Rebuilding Bonds of Love

St. Thomas’ Episcopal Church, Owings Mills MD

June 26, 2022

Year C, Proper 8: The Third Sunday after Pentecost

2 Kings 2:1-2, 6-14

Psalm 77:1-2, 11-20

Galatians 5:1, 13-25

Luke 9:51-62

Rebuilding Bonds of Love

Back in Jersey City, many of our parishioners lived in neighborhoods that were regularly scarred by violence.

These good people never knew what they might face each time they stepped out their door – worrying about their kids until they got back home safely – passing by the makeshift shrines set up at corners where yet another young man or woman had been struck down by gun violence.

Each time someone was killed in Jersey City, we would pray for them by name in church – and, for a while, a group of clergy would gather to pray at these places of violence and death, hoping that our witness would be a sign that God’s love was present, even in these bloodstained and seemingly hopeless places.

After a while, most of the clergy stopped coming to these grim vigils – maybe even they found them pointless or just too depressing.

Here, of course, it’s different.

Now, thanks to alerts from the “Owings Mills – Reisterstown Patch,” I know that there is some violence here in our immediate neighborhood, but most of us leave our homes without feeling like we are taking our lives in our hands.

But then there is the city just down the road.

You know better than I that the epidemic of gun violence has battered Baltimore.

There is so much death, so many victims, that I am ashamed to say that they become a kind of bloody blur. But every once in a while a violent death stands out as especially tragic.

Maybe you remember from the news that the other day Trevor White was shot and killed in Baltimore City.

He had played football at Boston College - he was the father of three, a CPA, an entrepreneur – he had recently opened a restaurant in Little Italy.

But, what really caught my eye was that for the past five years he had worked with ReBUILD Metro – which, as many of you know, is a grassroots effort to restore city neighborhoods block by block.

As I read Trevor White’s obituary, I grieved that someone so talented and, most of all, someone working hard to rebuild long-neglected city communities, had fallen victim to gun violence.

Meanwhile, here at St. Thomas’, lately quite a few of our parishioners have faced difficult and sometimes heartbreaking challenges.

Some have endured serious illness or injury, the death of a loved one, or a rupture within the family.

No matter what, these are difficult challenges, but a few days ago I heard one of our parishioners who has been going through a hard time speak very movingly about how much harder it all would be without her faith in God - how much harder it would be without the love and support that she has received from our St. Thomas’ community.

Amen.

There is no getting around the fact that life is often hard, and sometimes unspeakably sad.

And yet, it’s often in the midst of the hard times, and during the sad moments, that we get little glimpses of the way God has always meant life to be:

The kind note or concerned phone call.

The delicious homemade meal dropped off at the door.

The tender touch of a friend’s embrace.

A church full of people gathered to celebrate a life well lived and to console a grieving family.

Little glimpses of what God has always intended for us.

Right from the start, God’s great hope has been that all of us – God and us – that all of us would be held together by bonds of love – bonds of love, stronger than the violence we inflict, stronger than any disagreement or division, stronger than any challenge, stronger than any heartbreak, stronger even than death itself.

Today’s lesson from the Gospel of Luke marks the beginning of Jesus’ journey to Jerusalem and all that awaits him there: a joyful welcome that was followed quickly by betrayal, rejection, suffering, and a death that seemed to be the end of his story.

Perhaps it’s Jesus’ awareness of his fate that shapes the serious and challenging tone of what we heard today.

Jesus and his disciples began their journey from Galilee to Jerusalem by traveling through Samaria.

Now, because of the famous parable, we tend think of Samaritans as “good,” but back in the first century there wasn’t much love between Jews and Samaritans. Although Jews and Samaritans were related, they had different ideas about scripture, worship, and the messiah.

So, probably it was no surprise that Jesus was rejected by at least one Samaritan village.

And, I suppose we shouldn’t be surprised that the brother disciples James and John respond to this rejection with let’s say, a wild overreaction.

Their threat to call down fire and destruction reveals an astonishing overconfidence in their own power – just the latest episode of our long-running series, “The Disciples Just Don’t Get It.”

Although they’ve been with Jesus for a while now, James and John seem to have missed, or maybe have just conveniently forgotten, that we are supposed to forgive those who wrong us – that we are meant to love our enemies.

But, then again, we have been with Jesus for a while, too, and we also struggle with those teachings.

It would be fun to spend the rest of my sermon picking on the disciples. But, no matter how much I want to skip it, I can’t avoid talking about the second, more challenging, half of today’s gospel lesson.

Jesus has brief interactions with three unnamed would-be disciples.

And, each time, Jesus emphasizes the high cost of discipleship.

It is costly to follow a Savior who has no home of his own.

It is costly to follow a Lord who insists that he comes first, ahead of even serious obligations like burying one’s father.

It is costly to follow Jesus who insists there can be no looking back at what we have left behind.

We’re not told if, after hearing about the high cost of discipleship, these three would-be disciples ended up following Jesus.

I wonder.

As I’ve sat with this really hard passage, I’ve come to see it as Jesus’ version of God’s commandment:

“I am the Lord your God who brought you out of bondage. You shall have no other gods but me.”

God began that commandment by reminding the Israelites of God’s liberating power – and then God demands an exclusive bond between God and God’s people.

Now, God does not insist on this exclusivity because God somehow needs our love and devotion.

No, God insists on being first because God knows that we are made for God, made for God’s love.

And so whenever we try to put something else – or even somebody else - in God’s place – we very quickly go off the rails.

But, when we accept God’s bonds of love, then, as St. Paul wrote to the Galatians, we are set free – free to truly love one another, free to generously serve one another.

I’ve mentioned before that some of us have been thinking about the mission of St. Thomas’ at this time of our history.

You’ve heard me talk about my vision of us as a servant church – but maybe we need to go even deeper than that.

