Rector's Study January 2010

From the Rector’s Study ~

Manifesting God’s Love – this is the meaning behind our celebration of this season called Epiphany. If Advent recalls humanity’s anticipation of the coming in of God’s presence, Epiphany recognizes the fulfillment of that anticipation. What comes into our lives, what God manifests before us in the birth of Christ, God incarnate, is the Love of God.

God’s Love is not necessarily what people are anticipating when they look forward to the drawing near of God. If there is some fear, some bit of worry, Epiphany recognizes that God is not to be feared but loved, that God’s presence is a loving one, and only people who fear divine love for humanity need have fear toward God. Whether it is what we anticipated or not, what is manifest before us as God comes to us in person is the Love of God for all.

Bad Fruit From a Bad Tree

It is a given, I think, that most Episcopalians view the proposed “Anglican Covenant” as the fruit of a bad tree. It derives from the envy of a small number of emerging-world primates and the homophobia of some influential North Americans. The effective disturbance they raised together as far back as 1998 at the Lambeth Conference planted the seeds of conflict and caught the primates by surprise, especially the Archbishop of Canterbury, George Carey, and our own Presiding Bishop, Frank Griswold. The surprise that these primates’ highly un-Anglican behavior achieved enabled their effort to gain momentum. While the Churches of the Communion continued to work and pray in accordance with Anglican norms, the ‘family’ of a few primates and their North American sponsors continued to work in a manner that owes more to guerrilla politics than to Christ-like or apostolic fellowship.

Covenant Texts and Intentions

It is, I think, a given that the proposed 'Anglican Covenant' is the fruit of a bad tree. It derives from the envy of a small number of emerging-world Primates and the homophobia of some influential North Americans. The disturbance they raised effectively together as far back as 1998 at the Lambeth Conference caught the Primates by surprise, especially the Archbishop of Canterbury George Carey and our own Presiding Bishop Frank Griswold. The surprise that these primates' highly un-Anglican behavior achieved enabled their effort to gain momentum. While the Churches of the Communion continued to work and pray in accordance with Anglican norms, the 'Family' of a few primates and their North American sponsors continued to work in a way that is much more akin to guerrilla politics than to Christ-like or apostolic fellowship.

Rector's Study December 2009

From the Rector’s Study ~

“He was made man that we might be made God.” It is a statement about Jesus well-known in theological circles, enthusiastically endorsed by some, suspiciously scrutinized by others. It was written by the Bishop of the Egyptian city of Alexandria in his thesis Of the Incarnation of the Word of God.

Athanasius was bishop at a time when the Church was struggling to understand for itself some central tenets of the faith and wrestling with how to communicate these meaningfully to a skeptical world around it. Tradition holds that Athanasius is the author of the creed that bears his name, and which we find in our Book of Common Prayer beginning at page 864. One reads in the fine detail of this statement of faith the subtle distinction between what Athanasius intends to say and what he decidedly means not to say. When Athanasius claims that Jesus ‘was made man that we might be made God,’ he means exactly what he writes.

Rector's Study November 2009

This month begins with a celebration of saints and saintliness and concludes with a celebration of both all that we have for which we can be thankful and the phenomenon of thankfulness itself. This month also marks the end of one liturgical year and the beginning of the next. The convergence of all these events reminds us of a basic truth of Christian life: relationship with God is oriented around gratitude. Thankfulness toward God for all that makes up our lives is the guide to and the product of being saintly.

“The original sin of Adam and Eve, the prototype of all sin, is presented as a failure to be receptive and grateful.” So writes theologian and author Ronald Rolheiser in his recent book, The Shattered Lantern: rediscovering a felt presence of God. He explains: “God makes Adam and Eve and places them in the garden and showers them goodness and life. They are given gift beyond measure and are promised that life will continue in this rich and good way on one condition – they are not to eat the fruit of a certain tree.” He goes on, “The condition God places on them is not an arbitrary or petty test…God has told Adam and Eve that they may receive life as gift, but they may not take life as if it were theirs by right.”

