, united in love, 
grant the blessing of your peace 
to all for whom we pray.

Amen.

Prayer, day 2684

Holy, Holy, Holy Lord,
we sing a song of thanksgiving before You,
recalling the comforting weight of your hand
shielding and guarding us through the night:
O God, we lift our hearts to You.

God of Compassion, grant us wisdom,
that we may study your Word,
and never stray from the heart of your law:
to love You in word and deed,
and to love our neighbors as our own selves.
Almighty One, you command us to relieve suffering,
to stand alongside the oppressed,
to welcome the homeless,
remembering that your law is grounded in love,
for we are ourselves upheld
only through your grace and mercy.

Blessed Savior,
strengthen us in integrity and compassion,
that we may we do justice,
love mercy,
and walk humbly and honorably with You in every moment.
May we tear down the edifices of cruelty and injustice,
remembering we are each other's keeper
as Christ's hands and heart in the world.

Accept now, we pray,
our intercessions and our cares which we place before You,
O Merciful God,
Creator, Redeemer, Sustainer,
that your blessing may cover these beloveds
in a cloud of comfort and peace.

Amen.