We live beside a violent city in an appallingly violent country, a frightened and angry country, ever more armed to the teeth.

We live in a land where on Friday the Supreme Court deleted a right, further inflaming the country, and leaving many people, most especially our gay family, friends, and neighbors, fearing what will be lost next.

We live in a time when people don’t know God or the church (and, frankly, considering our track record, many do not want to know the church).

And we live in a time when people don’t know each other, either.

So, in a time and place such as this, maybe our mission is to show the world out there what it means to be a community where, despite our differences and disagreements, the bonds of love – the bonds among God and us – are so strong – a community that looks more and more like what God has always intended for us.

With God’s help, may we rebuild our bonds of love.  

Amen.

Agents of Liberation

St. Thomas’ Episcopal Church, Owings Mills MD

June 19, 2022

Year C, Proper 7: The Second Sunday after Pentecost

1 Kings 19:1-15a

Psalm 42

Galatians 3:23-29

Luke 8:26-39

Agents of Liberation

Most of you know that before I was a priest I was a high school history teacher.

Although I’ve been out of the classroom for quite a while now, I have so many vivid memories, making it feel like not too much time has passed.

But, every once in a while, I have an experience that forces me to realize how long ago that all was, and just how much has changed.

So, I can’t remember. Have I mentioned to you that my wife Sue recently earned her doctorate? Has that come up before?

Well, what most of you don’t know is that one of the other students in Sue’s program was a woman named Aileen - who I taught more than twenty-five years ago, at St. Vincent Academy, an all-girls high school in Newark. 

I’ve known about that remarkable connection for about three years, but it was still a little unnerving to actually see Aileen and some of her high school classmates who came to celebrate with her at the graduation ceremony a couple of weeks ago.

I was glad that these former students all still recognized me and even happier that they wanted to pose for a picture with me, but our little reunion was still a kind of disorienting reminder of just how much time has passed since they were all in my History class.

 

So, as you might guess, that experience put me into a kind of reflective mood.

And, as I’ve thought back to my teaching days, I’ve cringed a bit at my younger self: so sure that I had things mostly figured out, thinking that I really knew what I knew and that I knew what I did not know.

To give just one example, having grown up in the relatively peaceful time after the end of the Vietnam War, I remember saying to my students that I was sure that Americans simply would not tolerate another drawn-out military conflict in a faraway land, only later to be proven quite wrong, of course. 

And, even though the history curriculum at St. Vincent’s emphasized Black history and women’s history, there was so much that I just did not know, so much that I certainly did not teach.

Like, for example, Juneteenth.

Do you know the story?

On June 19th, 1865 – more than two years after the Emancipation Proclamation - Union General Gordon Granger proclaimed freedom at last for the enslaved people of Texas, the most remote and the last to be occupied part of the Confederacy.

Of course, Black people did not forget this day of liberation.

Each year in Texas and across the South, they celebrated what came to be known as Juneteenth. 

And then later, during the Great Migration, they brought this tradition to other parts of the country.

And, as you probably know, just last year Juneteenth became a Federal holiday, now meant to be a national celebration of liberation.

When I first turned my attention to today’s Gospel lesson, I was immediately struck by how appropriate it is that today - on the 157th anniversary of the first Juneteenth - we hear a story of liberation.

Jesus and his disciples have traveled away from home, to the “country of the Geresenes.” We don’t know exactly where that was but, thanks to the presence of an unfortunate herd of swine, we know that Jesus and his friends are no longer in Jewish territory.

The moment Jesus steps foot on this foreign soil, he is immediately greeted by a disturbing and pathetic figure: the man with many demons.

We’re told that he’s naked and lives among the tombs.

His neighbors tried to keep him under guard and chaining him, maybe to protect themselves and maybe to protect him from himself. 

But those demons were powerful.

And, it turns out that those demons were knowledgeable, too.

Unlike Jesus’ own disciples, who always have a hard time figuring out his identity, the demons in this foreign land get it exactly right: 

Jesus is the Son of the Most High God.

Well, without waiting to be asked, Jesus liberates this poor man.

And, at the demons’ request, he sends them into the swine that promptly rush down a hill and drown in the lake, leaving the swineherds suddenly without their livelihood and probably feeling not so positive about Jesus and his ministry.

Actually, it’s interesting that, aside from the man who was freed of his demons, nobody seems very happy about this turn of events.

Instead of rejoicing at the liberation of their neighbor, the people are afraid. No doubt this miracle has upset their sense of order.

If this man possessed by a legion of demons can be liberated, just what else might be possible?

Faced with that uncomfortable question, they probably just want Jesus to turn around and go back where he came from.

Not the liberated man, though. He becomes a disciple, telling everyone how much Jesus had done for him.

The story ends there, but like so often with the Bible, I wonder what happened next.

In this case, I wonder about the moment when this man’s family first saw him “clothed in his right mind,” finally free.

What was that day of liberation like?

Joy, yes, of course. 

But maybe also anger and sadness about how much had been lost: time, opportunity, dignity.

And, I wonder, in the years ahead, did this man and his family continue to celebrate the anniversary of his liberation?

At this week’s Bible Study, we had a lively conversation about this amazing story of liberation.

Although we know from the gospels that exorcisms were a significant part of Jesus’ ministry, we don’t talk about them much because, with our modern understanding of illness and healing, they confuse us, or make us uncomfortable and embarrassed.

And horror movies certainly haven’t made things any easier.

Yet, even just a quick look at the news reveals that the old demons are on the loose.

The demons of hate, and violence, and fear, and addiction are on the march, wreaking havoc, destroying people, just as surely as that naked man living in the tombs was nearly ruined.

But, here’s the good news: just like two thousand years ago, Jesus is the Liberator.

And, today, Jesus calls us to be his agents of liberation.

With God’s help, this liberating work begins by us building a community here that is a demon-free zone:

A church where absolutely everyone is welcome.