Rector's Study October 2009

From the Rector's Study ~

“Ours was a life lived in paradise and thus it rendered any discussion of transcendental ideas pointless. …death was something similar to recycling.” So writes author Douglas Coupland in his novel Life After God. Fiction though it is, it is autobiographically reflective. He continues, “Life was charmed but without politics or religion. It was the life of children of the children of the pioneers – life after God – a life of earthly salvation on the edge of heaven. Perhaps this is the finest to which we may aspire, the life of peace, the blurring between dream life and real life – and yet I find myself speaking these words with a sense of doubt. ”

Few authors have expressed as well as this the spiritual life of many of the people emerging into adulthood in the wider community all around us here at ECR. Few authors have so well articulated the deep need among people today for a community like ours here at ECR, and for the good news about God that has made us who we are. Few communities like our own so well express God’s Love and so wonderfully celebrate the opportunity to connect other people with it, as do we.

17th Sunday after Pentecost - 27 September 2009

17 Pentecost - 27 September 2009 - Proper 21 B
Esther 7:1-6, 9-10, 9:20-22; James 5:13-20; Mark 9:38-50
James V. Stockton

“I don’t believe in God, but I miss Him.” It’s the opening sentence of author Julian Barnes’ latest book, Nothing to be Afraid Of. Barnes claims to be an atheist. Of course, if it were a settled issue for him it seems unlikely that would have written an entire book expressing his nostalgia for Church, religion, and faith in God. His voice made especially poignant because it speaks for one who believes that he once had that relationship, but seems to have lost it somewhere along the way.

I read a story about a family of mice who make their home inside a large grand piano. For as long as any of them can remember, they have blissfully enjoyed the music that regularly surrounds them. Sometimes it is sad, but not regretful, sometimes inspiring, and often soothing and peaceful. The mice take great comfort in the sense of some great Unseen Someone above them but also close to them from whom comes the beautiful music that they all love.

15th Sunday after Pentecost 13 September 2009

15 Pentecost - 13 September 2009 - Proper 19 B
Proverbs 1:20-33; James 3:1-12; Mark 8:27-38
James V. Stockton

One break-in was bad enough. Add to that another one, more severe, ten days later. Add these to the grief we still bear from July and August and one must wonder, is this just part of what one must endure and, given that we are Christians, must endure with and especially stiff upper lip? We’ve been through rather a lot here at ECR in a just short amount of time. So, is it our role as Christians to endure all this with particularly stoic disaffection? In terms of what we hear in the reading from the Gospel today, is this just our collective cross to bear?

People use the phrase in ways that suggest that it is so. Someone may be caring for a loved one who is chronically ill; someone else has been passed over for a promotion at work; a community has lost a beloved friend; a community’s sense of safety has been violated by people whose values violently contradict its own.

And if people find consolation in the notion that somehow this is just their cross to bear, then far be it from you or me to deny them that comfort. But it must be said, at least among you and me together, that the God that we are here today to worship and praise does not inflict pain and suffering on anyone. So, from where, then, comes the common wisdom that misfortune is sign of the cross that Christ Jesus places upon the shoulders of those who follow him?

CHURCH SCHISM part II: local Episcopal Rev addresses homosexual controversy

CHURCH SCHISM part II: local Episcopal Rev addresses homosexual controversy

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13th Sunday after Pentecost 30 August 2009

13 Pentecost - 30 August 2009 - Proper 17 B
Song of Solomon 2:18-13; James 1:17-27; Mark 7:1-8, 14-15, 21-23
James V. Stockton

Twentieth century historian and author Jaroslav Pelikan once observed that, "Tradition is the living faith of the dead; [while] traditionalism is the dead faith of the living." I read a story about a parish and their new interim priest. The Rev. Mr. Hall offers thoughtful and lively sermons, is quick to respond with pastoral care and attention, and his manner is a balance of reverence and comfortable ease. But people notice immediately that the Rev. Hall is not doing Holy Communion the way that they have always known it to be done. And as good a fit as he might be, some begin to wonder if Fr. Hall might be downright audacious.

In terms of audaciousness, the Song of Solomon, or Song of songs, is the one book of the bible that fits that description. Reveling in the gift of senses, and in the sensuality of creation, here is the lover celebrating the arrival and embrace of her beloved. And the book never even mentions God.

