You preach what you most need to hear.

I preached this morning in the CDSP chapel. It was a healing Eucharist; when I requested this spot, I was only aiming to get over the terror of preaching in that space. I had no idea of the week I would have, leading up to this.

One of my classmates asked me for a copy, later.

I am enormously grateful that I got to do it, that I'm working through this stuff, and that I'm doing it in a way that helps other people.
***

Matthew 9:2-8


Jesus heals the paralytic.
We know this story.
But we’re used to a noisier telling.
Matthew doesn’t give us the dramatic,
crash-bang-boom!
of the men breaking a hole in the roof,
letting their friend down onto the floor
in the crowd, in front of Jesus.
We don’t have any kind of big,
attention-grabbing scene here.
What we have are the words of Jesus,
first to the paralytic,
and then to the scribes,
who are only talking to themselves,
and then to the paralytic again.
We have a man lying on a bed.
His friends, or family members—it doesn’t specify—
carry him to the One they believe can heal him.

A paralytic is someone who physically cannot move,
on their own power.
They can’t stand, or walk,
maybe they can’t use their hands.
Before things like wheelchairs,
ramps, and Social Security,
if you couldn’t walk,
you were totally dependent on other people
to take care of you.
You simply couldn’t move through this world on your own.
There are people in the world now,
in that situation.

All of us here can move our fingers and toes.
Each of us has more power than that paralytic.
We can function in the world;
we can advocate for ourselves.
And yet, all of us get stuck, on something.
We have times when we are the paralytic.
We are the wounded.
We need forgiveness.
We come in search of healing.

Not all paralysis has primarily to do with the body.
Most of it does not.
Can you spend forever staring at your work,
or your life,
or your dorm room—
because you have no idea how to get it organized?
It’s October already,
and I haven’t seen my stapler since May.

Do you wind yourself so tightly around your anxiety,
that it makes you physically sick?
Have you done something,
or said something,
that you don’t know how to fix?

You are so not alone.
We all have been there.
We are here, because we have been there.

How did Jesus respond to the paralytic?
He did two things.
First, he said to him,
“Take heart, your sins are forgiven.”

That phrase, “take heart,”
sounds so very comforting.
“Chin up! God still loves you.”
And it’s true.

The Greek is also rendered, “have courage.”
Literally, they mean the same thing.
They are the same word.
Their connotations are different.

Courage is strength.
Courage is toughing it out,
when you’re terrified.
Courage is looking up at the rocky face of a mountain,
clipping on your ropes,
and climbing.
Courage leads to exhilaration.
It leads to confidence.
It leads to growth.

Why do you need to have courage,
if your sins are forgiven?
Why not just feel about a thousand pounds lighter,
and be happy about it?
Why not just go dancing through your day?

Because forgiveness un-sticks you.
Guilt is not yours to hold onto anymore.
Regret loses its death-grip on you,
your soul,
your mind,
your body.

Because there is no separation between those parts of you.
Physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual well-being
are dependent on one another.
The idea that there is a division between
your mind, soul, and body
is a modern, Western invention,
and it’s completely false.

Forgiveness makes you able to rise back into your life,
and so you do.
Back into relationship with God
and the people who love you.
Back into the dailiness you couldn’t focus on before.
Back, onto your calendar.

And getting back into the world,
when you’ve been only halfway present to it,
takes courage.
It takes re-commitment.
It takes being willing to risk making mistakes,
and needing forgiveness.
It takes giving your trust to God,
knowing that you are loved
and you will be forgiven,
again and again,
as often as you need it,
because you need it.
It takes wanting to rise up and walk,
healthy and well,
fully alive.

As Jesus told the paralytic,
“Stand up, take your bed and go home.”
And he stood up, stretched his new legs,
and walked away.

This story is not even primarily about physical healing.
That’s secondary.
The first thing that happens is forgiveness.
The scribes are only here to set up the argument.
Jesus heals the paralytic in order to show his ability—
and authority—
to forgive.
He heals him as a sign that the Kindom of God
was breaking in on the earth.
He heals him to show that separation wasn’t final,
that God wanted to be in relationship with us—
and would risk being human, to do it.