A church where we are unafraid to confess our faults.

A church that offers itself in loving service to the poor and oppressed.

A church where, like the liberated man, we proclaim how much Jesus has done for us.

A church that is wonderfully diverse but where, as St. Paul wrote to the Galatians, there is no longer Jew or Greek, no longer slave or free, no longer male and female, because we are one in Christ.

Today is Juneteenth – and, regardless of our age, or our history, or how much we still have to learn, Jesus calls us to be his agents of liberation.

Amen.

Mutual Joy

St. Thomas’ Episcopal Church, Owings Mills MD

June 12, 2022

Year C: The First Sunday after Pentecost – Trinity Sunday

Proverbs 8:1-4, 22-31

Psalm 8

Romans 5:1-5

John 16:12-15

Mutual Joy

Now, I don’t want to make anyone feel bad, but if you were not here at St. Thomas’ last Sunday, well, you missed something pretty special.

We celebrated Pentecost – we celebrated the gift of the Holy Spirit – with so much joy.

All three of our services were Spirit-filled – so many Alleluias - but the 10:00 service was something else.

It was wonderful to look out in the pews to see so many of you dressed in red – or at least wearing red accents – and to see the choir with their sharp red scarves – and to see the acolytes wearing red cinctures, the cord that we wrap around our robes.

The choir sang nothing but Holy Spirit music.

And then there was the Baptism.

Everything had gone very well during our Saturday morning rehearsal, but when it came time for the baptism itself, two year-old Marcelo had some… very vocal second thoughts.

I’m sure he was a bit overexcited, surrounded by his loving family who filled the first four pews.

And, it pains me to say that he was probably scared of me - wearing both a mask and a bright red outfit, who poured water over his head, anointed him with oil, and then held a candle before him, telling him that he is the light of the world.

At the rehearsal, Marcelo’s parents had expressed some concern about how it would go – two year-olds, you know – but I told them that, just like at a wedding, at a baptism you are surrounded by people who love you so much, so no matter what happens you just can’t go wrong.

And, sure enough there was great joy, even amidst the screaming.

And, I’m happy to report that after the service, Marcelo and I shook hands and parted as friends.

It was an amazing Pentecost.

But there was more – after the service, about fifty of us gathered outside for a delicious lunch – and, yes, there was even an ice cream truck!

I mean, come on, right?

So much love, so much joy.

I feel like I really know what Paul meant when he wrote to the church in Rome, “…hope does not disappoint us, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us.”

Well, after such a big day last week, you might think that things would now kind of settle down around here.

But, you would be wrong!

Yesterday, I had the great honor of officiating at my first wedding at St. Thomas’ – it was actually my first wedding since before the start of the pandemic.

Frances Wells, who grew up in this church, and Braxton DeCamp made some big promises to each other at the altar, and all of us who were here promised to support them in their married life.

I really enjoyed preparing Frances and Braxton for their wedding and for marriage – just as I’ve enjoyed working with Katherine Moriarty and Conor Barr, who will be married here next Saturday.

Just like with every soon to be married couple, we spent time looking at the words of the service, and discussing what they teach about the meaning of marriage.

You may remember that, near the start of the service, the Prayer Book lists the purposes of marriage, and at the very top of that list is this:

“The union…in heart, body, and mind is intended by God for their mutual joy.”

Mutual joy.

The list continues with helping and comforting each other, and the possibility of raising children, but I always remind couples that number one on the list is “mutual joy” – imperfect as we all are, that is what married people are meant to offer each other.

But, actually, mutual joy is not just for married people. 

All of us are made for mutual joy.

Today is the First Sunday after Pentecost – Trinity Sunday - the day when the Church invites us to reflect on God’s inner life – our mind-blowing belief that God is One in Three Persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

Since the Trinity takes us way beyond the limits of our comprehension, trying to explain it is a big mistake, and even talking about it is notoriously difficult.

All I know is this: the Trinity reveals that God’s very essence is community.

God is a community of love.

And the three members of that community offer each other mutual joy.

And, you know, that community of love – that mutual joy - would have been enough for God.

The One God in Three Persons could have gone on forever and ever, perfect and completely content, in a kind of eternal and divine dance, as some early theologians imagined.

But, instead, and even more mind-blowing than the Trinity itself, God invites us to be part of the community of love.

All of us are made for mutual joy.

Throughout history, our One-in-Three God has invited us to be part of the community of love, sending the prophets to call us back to faithfulness, to demand that we beat our swords into plowshares, to offer a vision of the day when we will all gather together on the holy mountain, beloved siblings at last.

Our One-in-Three God has invited us to experience mutual joy, most of all by coming among us in and through Jesus of Nazareth, who offers the joy of forgiveness, the joy of healing, the joy of welcoming absolutely everybody, the joy of knowing that not even death can separate us from God’s love.

And, throughout our lives, our One-in-Three God offers us signs of the community of love – tastes of mutual joy – so we can know that this – this – is what we are made for.

Falling in love, the look of wonder in a child’s eyes, the bond of a lifelong friendship, simply holding the hand of another, sharing good food and drink, coming together here at St. Thomas’, with all of our different backgrounds and various ideas – joining together, imperfectly, yes, but united as a community of love.

Our One-in-Three God is a community of love, who has made us for mutual joy, inviting us to be part of the community of love.

Unfortunately, with all of the woes of the world and the challenges in our own lives, it’s so easy to forget this great truth.

So, I’m going to try to remember Frances and Braxton, and Katherine and Conor, making some big promises, surrounded by so much love.

And I’m going to remember Marcelo, who was frightened and overwhelmed and screaming – and, especially these days, we all know that feels like – and yet the truth is that he was surrounded by so much love.

And I’m going to remember our Pentecost ice cream truck.

We are made for mutual joy.

Amen.