12th Sunday after Pentecost - 23 August 2009

12 Pentecost - 23 August 2009 - Proper 16 B
1 Kings 8:[1, 6, 10-11], 22-30, 41-43; Ephesians 6:10-20; John 6:56-69
James V. Stockton

A fellow priest commented recently about preaching from the Gospel readings for this month of August. “Bread, bread, bread!” he said. “How much can I think of to say about bread? Remind me,” he added, “when Year B of the Lectionary roles around again, to take the month of August for my vacation.”

I’m glad to be back from vacation. And I say this not because I somehow managed to avoid for the most part a repeated emphasis at this time of the Church’s year upon Jesus’ teaching of the familiar if mysterious metaphor of ‘bread, bread, bread’ as somehow representative of, or equivalent to, his flesh. To the contrary, I’m glad to be back with this, my community of faith because while distance may ‘make the heart grow fonder,’ yet it is proximity that enables trust in God to do what it is meant to do.

Whose Tolerance?

My point about patience is that tolerance is a luxury that can be invited only by those on the inside. Those still being excluded, still having their access to the earthly expression of God's Kingdom denied, have little investment in tolerance of those who are barring the doors. That there is difference of opinion is plainly evident. Even that some of those who are homophobic or who are are all too eager to condemn gay people and we who are their friends may be sincere, let's accept this proposition for the sake of argument as well. But what then is the relevance of this to the Gospel or the Church?

People make choices. If they cannot follow the Gospel into the Episcopal Church, or cannot follow the Episcopal Church into the Gospel, so be it. I can admit, for the sake of argument, that people who despise gay people and who loathe us who advocate for their full welcome and integration into the life and ministry of the Church, can be intelligent, sincere, and honest. Done. But how does this translate into a some vague Utopian vision wherein none of these differences matter? Is it the suggestion of those calling for tolerance that humility before God, such as at the Eucharist, equalizes everyone in some practical way? Surely they can acknowledge that this isn't so. Instead of trying to pretend that the Church is a place and a fellowship where differences don't much matter, can't we instead be proud that this Church, now joined by the ELCA, is one that says that the difference between prejudice and bigotry on the one hand, and the Love of God on the other, is a difference we are proud to emphasize?

Whose humility? Whose patience?

Implicit in the analysis of some that 'we all need to be more humble' is the plea to wait for wider consensus, as represented in the image of everyone on their knees at the Eucharist. It's a nice image, I agree. Just to ground things in reality, though, it's useful for us, I think, to remember that people have been and are today divided even around their respective personal and denominational understandings of Holy Communion.

More importantly, though, when I hear or read these pleas for those of us who are passionate in our pleas, either for the Church's overdue expression of the inclusive Love of God for all, or for the Church to declare itself opposed to same, I am inclined to ask those folks to stop speaking and kindly to leave the room or at least to remain silent until invited to speak or to return to the room. So, I invite you, who are asking the rest of us to be quiet, to imagine that I've asked you please to refrain from commenting any further, at all.

I invite you to pause, spend some time with your reactions, and reflect upon how willing or not you are to comply. How passionately would you defend your 'right' to participate in the conversation? How passionately would you defend your right to be passionate about it?

Recently, I was invited by someone to 'go slow' in speaking up in our diocese and to our new bishop about honoring the recent actions of General Convention. It struck me that this person is a member of two minority populations in terms of representation in the membership and the leadership of our Church, and more profoundly so in our diocese. I could not help but wonder to myself how differently this person might have responded had this person still been on the outside, still being denied access to the conversation, still being denied full membership in this Church? Yet, now benefiting from still-recent changes in the canons of this Church, this person now was calling for further delay around the inclusion of others, of those still denied in this Church the manifest Love of God for all. I found it difficult to fathom how this person in particular could be asking for political prudence, but there it was.

Whenever people ask us for patience, for willingness to consider the matter of inclusion of LGBT people in the life and ministry of the Church as still undecided, which is no longer the case, I want them to pretend that someone has turned to them with condescending expressions of complacent sympathy, and told them that they must be silent and must wait until called upon before they may participate; and then, only in the limited ways that they are allowed. Then they would ask themselves if they really want to invite others to be more patient, to wait a little while longer, to remain outside, on the margins to which they've been assigned by those who enjoy full privileges.