We don’t know what was in the paralytic’s past.
It was never meant to matter.
He was a human being in need.
Jesus forgave him,
and healed him to show that forgiveness was possible.

Why do we need to be forgiven?
Sin is all that alienates us from the wholeness of God.
Some of it is what we do—or don’t do;
some exists because we are human,
and we live in human systems, in the natural world.
In EOW, we confess
“the evil we have done,
the evil that enslaves us,
and the evil done on our behalf.”[1]

Charles Gusmer, in his book
And You Visited Me: Sacramental Ministry to the Sick and the Dying,
makes three basic assumptions
about the mystery of sacramental healing.[2]
The first is that “some relationship exists between sin and sickness.”
Sickness is not our fault,
and it is not any kind of a punishment.
Rather, “the whole human person suffers sickness
as a consequence of evil in the world.”
Viruses, bacteria, fragile bones simply are.
Brain chemistry is what it is.

His second assumption is that “God is on our side.”
God wants us to be healthy, whole, and well.

His third statement is this:
“The promised salvation in Jesus Christ encompasses the total person, for its goal is none other than the resurrection of all flesh…. Jesus has come to free us, to heal us from sin and evil and all its manifestations, so that we can grow to full stature as children of God.”

We don’t always get what we ask for,
when we ask for it,
how we ask for it.
I’m taking a class on the rites of the sick,
and I can’t tell you how it works.
I don’t know why some healings that we ask for happen instantly,
and others take patience, work, and time.

But I read that last statement as saying,
Christ is always moving us toward wholeness.
God is always raising us up.
When we come forward, in faith,
to ask for healing,
we are cooperating in one of the most
basic, intimate, and joyful works of God.

The effects may be screamingly obvious.
They may be imperceptible.
We ourselves may not see a difference,
when everyone around us is commenting on it.
In the act of asking for healing,
we are changed.

In closing, let me go back to the characters
in the original story.
We are all the paralytic.
We are all the wounded person, seeking healing,
on all the levels in which we are broken.
And we are all the paralytic’s friends,
carrying him,
supporting him,
taking him to the One who will heal him.
Sometimes we’re the scribes,
not sure what to make of any of this.

God has given this authority to human beings.
We all are wounded.
And we all are called to help one another heal.
So let us have the honesty with ourselves
to recognize and admit where we are broken.
And let us have the courage to ask for God’s healing
in the midst of our community.

We will be moving from the anointing
into the Eucharist,
the ultimate healing rite.

Let us listen for the voice of God within us,
and let us answer when God says to us,

“Take courage,
Your sins are forgiven you.
Rise. Take up your bed, and go home.”




[1] The Church Pension Fund, Enriching Our Worship 1 (New York: Church Publishing, Inc., 1998), 56.
[2] Charles W. Gusmer, And You Visited Me: Sacramental Ministry to the Sick and the Dying, Rev. Ed. (New York: Pueblo, 1984), 147-48.

Thank you

I'm still fighting uphill, but I'm feeling stronger. I know I'm in a growth time. (Those are always hard.) Thank you all, again, for so much wisdom and love.

Easy action for Burma

From MadPriest:

"Saturday, October 6th, has been declared an International Day of Action For Burma. Organizers are asking that people worldwide wear red or saffron as a show of unity for the Burmese monks who are standing in opposition to one of the most brutal military dictatorships in the world.

I think I could manage that."

I, too, have a red shirt in my closet. It's clean, even.

Also, go to MP's link to see a video of our blessed St. Desmond, discussing a proposed boycott of China.

Feast of St. Francis

Jane posted a good picture, with a promise of more to come.

And, since I seem to be collecting helpful prayers:

Lord, make me an instrument of your peace,
Where there is hatred, let me sow love;
where there is injury, pardon;
where there is doubt, faith;
where there is despair, hope;
where there is darkness, light;
where there is sadness, joy;

O Divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console;
to be understood as to understand;
to be loved as to love.

For it is in giving that we receive;
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned;
and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.

Wow.

