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When we moved twelve years ago, we decided not to subscribe to cable. The installer who came to set up internet service had not read the work order closely. I was in the basement with him, and he asked where the television would be, so he could measure line to run to the converter. It took a few minutes to explain we wanted internet, but had no interest in paying to watch television.

A lot of people are unplugging. The availability of internet based content is part of the reason. Another is cost. A major factor for us was when we had cable, we watched a lot of things we did not actually need or want to watch, just because they were on, and we happened to be sitting in front of the screen. Mindless, end of the day vegging out. Everyone can use some, but we decided it wasn’t worth the cost, in time and money.

Our kids were very young when we pulled the plug on cable. They have grown up without hundreds of channels- and settle for what comes over the airwaves. We get about 10 channels using our attic antenna. We also keep the tv in the basement. Our living room is filled with musical instruments, and the stereo. I think the musicality of both kids can be connected to that choice.

We still watch television at our house. We find things online, and we use Netflix. Recently I added an app to my ipad that allows me to watch shows from the Global Network when I run on the treadmill. I did that the other day, and noticed some things.

I was wearing Bluetooth headphones, so I was very aware the people at Global pump up the volume for the commercials. I hate that. It’s another reason I don’t like regular television.

I also noticed the content of the ads. During “Angel from Hell”, and the Late Show with Stephen Colbert, the same three ads cycled over and over. They reminded me of a story:

Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, left the Jordan and was led by the Spirit into the wilderness, where for forty days he was tempted by the devil. He ate nothing during those days, and at the end of them he was hungry.

 The devil said to him, “Get thee over to Subway, where every day is Sub Day. Thou shalt purchase the foot long of your choice for $5.99.”

Jesus answered, “It is written: ‘Man shall not live on bread alone.’”

The devil led him up to a car dealership. And he said,” This 2016 Subaru with assymetrical all-wheel drive shall take thee anywhere you might possibly want or need to go. You will be the envy of all who see you in this beauty, and every place you drive will be sunny and warm. Just having this car in your driveway will make you look trendy, smart, and attractive.”

 Jesus answered, “It is written: ‘Worship the Lord your God and serve him only.’”

 The devil led him to the lottery kiosk, and said, “Dost thou realize what you could do with 50 million dollars? If this desert was in the United States, we could hook you up with a Power Ball ticket, and the prize could be 1.3 billion dollars. Just think how much better your life could be. Nothing bad or uncomfortable could every touch you. Anything your heart desired, would be at your finger-tips. After winning this amazing, wondrous, miraculous prize, people would flock to you.”

Jesus answered, “It is said: ‘Do not put the Lord your God to the test.’”

Fast food, fancy new cars, and ridiculously large pots of money may not be what tempts you or I. There may be other things. Popularity. The thrill of gambling. Sex. Gossip. Cheesecake. The reckless abandon of just a few too many drinks. The superiority of judging everything, and everyone, and finding fault.

We each have our personal temptations, the bright baubles or special perks, or unmet hungers, or unquenched thirsts, the buttons that can be pressed to capture our attention, to tap into our obsessions, to convince us life would be so much better, even if only for the time it would take to eat that Cadbury Easter Crème Egg.

The things that tempted Jesus, and that may tempt us, may not, in themselves be good or bad. In the story, the devil tempts Jesus to use food, or power, or miracles, to prove himself.

In Luke’s Gospel, after he was baptized by John, in the river Jordan, Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness. Some authors suggest this was like a spiritual retreat, or a vision quest.

The Spirit came down in bodily form like a dove when he was baptized, and Jesus heard a voice from heaven naming him as God’s beloved son. Jesus needed time and space to sort out who he is, what his life woud be about, and how he would live. How will he be the person God intends?

The question is acted out in dramatic ways. The tempter offers options, and each time Jesus has to decide, is this right for me? Jesus will face similar choices his whole earthly life, as each of us does. We have to find the best way to be ourselves, in little moments, and with big choices, every day.

It is not easy. Many of the actual things that tempt us in our daily lives, food, the things money can buy, the hope of easy and simple answers to hard questions, are not bad in themselves. But they can sure distract us.

In a wild and barren wilderness, away from daily distractions, Jesus wrestles with questions of what his life will be. He is tempted with visions of food, of power and prestige, and with security. In each case he answers his tempter with words of scripture, that point toward God.

It is good to bring God into the decision making process.

I went to a meeting this week at another United Church, where the leaders are wrestling with hard decisions about the future of the congregation. The people in that meeting room seemed afraid, and deeply worried. I was there because they had wanted a quick and easy solution to their problems, and for some of them, the quickest answer seemed to be to let their minister go. My role was to make sure they knew the proper process, and the full implications of their choices.

As I listened, and talked with them about possibilities they might not have looked at, in their fearful desire to resolve the issues yesterday, or sooner, I found some lines of scripture rising in my thoughts. They are from Matthew’s Gospel, in the version called The Message, a paraphrase written by a scholar named Eugene Peterson. They come from a part we call the Beatitudes, in which Jesus describes how we are blessed. We will come to a different version of this speech as found in Luke’s gospel in a few weeks. In Matthew Jesus says,

 “You’re blessed when you’re at the end of your rope. With less of you there is more of God and his rule.

⁴ “You’re blessed when you feel you’ve lost what is most dear to you. Only then can you be embraced by the One most dear to you.

⁵ “You’re blessed when you’re content with just who you are—no more, no less. That’s the moment you find yourselves proud owners of everything that can’t be bought.

⁶ “You’re blessed when you’ve worked up a good appetite for God. He’s food and drink in the best meal you’ll ever eat.

⁷ “You’re blessed when you care. At the moment of being ‘care-full,’ you find yourselves cared for.