"Living Christs Here and Now"

St. Thomas’ Episcopal Church, Owings Mills MD

June 5, 2022

Year C: The Day of Pentecost

Acts 2:1-21

Psalm 104:25-35, 37

Romans 8:14-17

John 14:8-17, 25-27

“Living Christs Here and Now”

Alleluia! Christ is risen!

The Lord is risen indeed! Alleluia!

As most of you know only too well, beginning on Easter Day and continuing through all the Sundays of Easter, I have begun and ended each of my sermons with the Easter Acclamation:

Alleluia! Christ is risen!

The Lord is risen indeed! Alleluia!

I’ve kept our Easter call and response going as a way to keep Easter joy alive, even after the crowds in church have thinned out just a bit, even after the flowers are scaled back (but still always beautiful), even after most of us have long since left Easter behind and gotten back to our daily routines.

For those of you who have been not so thrilled with the Easter call and response, I have some welcome news.

Today is Pentecost – the fiftieth and final day of Easter – and so today is the last day for a while that I’ll begin and end my sermons with the best news of all time:

Alleluia! Christ is risen!

The Lord is risen indeed! Alleluia!

You’ve all been good sports and given it your best, but there’s no denying that our call and response has faded a bit over these past Sundays.

And a few of you have mentioned to me that our joyful “Alleluias” sound hollow, or maybe even false, as we look at the bleak state of the world, and as we face our own personal challenges and setbacks. 

I get that, of course.

And I wonder if the first disciples experienced something similar.

For them, there was the shock of the empty tomb and then the overwhelming joy of Easter – the difficult to describe describe experience of encountering the Risen Christ – the Risen Christ who was still very much the Jesus they had known, still marked by the nails of execution, still up for breakfast on the beach – but also mysteriously transformed – now able to pass through locked doors and not always recognizable at first glance.

It must have been amazing time.

And, if I were one of those first disciples, all I would want is to sit with the Risen Christ – to see him in his glory – and to wait around for his next appearance.

But, at least according to Luke’s timeline, this intensely beautiful time only lasted for forty days, only lasted until Jesus ascended.

Then the appearances of the Risen Christ stopped.

Even for people who had seen the Risen Christ with their own eyes, perhaps Easter quickly became just a sweet memory, as the cares of the world crowded out their joy, silencing their “Alleluias.”

We don’t know what the disciples were up to during what must have been a strange and uneasy days.

But, they gathered in Jerusalem for the Jewish Festival of Weeks, also known as Pentecost because it was held fifty days after Passover. 

Not only were the disciples in Jerusalem, but, the author of Acts tells us, “the disciples were all together in one place.” 

I imagine them waiting together for something to happen – or maybe they stuck together because they were frightened and demoralized.

And then we’re told, suddenly, there’s a loud sound like rushing wind that fills the house and divided tongues like flames appear above their heads.

The Holy Spirit gave those first disciples the ability to share the Gospel so that people from all over the world could understand it.

That day in Jerusalem, those Spirit-filled first disciples made such a spectacle that some people concluded that they must be drunk!

But no, it wasn’t early morning wine.

It was the Holy Spirit, transforming the frightened and demoralized little band of disciples into bold and courageous ambassadors for Christ, spreading the Good News far and wide until eventually it arrived here among all of us:

Alleluia! Christ is risen!

The Lord is risen indeed! Alleluia!

I love Pentecost (and, as most of you know, I really love baptizing people – and so with Marcelo here about to be baptized I can barely contain myself right now!).

Mostly I love this great feast - I love celebrating the gift of the Holy Spirit - because unlike the other big days like Christmas and Easter, Pentecost is not only a historical event.

No, Pentecost happens all the time.

The priest and writer Henri Nouwen wrote, 

“Without Pentecost the Christ-event – the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus – remains imprisoned in history as something to remember, think about and reflect on. The Sprit of Jesus comes to dwell within us, so that we can become living Christs here and now.”

I love that.

“The Sprit of Jesus comes to dwell within us, so that we can become living Christs here and now.”

And I know Pentecost happens all the time because I’ve seen it for myself.

I’ve seen the Spirit of Jesus come to dwell within us at St. Thomas’. I’ve seen you become living Christs here and now.

Now, it’s true that there may not be a sound like rushing wind or divided tongues like flame over our heads, but God sends the Holy Spirit to us all the time.

To give just one example, I have no doubt that the Holy Spirit was at work last year, when some among us who were feeling awful about the plight of Afghan refugees suddenly hit on the idea that we could do something big – that we could do more than just write a check – that we could and should make some real sacrifices to welcome people from far away.

Maybe some people thought it was a crazy – dare I say drunken - idea, but this hearty little band of ambassadors persevered through many, many obstacles.

Some even learned to speak a new language – mastering the complicated jargon of refugee resettlement! 

And now our application is just about complete, and God willing, one day soon, we and our partners St. Mark’s On the Hill and ERICA will finally welcome refugees into our community.

Pentecost happens all the time.

The Holy Spirit is right here and now transforming us into Living Christs –Living Christs offering love to the outcast.

And, in just a moment, in the water of Baptism, the Holy Spirit is going to descend on young Marcelo – you folks in the back may have trouble seeing it but it’s gonna happen – transforming him into a Living Christ – giving him all that he’ll need to live a life of love and service.

And, I don’t know about you, but the joy of a Pentecost Baptism makes me want to cry out once more:

Alleluia! Christ is risen!

The Lord is risen indeed! Alleluia!

Amen. 

Oneness and Liberation

St. Thomas’ Episcopal Church, Owings Mills MD

May 29, 2022

Year C: The Seventh Sunday of Easter

Acts 16:16-34

Psalm 97

Revelation 22:12-14, 16-17, 20-21

John 17:20-26

Oneness and Liberation   

Alleluia! Christ is risen!