You guys are fantastic. Thank you, for so much understanding, and so much love. You are helping, more than you know. (And thank you MadPriest, for sending a call out.) I really appreciate everyone's concern. I hear you urging me to be gentle with myself, and I know you're right. Thank you.

(Orthodox) Mimi, we have a full penitential rite which I could request if I wanted--it isn't what I need right now. I want to lift out the confession that we use in this season, at my church. I didn't help write this part of the liturgy, so I don't know where it comes from--the usual copyright cautions apply. Still, the language heals me--and you are of course welcome to pray it at home.

That's what I'll be doing, until Sunday when I can do this in my community, and know the absolution is for real. (If I pray that piece now, it's a "please," not a "yes.")

We say:

Beloved God,
you come to us when we are most ashamed;
and when we long to hide our face from you,
you will not allow us to turn away.
You call us by our name;
you touch us, raise us,
invite us into shameless love.
God our lover, know us, judge us,
turn us, wound us, demand of us,
forgive us.
We are yours.
We abandon ourselves to your love.
We trust you.
Amen.

The Presider says to the People:

May the God of infinite grace bless you, hold you,
wrestle with you, embrace you in love,
forgive you, and make you whole.

Burmese monks "to be sent away"

Never mind me. Go here. And then here.

Sure, I need prayer. They need it more.

What I can say about why I asked for prayer

I’m so angry with myself that I’m physically ill. I don’t think that I did anything wrong—but I feel like it. I feel like I need confession.

I never feel like I need confession. When I do it, I’m inside it, and it is sincere—but I very rarely hunger for it. When I clearly wrong somebody, I can say so. (My relationship with God more often needs repair for my absence.) Forgiveness for most things comes easily. This… is murky. I said something about myself that I shouldn’t have, and created a disturbance that I don’t know what to do with. It wasn’t wrong in the sense of hurtful—I don’t think, anyway—I just was speaking from a shaky emotional place. Trying to be rational, and not fully succeeding. And I don’t know if there is forgiveness for that.

I think this will end up being a small piece of a larger me, to the people involved, in time. I asked if we were okay; the answer I got was, “Yes, always.” But I’m afraid of being branded. And I know that it’s me who is branding myself.

I don’t have a mental health diagnosis, and I’ve had chances to get one. There’s nothing in this but organic me. It’s history reacting with now. I have anger, fear, and panic hitting me harder than they have in a long time. I know very well why. (The reasons are really at the crux of this; and in themselves, they’re life-giving and good.) And I’m trying to figure out how to be responsible about this love-trust-need conflation I have going, and how to grow through and beyond it.

What I know I need now are time, prayer, understanding, patience, and love. And the presence to give those to myself.

Pray with me.

...and a prayer for healing.

Stolen from lj, who showed it to me, because this is gorgeous.

Lord, open unto me

Open unto me -- light for my darkness.
Open unto me -- courage for my fear.
Open unto me -- hope for my despair.
Open unto me -- peace for my turmoil.
Open unto me -- joy for my sorrow.
Open unto me -- strength for my weakness.
Open unto me -- wisdom for my confusion.
Open unto me -- forgiveness for my sins.
Open unto me -- love for my hates.
Open unto me -- thy Self for my self.

Lord, Lord, open unto me!

--Howard Thurman


I found a slightly different version, here. It's about halfway down the page.

Struggling with something I don't know how to blog about

...without spilling more than I want to of my own soul, in public. It's a long, off-and-on battle for me, and I feel further along than I used to be--but I have some more monsters to fight before I'm done.

I know that God is with me in this. I know that people I love are with me in this. I am with my own self, in this. I would like your prayers, please.

My feet are filthy again

Just came back from two days at the Ranch; I helped staff clergy conference. That's still happening, until tomorrow afternoon--but I have class in the morning. I came back late this afternoon so I could study. Guess how well that's going?

One of my classmates calls the Ranch his cathedral. It is for me, also. Imagine how odd it is, to be in your holy place... doing Systematic Theology homework. I was sitting at a picnic table outside, studying, and one of the priests I worked with last summer (she's fantastic) came by and commiserated with me. A friend who graduated two years ago said it appealed to him. Different strokes, clearly.