It's one thing to experience the spiritual fellowship of humble faithfulness around the Eucharist. It is quite another thing to experience the hypocrisy of receiving the Eucharist with the dominant majority of God's people, while others of God's people are discouraged or denied their place beside us. The Eucharist doesn't make God's people what they are supposed to be. God's people make the Eucharist what it is meant to be. Or we don't.

Jim +

Concerning the Conclusion of the 76th General Convention of the Episcopal Church

Concerning the Conclusion of the 76th General Convention of the Episcopal Church

The General Convention of the Episcopal Church concluded its work for this year. It will meet again in 2012. Please know that the Church did far more than address the two resolutions that made a few headlines during Convention. These other matters, equal in importance to the more sensational ones, include adopting the new practice of incorporating into the Church’s budget financial support for the Church’s seminaries. This has never been done before and is long overdue.

The Church also adopted a health care plan that will provide coverage for both clergy and lay persons employed by the Church and which should lower existing costs for these items. The Church called for greater participation by our Youth including seating on Vestry (a proposal that ECR’s own Vestry has been considering already and the logistics of which have been under review for a couple years.) The Church recommitted itself to being intentionally and proactively anti-racist. The Church has also reduced its overall budget and reduced by two the number of days that General Convention shall be held. The Episcopal Church has renewed its budgetary commitment to the Millennium Development Goals, and expressed a new focus upon economic justice for the poor in the United States. All of which helps demonstrate that the Episcopal Church is alive, well, and responding conscientiously to its many responsibilities.

Biography

With Fr. Jim away for vacation, this edition of the Radiant Cross provides a good opportunity to help our members and friends know a little more about our rector. Here is an updated biography of Fr. Jim.

Fr. Jim and his wife Lee Elena recently celebrated their twenty-first year together. They met in St. Louis, Missouri where Jim was born and raised, and near Lee Elena’s hometown of Monticello, Illinois. Lee Elena is a Nurse Practitioner working at a clinic in Giddings, an area designated by the state as under-served. Their three children are Valerie, 19, Emily, 17, and Melanie, 14. Fr. Jim attended a Lutheran elementary school and credits his early education in this Christian environment as formative of his faith in God. It was there that he began to sense a vocation from God to Holy Orders.

Before attending college, Jim worked variously as a self-defense instructor (earning a black belt in Chinese Kenpo), as a carpenter building custom homes, then as a laborer and/or department supervisor at a variety of manufacturing companies. Responding to a re-emerging sense of call, Fr. Jim returned to church life in his mid-twenties. Having drifted from the Lutheran Church of his childhood, he looked up “Church” in the white pages of the phone book. There he found a local Church of Christ congregation listed and began attending worship services. It was at this congregation that he was blessed to meet Lee Elena Mathis, his wife-to-be.

5th Sunday after Pentecost - 5 July 2009

5th Sunday after Pentecost - 5 July 2009 - Proper 9 B
2 Samuel 5:1-5, 9-10; 2 Corinthians 12:2-10; Mark 6:1-13
James V. Stockton

19th century American poet and author Ralph Waldo Emerson once wrote, “Our American eagle is very well, indeed. Let us protect it here and abroad,” he wrote. “But let us also beware of the American peacock.” At this time of the annual celebration of our nation’s hard-won independence, the scripture appointed for today are at least a happy coincidence. They speak to every Christian of the marks of genuine ministry, but also of qualities more widely recognized by many Americans as marks of genuine leadership.

The story of David shows that he is a reluctant draftee to the throne. Read his story in the two books of Samuel. David goes out of his way to avoid usurping the throne from King Saul, or even showing Saul the slightest disrespect. David ignores Saul’s petulant refusal to recognize David as the rightful king. Other than simply staying far enough away from Saul that Saul cannot actually kill him, David endures Saul’s slanders and threats with respectful pity. Until, finally, Saul’s stubborn rejection of God’s sovereignty and the people’s will leads him ever more deeply into the negative consequences of the path that he has chosen.

Rector's Study July 2009

From the Rector’s Study ~

Do you ever think about the ‘service area’ of ECR? Do you ever suppose that ECR serves certain areas, certain peoples, but not others. I doubt it.