The Lord is risen indeed! Alleluia!

Reflecting on today’s lesson from the Acts of the Apostles – the story of Paul and Silas and their incarceration and divine jailbreak in Philippi – got me thinking back quite a few years, back to a parishioner who had been arrested for drunk driving.

Since, unfortunately, he was a repeat offender, he was sentenced to six months in the local county jail.

Before visiting him for the first time, I had never been inside a jail – and I admit that the prospect made me both nervous and also curious.

Would it be like what I had seen on TV and in the movies?

When I arrived, I had to wait on line with all of the other visitors, mostly family members, it looked to me. My black suit and clergy collar did not get me any special treatment.

Just like when you enter any government building, I had to empty the contents of my pockets into a bowl that was then run through a scanner. My pyx – the small round container that’s used to hold consecrated wafers – drew some attention, with the guards puzzling over it and then asking me what it was inside. 

I almost said “Jesus,” but went with “Holy Communion,” instead.

The guards asked me to open it so they could see for themselves.

I remember that the jail was cold – really cold – and in some places it was very loud – with the voices of the prisoners echoing off the concrete floors and cinderblock walls.

But in other places it was eerily silent.

I met with my parishioner in a small glassed-in room. There is no privacy in jail – we could see his cellblock and the other inmates and guards – and they could see us.  

We sat across from each other at a metal table.

The guard left us, closing the door, which locked with a loud “click” behind him.

As soon as we were alone, the parishioner reached across the table and held my hands tight.

He told me that I was the only person he was allowed to touch. Even when his wife came to visit, they were separated by a thick pane of glass. 

He said he had never before realized the importance of touch – and he missed it so much.

I went back once a month and after a couple of visits, I sort of got used to the jail – and some of the guards even got used to me. Sometimes they wouldn’t even bother to ask to look inside my pyx!

Each time, just like during my first visit, my parishioner and I would sit across from each other in the glassed-in room and he would grip my hands. We’d talk and pray and share Communion. And then I would press a button on the wall and through the intercom tell the guard that I was ready to leave.

Usually a minute or two later, a guard would appear to set me free and to send the parishioner back to his cellblock. 

That’s how it worked…except for one time.

I pressed the button, but no one answered.

I don’t know if there was a shift change or they were short staffed or if something was going on in the jail that required extra attention, but, for whatever reason, the minutes ticked by and my parishioner and I were locked in this small room.

As I felt the waves of panic begin to rise from my stomach, I tried as best I could to compose my face into a neutral expression, trying to project a “non-anxious presence.”

Eventually somebody showed up and I got out of there, but for that time – I don’t know how long it was, probably just ten minutes, but for that time I got a small taste of what it feels like to be imprisoned.

Of course, not all prisons are built of steel and cinderblock.

Many of us are imprisoned by fear or guilt or addiction or regret or hatred.

Many of us feel imprisoned by outside forces that are, or seem to be, beyond our control – crime that imprisons people in their own homes, economic and social change that makes people feel like they’re being left behind, cut off, strangers in their own land.

And then there is the gun violence that continues to terrorize our country, inflicting horrendous and unnecessary suffering, shedding so much blood.

We seem to have so many ruthless, angry, and often unhinged people willing to kill others on our streets, willing to slaughter innocents like people shopping in a supermarket in Buffalo, and like those little children and their teachers in Texas.

As I wrote to you a few days ago, I heard about the mass shooting at Robb Elementary School on Tuesday afternoon, just before going to our Preschool’s art show.

The show was was magical – and then we gathered outside with the band and the ice cream truck and all those happy, loving families, who looked so safe and carefree.

Standing there and taking in that scene, I felt something like what I felt all those years ago in jail when I was locked in that little room with my parishioner – the rising wave of panic and fear.

At that moment and in the following days as I read more about what had happened and watched the politicians and the media play their usual roles in this dreadful drama – “thoughts and prayers” – “guns don’t kill people, people kill people” – the sudden but always brief interest in mental health - intrusive video of so much grief – and talking heads saying what everyone has heard a million times – after going through this all yet again, I felt despair – the despair that we are imprisoned – imprisoned with people who are armed to the teeth – imprisoned with people who have at least some power to change things but for their own cynical political reasons do little or nothing.

Not all prisons are built with steel and cinderblock.

Today is the Seventh Sunday of Easter.

Although it is still Easter, today’s gospel lesson takes us back to the Last Supper.

Jesus is gathered around the table with his friends and he prays – he prays for oneness – Jesus prays that we will be one just as the Father and he are one.

And notice that Jesus doesn’t step out and go off by himself to offer this prayer. No, he prays out loud, right there in front of his friends, no doubt hoping that they will be the answer to his prayer – that they will hear and remember his great desire that we should be one – God and us – all of us one.

That’s what Baptism is about – it’s a sacrament of oneness – God makes an indissoluble bond with each of us in Baptism – a bond that can never be broken.

And that’s what Communion is about – it’s a sacrament of oneness – each of us taking Christ into our bodies and souls.

And, just like for Paul and Silas and even for their jailer, this oneness – this indissoluble bond with God – this unbreakable bond with each other – this oneness is stronger than any prison.

You know, bringing Holy Communion to that man in jail really felt like bringing Jesus behind bars. Very beautiful and humbling.

But the truth is that Jesus was already there. 

Jesus was already one with my friend - sustaining him, giving him the strength to go on, the humility to admit his failure, the courage to overcome his fear, and the confidence to reach across the table and hold my hand.

Today we are behind bars, in a prison built by violence, fear, and cynicism.

I don’t have all the answers but I do know this:

Just like for Paul and Silas and even their jailer, and just like for my friend in county jail, God always offers us liberation. 

But that liberation can only begin when we are the answer to Jesus’ prayer.

We’re only getting out of jail when we remember – when we truly believe in – our oneness – God and us – all of us one.