I didn't get to go hiking; I was busy and it was really hot. But I still got to be there. I love that place, and those people, so much. Even though I was either working hard at being Ranch staff or studying, and didn't get to just catch my breath much, there's a peace about the place that is deeply healing.

The gathering was big, noisy--and strikingly friendly and open. I caught up with a few friends whom I hadn't seen since they graduated (a year, or two, ago). One of the recently retired priests from St. Gregory's brought me greetings from Olympia, via Honolulu. (We have a mutual friend in Oly; they bumped into each other at some art thing in Hawaii.) I met some neat people, too, over Social Hour when I was supposed to be something like a barmaid. They're new to me, but we run in similar circles, and it was good to get to talk with them. The work they're doing incorporates what I want, and in some cases have been tapped, to do. I'm excited about all of it.

Have to get back to Systematics, though. My sunburned scalp, dirty feet, and I have a quiz tomorrow. I'll be back up there again over Reading Week, in late October.

In other news, MadPriest linked to me! I'm a big kid now.

Senior Sermon

I gave this yesterday in the CDSP chapel.


Feast of Edward Bouverie Pusey

Matthew 13:44-52



Have you ever lost your voice?

Have you ever had laryngitis?
A nasty cold?
A sore throat?

You know how frustrating it is,
when you can’t get the words out,
for a day, or two… a week.

But what about when it pains you not to speak?

Do you know what it’s like,
to be silenced?

Have you ever opened your mouth,
and the people you were speaking to
could not—
or would not—
hear you?

Have you ever been made to keep quiet,
when every cell in your body was shouting?

Have you ever told the truth… and paid for it?

Edward Bouverie Pusey was a founder of the Oxford Movement,
which was a revival movement in the 1830’s and 1840’s
in the Church of England,
centered at Oxford University.

Quoting from a biography,
“Fundamental to the movement
was “an appeal to the Fathers as interpreters of Scripture,
and a sacramentalism of nature and the world,
into which the sacraments of the Church fitted easily.”[1]
They pushed forward by reaching back,
and their ideals were high-church.
Today’s Anglo-Catholics have something of
the spirit of it.

Pusey was a good friend of John Henry Newman,
who became a cardinal in the Roman Catholic Church.
When Newman went to Rome,
leadership in the movement rested on Pusey’s shoulders.

He spent his entire academic life at Oxford.
He was a student there,
and then a professor of Hebrew.
He studied Arabic and Syriac,
as well as other languages.

Communication was his thing.

Lesser Feasts and Fasts says this about him:

“His most influential activity was his preaching—catholic in content, evangelical in his zeal for souls. But to many of his more influential contemporaries, it seemed dangerously innovative. A sermon preached before the University in 1843 on “The Holy Eucharist, A Comfort to the Penitent” was condemned without his being given an opportunity to defend it, and he himself was suspended from preaching for two years.”[2]

His sermon was condemned for sounding too Catholic;
for including passages such as this one:

“And so, where His Flesh is, there he is, and we receiving it, receive Him, and receiving Him are joined on to Him through His flesh to the Father, and He dwelling in us, dwell in Him, and with Him in God. ‘I,’ He saith, ‘in the Father, and ye in Me, and I in you.’ This is the perfection after which all the rational creation groans, this for which the Church, which hath the first fruits of the Spirit, groaneth within herself, yea this for which our Lord Himself tarrieth, that His yet imperfect members advancing onwards in Him, and the whole multitude of the Redeemed being gathered into the One Body, His whole Body should, in Him, be perfected in the Unity of the Father. And so is He also, as Man, truly the Mediator between God and Man, in that being as God, One with the Father, as man, one with us, we truly are in Him who is truly in the Father. He, by the truth of the Sacrament, dwelleth in us, in Whom, by nature all the fulness of the Godhead dwelleth.”[3]

I wanted to let you hear him speak for himself.

Ironically, his whole point
in sharing his view about how the Eucharist unifies
humanity with God (and that goes on for 32 pages)
was to comfort sinners.
He thought he’d come down too harshly on penitents,
in earlier sermons,
and he wanted to give them hope.
He wanted them to know that God loved them,
and was with them.