“Across traditions, the ultimate focus is God – often represented as God’ sovereignty and God’s glory – as this extends to include the well-being of all life.” So notes theologian and author Paula M. Cooey in her book Willing the Good: Jesus, Dissent, and Desire. She continues, “Christians are called to love God and to love their neighbors as themselves. Nevertheless, conversion [to Christ and Christianity] focuses the energy on the making of the Christian subject or agent. This sustained, often all-consuming, focus…makes it all too easy to lose sight once again of the radical orientation to others of the Christian life and ethics.” Cooey reminds the reader that, “This focus on the other, apprehended in Jesus’ identification as the other in need, should collect and sustain the desire to will the good for all creation. Making people pure through the forgiveness of sins, and holy through their subsequent actions, is in this respect a by-product , a means, to a further end, and at best a secondary concern.” Her point is that, “When concern for one’s purity and holiness becomes the central force driving human life and action,…it subordinates God’s will for the good of all,…to the desires of one’s ego. This subordination,” she suggest, “constitutes a form of religious or spiritual narcissism.”

4th Sunday after Pentecost - June 28, 2009

4th Sunday after Pentecost Proper 8 B - 28 June, 2009
2 Samuel 1:1, 17-27; 2 Corinthians 8:7-15, Mark 5:21-43
Marie Butterbaugh

It’s a beautiful, cloudless spring day in Austin, Texas. The thermometer surges to one hundred degrees. It’s hot. Like many people I seek shelter inside where it’s cooler and settle in to check out the evening news only to find things that are deeply distressing. A television commercial that turns an innocent children’s cartoon into a gyrating free for all. Square “hot pants” on beautiful young girls. A carpenter’s square dispatched by “the king of burgers” to see if things measure up to his standards. Sponge Bob Square pants apparently gone mad!

News reports blare on. Commentators argue about the state of our nation and the world reminding us of the sad fact that our economy is in a mess. General Motors filing bankruptcy, billions of dollars are being allotted for war, potential conflict with North Korea and uncertain elections in Iran. You and I live in a world that often makes no sense.

What we have ALL declared?

What baffles me, with all due respect, is how people can continue to claim that "We have stated as a church that ALL God's people, regardless of orientation, are eligible to participate fully in the life of the church at all levels" and that "The Episcopal Church at a national level has a very open, supportive stand with regard to GLBT issues." Neither claim is true. Both are simply false.

I pray that people would lift their eyes, their hearts, their ears from the insular experience of the community of their self-contained 'liberal' local congregations. Rather than celebrate how wonderfully everyone there seems to get along with one another, because, as they will tyypically describe, everyone there seems to have entered into a tacit agreement not to discus 'issues' around which real disagreement may emerge. I urge them instead to sacrifice their own experience of beatitude in order to participate in the experience of those to whom beatitude continues to be denied by the Episcopal Church.

3rd Sunday after Pentecost - 21 June 2009

3rd Sunday after Pentecost - 21 June 2009 - Proper 7 B
1 Samuel 17: (1a, 4-11, 19-23), 32-49; 2 Corinthians 6:1-13; Mark 4:35-41
James V. Stockton

I read a story. It the tale of some hardy folks, and rowdy, too: a farmer and three sons, Jimmy, Johnny, and Joe-Bob. None of them ever goes to church. None ever takes time to inquire after the things of God. They do speak God’s name once in a while, but not in any way that is reverent or respectful. The priest of the nearby church has been trying for years to draw Pa and the boys to God and to the people of God. The members of the church have done the same, but it seems their efforts have proven futile. Jimmy, Johnny, Joe-Bob and Pa are content to manage their lives, their joys, and their challenges, without benefit of God’s presence, help, or blessings.

The story of David and Goliath is a story that says much about adversity and how people face it. The story is well-known, at least in the broad strokes. As recently as the NBA match up between the Los Angles Lakers and the Orlando Magic, the drama of a sports team that starts the season with low expectations all around, then working its way into contention for the championship is characterized as a ‘David vs. Goliath’ match-up. In their struggles to defy their government’s repressive ban on media, the people of Iran are using cell phones, Twitter, and You Tube to get out the truth to the world around them. Their efforts are being written of as “a cyber David doing battle with a theocratic Goliath.”