Alleluia! Christ is risen!

The Lord is risen indeed! Alleluia!

Amen.

God's Great Art Project

St. Thomas’ Episcopal Church, Owings Mills MD

May 22, 2022

Year C: The Sixth Sunday of Easter – Rogation Sunday

Deuteronomy 11:10-15

Psalm 147:1-13

Romans 8:18-25

Mark 4:26-32

God’s Great Art Project

Alleluia! Christ is risen!

The Lord is risen indeed! Alleluia!

Our Alleluia call and response is a reminder that, yes, it is still Easter.

But, today, in addition to continuing to celebrate the Resurrection, we are also observing Rogation Sunday. 

The word “rogation” comes from a Latin word meaning “to ask.”

For many centuries, on rogation days Christians have asked God to bless us with a temperate climate and a bountiful harvest. 

And, in more recent times, rogation days have been opportunities to reflect on the ways we have damaged the earth, to repent of our destructive ways, and to ask God to help us take better care of creation. 

Now, at first, it might seem like Easter and Rogation Sunday don’t have much to do with each other. But that would be a mistake.

The Risen Christ is not a ghost, not some kind of disembodied spiritual being. Actually, that would be much easier to believe, right?

But the truth is both harder to believe and much better news.

The gospels insist that the Risen Christ is still a flesh and blood human being – mysteriously transformed, yes – but, as Thomas saw for himself, still bearing the wounds of the cross – still very much the Jesus that his friends knew and loved.

The Risen Christ is a most powerful sign that God cares about our bodies and loves this physical world.

You know, I assume that God did not have to create anything at all.

I assume that God could have just gone on forever all by God’s Self, perfectly content and at peace.

But, I suspect that the God who is love almost couldn’t help creating the universe – or maybe many universes – almost couldn’t help creating all that we see hear, smell, touch, and taste - and all that we still have no idea about.

I suspect that God almost couldn’t help creating this beautiful planet and all of us.

It’s hard to contain love and creativity, maybe even for God.

And, creation didn’t have to be as beautiful and diverse and complex as it is, right?

I suppose God could have just created in black and white, rather than the riot of color that’s all around us, all the color of the galaxies that are sprinkled through the universe.

I suppose God could have created in straight lines and right angles, rather than the infinite number of shapes and sizes and designs that make up the world.

I suppose God could have been very economical with creation, creating only the bare minimum, only what was absolutely necessary, but instead God is very much like the sower in Jesus’ parable, spreading seeds, always hoping against the odds for new and abundant life.

I suppose God could have made us all the same, instead of the rainbow of colors and cultures that enrich the world and our church, instead of the different personalities with different ideas and beliefs that make life so interesting and, yes, sometimes maddening.

Creation did not have to be as beautiful and diverse and complex as it is, but God is the Great Artist and the world is God’s great art project.

And, so of course God the Artist cares about God’s great art project.

But, there’s another twist to this story:

God invites us to work on the great art project, too.

God invites us to be co-creators, to be assistant artists.

God invites us to see and appreciate God’s art, and, not only that, God wants us to add our own touches, organizing plants into a beautiful garden – mixing colors to paint a beautiful picture – arranging sounds to make beautiful music – carving wood and stone into beautiful sculpture – and, most of all, caring for creation and sharing its bounty with the hungry and the lost.

Now, let’s be honest, considering our rather poor track record in this department, God’s invitation for us to care for creation might seem unwise, at best.

This weekend’s broiling heat is an uncomfortable reminder that we have made a terrible, terrible mess – and, unless we change our ways fast, we face a bleak future indeed.

But, Easter is a reminder that God never gives up on us, a reminder that suffering and death do not get the last word.

God the Great Artist is still at work.

And, one of the true joys of being here at St. Thomas’ is that we don’t have to look hard or far to see plenty of people accepting God’s invitation to work on God’s great art project.

Each week, super-talented volunteers adorn our altar with beautiful floral arrangements. Our fellow parishioners are God’s assistant artists, indeed.

And the co-creators and assistant artists on our Green Team created and tend our pollinator garden, giving us beauty, and feeding lots of buzzing bees and all different kinds of beautiful butterflies.

The Green Team have also seen to it that trees have been planted on two and a half acres across our church property, each of those fragile saplings in their protective tubes is a little art work, a small co-creation with God, a very real way to restore and care for creation.

And then there is our Preschool and Kindergarten.

As most of you probably know by now, the school has entered a time of transition, preparing to say thank you and good-bye to Kristin Morrow who has led our school with so much dedication, skill, and heart – and getting ready to welcome our next director, Nicole Norris, who I am confident will build on our school’s strong foundations, leading us into an exciting future.

You may not know that our school is very much nature-focused.

Just about every day, the teachers and students are outside, exploring our expansive grounds. The children learn in and from creation, probably without even realizing they are learning.

But, it gets better: these children who are so familiar with God’s creation are also co-creators. Just like last year, the kids have been carefully growing plants from seed – plants that are available for us to take home and plant in our gardens.

And our children are also assistant artists. They’ve been using their God-given imaginations, their sense of wonder, and their uninhibited creativity to make some truly beautiful art – work that you can see for yourself in the Parish Hall today.

And so, despite the terrible mess we have made of things, there are reasons to hope.

It is still the Easter Season, the time when we especially remember and celebrate that God raised from the dead the flesh and blood Jesus.

The Risen Christ is a most powerful sign that God cares about our bodies and loves this physical world.

And, today, Rogation Sunday is a reminder that God invites us to be co-creators and assistant artists, playing our part in God’s great art project.

May it be so.

Alleluia! Christ is risen!

The Lord is risen indeed! Alleluia!

Amen.

Love is a Verb

St. Thomas’ Episcopal Church, Owings Mills MD

May 15, 2022

Year C: The Fifth Sunday of Easter

Acts 11:1-18

Psalm 148

Revelation 21:1-6

John 13:31-35

Love is a Verb

Alleluia! Christ is risen!