To us, that would be almost a non-issue.
If you ask each of us what we believe about the Eucharist,
you’d get a range of answers.
We might be advised on what not to say on the GOE,
but we wouldn’t be condemned.

But for writing this about what happens when we receive Communion,
and for speaking it publicly,
the University of Oxford suspended Edward Pusey
from preaching for two years.

Think about it.
Oxford had been his home for something like 25 years.
More than half his life, in 1843.
He was chair of the Hebrew department.
A language scholar.
A communicator.
And, he was also a priest.
Preaching was a tremendous part of his life.
It would have been an inner compulsion.
A calling. Like we know.
And suddenly, he couldn’t do it at home,
in the place that had always embraced him.
He was cut off from participating in his community
in a way that was vital to him.

In our time and place,
there are other options.
We might think, “I’ll just go somewhere else.
Get a different job.
Preach to people who will be more receptive to me.”

No. He didn’t leave the university.
Even after his friend John Henry Newman went to Rome,
he didn’t leave the church.
He stayed an Anglican, and an Oxford professor,
because that was his life. That was his way of being faithful to the Gospel.

A man found a treasure hidden in a field.
He went and sold all that he had,
and bought that field.

Jesus is saying, the Kindom of God is worth
all that you have
and all that you have ever had
and all that you can imagine having.

This is the vision that Edward Pusey served.
He sacrificed his voice for two years,
and whatever additional advancement
the university would have given him,
had he not preached that sermon,
to serve the truth that God forgives and loves us all
and the Eucharist is how we experience that love.

Parables have multiple layers of meaning.
They are ways of telling the truth
by tugging at your soul
and making you hear something in a different way
for the first time.

Can you hear something else in the story of the buried treasure?
People don’t bury valuables in the ground anymore;
that’s what safety deposit boxes are for.
But in Jesus’ time and place,
it was common—
particularly under occupation.
If you wanted something to stay safe,
you buried it.
You might have to move, quickly,
and you couldn’t throw it in the trunk of your car
and pack it with you.
Then, if it was ever safe to come home,
you could dig it up.

A man buried his treasure in a field.
Another man found it,
and sold all that he had to buy it.

I can also hear Jesus saying,
“Don’t bury your treasure.”
Because it will be found.
And it will be given.
You are called,
and you can not help it.

The kingdom of heaven is like a treasure hidden in a field.

The kingdom of heaven is like a pearl of great price.

The kingdom of heaven is like…
the most precious thing that any of us can imagine.
But the Reign of God is not an abstraction.
John Kater—
God bless him,
I’m pulling this directly out of my notes from his Ethics class last fall—
defines the Reign of God
as the way into understanding what Jesus is about.
It is shalom: deep peace,
true wholeness.
It happens when God’s will is done.

We help to create the conditions for the Kindom,
when we do the will of God.
Ministry is what we do to embody
and celebrate the Reign of God.

Ministry takes all kinds of forms.
Students,
faculty,
staff,
friends,
we are all doing ministry.
And we are all learning what that ministry will be
and what it will mean to the creation,
and the people,
whom we serve.

St. Francis said, “Preach the Gospel at all times.
When necessary, use words.”
We are all called to bear witness to the Good News of Jesus Christ.

So. Do not fear the consequences.
Take everything you know about the Reign of God,
and everything you’re learning.
Take courage.
Breathe deeply.

And speak the truth in love and joy!

Let us hear you.




[1] Cummings, Owen F. Eucharistic Doctors: A Theological History. (New York: Paulist, 2005), 241.
[2] LFF 2003, p. 372.
[3] “The Holy Eucharist A Comfort to the Penitent.” Bound in Pusey’s University Sermons. (Oxford: 1843), 14-15. (Each sermon has its own pagination.)

Birthday!

I got sung to at church, and very well taken care of by the people I most wanted around me.

Was asked to preach during Advent, at church. That's obviously not a birthday present, but a very cool thing. Preaching excites me as much as it can sometimes scare me. The act of speaking doesn't frighten me, anymore. I pressure myself to come up with good content, but I can if I pray and listen well enough.