The Lord is risen indeed! Alleluia!

So, as some of you know, my birthday was the other day.

It wasn’t a major milestone but it was a number big enough to get me thinking more than usual about my life’s journey, with all of its twists and turns.

For a number of reasons, I’ve been reflecting a lot about the first church I served as a priest.

When I was ordained about fifteen years ago, one of the few jobs available was curate – or assisting priest – at Grace Church in Madison, New Jersey.

Madison is a beautiful and relatively affluent suburban town, only about 25 miles west of my hometown of Jersey City.

But, when I first thought about moving there and serving there, Madison looked and felt like a world away, the kind of place where I had never imagined I would work and live.

So, I wasn’t sure I really wanted to go there.

But a priest’s gotta work, so I accepted the job, bringing my insecurities and uncertainties, wondering if I would have anything in common with these well-to-do suburbanites, not sure if we would have much to talk about.

Somehow, I even imagined that these people must have their lives pretty much together and so there might not be much pastoral work for me to do.

Well, I got started and, to my surprise, from day one it was an amazingly joyful experience.

From Grace Church’s rector, The Rev. Lauren Ackland (some of you met her a few months ago at our Celebration of New Ministry), I learned much of what I know about being a priest, and from the parishioners of Grace Church I learned that people are people – and that beautiful houses and green lawns don’t exempt anyone from the human condition, the ups and downs of life.

And, yes, that was a lesson I remembered before my most recent big move.

Anyway, on one of my first Sundays at Grace, the youth group gathered outside after church to tie-dye t-shirts, selling them as a messy, but fun, fundraiser for their next mission trip.

I still have mine.

On the back are written the words, “Love is a Verb.”

“Love is a verb.”

I don’t know where the kids came up with that, but I remember being so struck by it – love is a verb – love is action – love is motion – and love can take us to some unexpected places.

“Love is a verb.”

Although our “Alleluias” remind us that it is still Easter, today’s lesson from the Gospel of John takes us all the way back to the Last Supper.

Jesus has gathered with his friends for one final meal. And during that intense and emotional gathering, with time running out, Jesus tries to teach some most important lessons:

He will always be with us when we gather around the table, when we share the Bread and the Wine.

We are to offer lowly service, like washing each other’s feet.

And, as we heard today, Jesus says, “I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. By this everyone will know you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”

I don’t know if the disciples spent a lot of time later on debating what exactly Jesus meant when he commanded them to “love one another.”

But, we know that they remembered the love of Jesus – a love that was shared as he traveled from village to village, healing and teaching and embracing those who were lost and suffering, caring for rich and poor alike, welcoming the outcast back into the fold.

Love is a verb.

And so, after they receive the Holy Spirit on Pentecost, that’s exactly what the eleven and the other first disciples did – they went out into the world healing, and teaching, and embracing and welcoming as many people as they could.

And, love took them to some unexpected places.

After the Resurrection itself, probably the biggest surprise for the early Church was the fact that non-Jews – the Gentiles – wanted to be part of the community, too.

As we heard in today’s lesson from Acts, this unexpected development raised complicated questions about rules and identity – challenging the church to draw the circle wider and wider.

Ultimately, the Gentiles were included – and love continued to carry the Good News throughout the world, eventually all the way to Jersey City, to Madison, and to Garrison Forest and Owings Mills, and beyond!

Alleluia! Christ is risen!

The Lord is risen indeed! Alleluia!

In just a few minutes, I’ll have the privilege of baptizing Hutton and Lillian.

These two children are too young to know exactly what they’re getting signed up for – although at yesterday’s rehearsal two year-old Hutton expressed some perfectly reasonable hesitations about it.

Hutton and Lillian may be too young to understand Baptism, but they are not too young to know about love.

In ways too deep for words, Hutton and Lillian already know that love is a verb – love is providing good food, love is offering cleansing and comfort, love is a gentle embrace, and love is a song softly sung.

The baptismal promises that will be made on Hutton and Lillian’s behalf – the baptismal promises that we will all renew – are all about love, too:

With God’s help, breaking bread together, praying together, asking for forgiveness when we mess up.

Love is a verb.

With God’s help, sharing the Good News, seeking and serving Christ in absolutely everyone, striving for justice and peace.

Love is a verb.

With God’s help, and with some assistance from all of us, that’s what Hutton and Lillian will continue to learn and share in the years ahead – and someday they’ll look back at their own journey and marvel at all the love that guided and strengthened them along the way – the love that will take them to some unexpected places.

Jesus and his first disciples, and the youth group at Grace Church in Madison, and the St. Thomas’ parishioners who carried and sorted and sold all of that stuff at this weekend’s White Elephant Sale, all of them – all of you - teach us a great truth:

Love is a verb.

Alleluia! Christ is risen!

The Lord is risen indeed! Alleluia!

Amen.

The Holy Work of Restoration

St. Thomas’ Episcopal Church, Owings Mills MD

May 8, 2022

Year C: The Fourth Sunday of Easter

Acts 9:36-43

Psalm 23

Revelation 7:9-17

John 10:22-30

The Holy Work of Restoration

Alleluia! Christ is risen!

The Lord is risen indeed! Alleluia!

Just in case you had forgotten, our “Alleluias” are a reminder that, yes, it is still Easter, but, if you don’t mind, I’d like to begin today by looking back to Good Friday – to Good Friday in Jersey City.

Seven or eight years ago, some of us Jersey City Episcopalians looked for ways to get out of our church buildings, to somehow bring the church into the world, onto the streets of a city that, not unlike Baltimore, has pockets of prosperity along the edges but the core has been long neglected, resulting in much suffering.

One way we got out of our churches was by offering an outdoor Stations of the Cross service on Good Friday - a procession on foot through the streets of Jersey City that aimed to connect the long-ago suffering and death of Jesus to the suffering and death happening among our neighbors today.

Since there are 14 stations in the Stations of the Cross, I worked with the police department to identify 14 locations of violence that were close enough together that we could visit them all within about two hours.

As you’d guess, in some neighborhoods there were way more than 14 to choose from.

I would do my best to plan our route and then we invited clergy from across the city to participate with their congregations.

I’m still very proud that not only did we draw Mainline Protestants and Roman Catholics but also Evangelicals and Pentecostals, people who might have been unfamiliar with, or even suspicious of, rituals like the Stations of the Cross.

Each year my colleague The Rev. Laurie Wurm crafted and assembled beautiful prayers for us.

And then, on Good Friday morning, well over 100 of us gathered at the First Station. We carried a large wooden cross. And we began to recall the journey of Jesus through Jerusalem – and the suffering of our brothers and sisters in our own time and place.

Some of us carried t-shirts, each bearing the name of someone who had been murdered in Jersey City over the past year.

At each station, we’d recall the violence that had occurred there:

“At this place, a beloved brother was shot and killed.”

“At this place, a beloved sister was stabbed to death.”

At each station, someone would hammer yet another rusty nail into the large wooden cross, the startling sound echoing off the houses and apartment buildings.

Passersby would sometimes stop to watch, trying to make sense of what we were doing at those corners – in some of the roughest neighborhoods in the city, where the cracked sidewalks were often littered with shattered glass.

A few times somebody said to us something like:

“I was here when that happened.”

Or,

“He was my cousin.”

And here’s the part of the ritual that I think was most important, the part I especially want you to remember:

Before we moved onto the next station, one of the clergy would say a blessing and sprinkle Holy Water on this place that few if any people would ever describe as holy, and certainly not beautiful.

We symbolically washed away the sins of violence and destruction, rededicating this place as part of God’s good creation.

The holy work of restoration. 

I thought back to those deeply meaningful Good Friday processions in Jersey City when I first began to reflect on today’s lesson from the Gospel of John.

Jesus is in the Jerusalem Temple and John notes that it is the Feast of the Dedication, the holiday that is better known to us by its name in Hebrew, Hanukkah.

In case you don’t know the story, in 167BC the Temple was profaned by pagan sacrifices.

Eventually the Jews under the leadership of Judah Maccabee were able to take back their capital city and went about cleansing, restoring, and, finally, rededicating the Temple.

Although they only had enough oil for one day, the lamps continued to burn throughout the eight days of the rededication.

And, of course, each Hanukkah our Jewish brothers and sisters continue to light their menorah candles, remembering and celebrating the holy work of restoration.

For us Christians, today is Good Shepherd Sunday, the day when we are invited to reflect on the image of Jesus as the Good Shepherd, and us as the sheep who hear his voice and follow him.

Unfortunately, just like on Good Friday, today’s gospel lesson paints a picture of division between Jesus and “the Jews,” tempting us to forget that Jesus and all his first followers – his first sheep – were Jews, tempting us to fall into the ugly sin of anti-Semitism, which continues to plague us.

So, once again, it’s important to remember that the Gospel began as a Jewish story.  And it’s also important to remember that Jesus and all his first sheep lived during a very troubled time – they lived under brutal Roman occupation – a time when the first hint of dissent or rebellion was brutally crushed.

Jerusalem was stained by the blood of the crucified.

Yet, in the face of so much suffering, Jesus the Good Shepherd never calls us to take up weapons and fight fire with fire, and also never calls us to hide from the trouble.

No, in the face of suffering, Jesus the Good Shepherd leads us right into the places of pain and grief, right under the shadow of death.

Jesus the Good Shepherd calls us to continue the holy work of restoration.

In this morning’s first lesson, we heard that work continuing in and through Peter, who went to Joppa, who went right into a place of suffering and death, went right into a place of apparent hopelessness, and Peter restored faithful and generous Tabitha to life.

The holy work of restoration.

You know, probably the biggest challenge for me over these past ten months has been moving from a place I know better than any other to a place where, especially in the early weeks, I needed to use my GPS to go just about anywhere.

I’ve spent much of this time getting to know you and this beautiful place, and also learning about the ministries that are already underway in the County and in the City – places like the Community Crisis Center, Paul’s Place, and Viva House – the places where the holy work of restoration happens all the time.

Certainly a highlight of our first year together was our spectacular Easter Day, with all those people, all those flowers, all that music.

You may remember that I mentioned the Garden Club in my Easter sermon.

Well, apparently, if you preach about the Garden Club, they invite you to one of their events.

So, a couple of weeks ago, Sue and I were very pleased to head over to the Irvine Nature Center and see tables full of beautiful plants and flowers, many nurtured by our own parishioners, and we were also wowed by some remarkably creative artistic creations.

After looking at all that beauty, most of us crammed into a room where we encountered a different kind of beauty.

The Garden Club members and Sue and I heard an inspiring presentation about the remarkable grassroots project led by ReBUILD Metro that is slowly but surely transforming Johnston Square in Baltimore City from a place of vacant buildings, cracked sidewalks, and shattered glass into, well, a place restored to what it was always meant to be: part of God’s good creation.

And, it was so moving to hear the enthusiasm from the club members, eager to use their considerable skills and resources to help restore this long neglected little corner of God’s garden.

As far as I know, there hasn’t been any Holy Water involved – at least, not yet.

The holy work of restoration.

I don’t need to tell you that in so many ways things look pretty bleak these days, but in the face of so much trouble, Jesus the Good Shepherd calls us into the places of pain and grief, right under the shadow of death, inviting us, with God’s help, to continue the holy work of restoration.

May it be so.

Alleluia! Christ is risen!

The Lord is risen indeed! Alleluia!

Amen.