Dinner was, of course, fabulous.

Came home to tons of happy-birthday wishes on my Facebook page. All in all, a sweet, fun day. I felt, and feel, very loved.

(And thank you Eileen, for the birthday shout-out at your place.)

Blessed be the One, Holy and Living God.

I’ve been awash in grace, the past few days. I haven’t done anything in particular to deserve it, I don’t think—I just feel really loved.

I found out last Monday that I’d be preaching in the chapel this coming Tuesday. I did family stuff all day Wednesday, and wasn’t here. I got an e-mail from my classmate who preached last week, saying she was praying for me. Thursday morning, I pulled my resources together and started working on it. The Gospel is the “pearl of great price.” The feast day celebrates a founder of the Oxford Movement, who was silenced from preaching for two years, for something he’d said. Risk/worth, silence/speaking—I don’t know what I’m going to say yet, but I know I can do this. It’s right up my alley. The senior sermon is a rite of passage—it has to be good—and these texts hit me where I live. And I know that writing it will further transform me. I am not afraid anymore.

I carried this assurance into a meeting with Marcia in the business office, who handles our financial aid stuff for us. She asked how I was, and we got talking. I told her about Wednesday, realizing as I spoke that what’s happening is not in a vacuum. I have always had fantastic friends. (I’ve told my Cali family that they remind me very much of my Olympia one.) God knows, how you gravitate to certain people, and they to you. Some relationships are only explained by grace. My friends who can, have always done a lot for me. Sometimes materially—always on a soul level, which is where I count wealth anyway. You celebrate what you’re swimming in.

Marcia mentioned something she saw when she first met me. I said, “Yeah, but when I first met you I was a road-weary mess and my phone didn’t work, and you helped me.” She remembers that too—and she says that we are only mirrors for each other. I can’t see anything that’s not in me. All I’m giving is what I see.

For her, it’s karma. For me, it’s grace. I can recognize that I’ve been giving love and good energy—but what I’m receiving is so enormous, in proportion. This cannot be only up to me.

My pre-discernment prayer group met on Thursday night. I opened, easily, but I couldn’t empty—so much is going on, and it’s all so good. I felt like I was floating. Every time I came back to God, I felt so deeply, exuberantly loved.

I e-mailed my mother earlier in the week, and I gave her the link to this blog. Our history is not for public consumption, but that is a huge big deal. She wrote back yesterday morning; a brief, nice note.

Marcia gave me a birthday present, yesterday. It’s a little metallic heart, with flowers all around it. She’d bought two; one for herself and one to give away. She knew after we talked, that this was mine.

It’s so little—and it means so much.

I had a headache from yesterday afternoon until bedtime—but the light is still glowing. It’s palpable.

Glory to God for ever and ever.

Another way of being home

I took a slightly ill-advised day off today, considering I'm preaching next Tuesday and have piles of regular homework, and did early birthday stuff with family-friends. (I asked them for family time; they're giving it.) They picked me up and we went out for breakfast, then to IKEA to get bookshelves for me. Out again for lunch, then we shopped for dinner stuff and went back to their house to make it. We baked communion bread for church. Their other friend came by and we all had focaccia, salad, and some sort of fish-chowder concoction; dear God it was good.

Taking me back to school, we were talking about driving through Olympia. They have relations north of there; they know the roads. I didn't make it up this summer, and I should have. I don't know when I will, as I'll be at the Ranch during Reading Week, NOLA in January, and I haven't planned spring break yet. I won't drive my rattletrap stick-shift minivan over the Siskiyous in December. I said to them, "You wouldn't let me."

Clearly, they couldn't stop me. They wouldn't try to guilt me out of it; they wouldn't feel angry with me if I went. I know they'd worry, though. They care about me in this sweetly protective way. I tease them, but I love it. I haven't had that in a really long time.

I'm blessed in so many ways right now--and blessed again, to know it.

In other news...

I left the Ranch eight days ago. I've taken showers every day since. My toes are still dirty.

I love that!