⁸ “You’re blessed when you get your inside world—your mind and heart—put right. Then you can see God in the outside world. Amen

 

 

 

Today we really get to begin the 40 Sundays with Jesus journey that I have been talking about. The story of Jesus being baptized is a great starting place, because it is seen as the launch of his public life. He joined the crowds of people who came to the bank of the Jordan River to hear John the Baptist preach his fiery sermons.

Jesus was Jewish. The fact he went to hear John preach suggests that he was making an effort to be a faithful Jew.

As I studied the story this week, it stood out powerfully that “After all the people were baptized, Jesus was baptized.”

He was not the only person baptized that day. Jesus was part of a large crowd, all of whom were baptized. They were not baptized into the Christian church, because that did not actually exist yet. They were Jews being called to a life of faithfulness, and offered a way to have a fresh start.

Jesus was about thirty at the time of his baptism. He had lived a lot of years since being a newborn in a manger, and from that time when he was twelve, and hung out in the Jerusalem temple, talking about God with the teachers of religion.

What did he do for those 18 years, from that time in the temple, to this moment in the Jordan River?

It is intriguing, and challenging to think of Jesus as needing or wanting a fresh start. That makes him seem a lot more human than he is sometimes described. There is a hint here that like all of us, Jesus, and all the other people gathered at the river that day needed to be reminded of who God had created them to be.

Think for a moment about your own life. Where were you at age thirty? What were you doing? Were you ready for a washing clean, a fresh start? Did you have a clear sense of who you were, and what God wanted you to be? Do you have that now?

John the Baptist was a kind of wild man of the desert, a prophet in the Old Testament tradition. He was not afraid to point out when people’s lives had gone off the straight and narrow path. That could be a very unpopular thing to do. Herod, the Roman appointed ruler, had John put in jail for publicly criticizing him.

The scene in which Jesus is baptized, and the heavens open, and the Holy Spirit comes down upon him is often described as the moment Jesus graduates from a quiet life, in obscurity, to a very public life, of preaching and teaching.

I heard a story this week about a young man who had led a kind of wild life. He had a lot of money, and many grown up toys. He did not have to work, and had more free time than many people. He was also very lonely, and at times, drank too much.

He was also a person with a deep spiritual hunger and curiosity. He was looking for more in life, and that led him to walk into a church one Sunday. It was a non-denominational congregation led by a husband and wife team of co-pastors. They had this small, struggling congregation in Mississauga, and they were also involved in mission work in an especially poor area in North West Haiti.

The congregation met in a building that used to be a United Church, and had a very small congregation, made up mostly of seniors. When the co-pastors saw a man in his late twenties walk in, they were thrilled. One of them actually said out loud, “Thank God, someone to help.’

It turned out the young man stuck around, and began to help. Before long he was teaching Bible study, and helping with the sound system at the church, and going to Haiti on mission trips. Something in him responded to being needed to help, and he blossomed. He found himself.

That is an important and powerful thing, to discover who you are meant to be, who you are in God’s eyes, and to find your purpose in life.

This congregation practiced baptism by full immersion, and the old church building they were renting does not have running water, never mind a baptismal tank. The young man invited the congregation to use the pool at his condo for a baptismal service.

Have you ever seen that kind of baptism? The person walks in, or is standing in water that may be above their waist. The baptizer is in there with them, and the baptism is not just a sprinkling on the top of the head with a few drops the way we often do it.

The candidate for baptism is literally dunked under. In some traditions they are pushed in backwards, and totally submerged in the water. They are not held down, but they go all the way in, so that they are completely under water.

As a person who does not even like to put my head in the water when I swim, I would find this style of baptism a bit terrifying. My mind might know I was going to be all right, but I would be anxious.

If you are able, and willing, try an experiment with me. I am going to use my watch to time us for 20 seconds as we hold our breath.

That’s not very long, and it is probably longer than you’d have to hold your breath to be baptized. But it is about long enough to remind us how it feels to not breathe.

I prefer to breathe. My body resists holding my breath. It instinctively knows what it needs.

But you would have to hold your breath if you were being baptized by John in the Jordan River. You might also close your eyes, in case the water wasn’t clean. A lot of other people may have been dipped in that part of the river.

The experience, and the symbolism would be powerful. A total rinsing off of the dust and dirt, and messiness of life up to that point, and a rising up out of the water, with a commitment to live a new kind of life. Terror, and then relief, and perhaps joy, as you rose up out of the water.

That is what happened to Jesus, in the Jordan River. The story tells us that after Jesus was baptized, the heavens opened, the dove of the Holy Spirit came down, and a voice said to him, “You are my Son, chosen and marked by my love, pride of my life.”

Another translation says, “You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased.”

One of the ways the Christian church has understood baptism is as a moment to participate in the mysteries of Jesus life, his death, and his resurrection.

The person totally submerged for baptism is for a moment, cut off from life around them.

They are like an unborn child, in those few seconds, except without the umbilical cord to provide all they need for life.

There is at once a hint of death, or the risk of it, and the reminder of what it is like for each of us, before we leave the safety of the womb, and enter the world. The water is at the same time, a womb, and a reminder of the tomb in which Jesus was laid, after he was killed on the cross.

Then the person rises up out of the water breathless, and is able again to breathe, and it suggests coming back to life, or being born.

There is a lot of powerful symbolism there, that we may only catch a glimpse of in the way we tend to do baptisms.

I heard the story of this young man’s baptism from his father, who is not a regular church goer, but who attended the service held at the condo pool, when his son was being baptized. When his son had been baptized, and was getting out of the pool, he slipped on the wet deck, and almost broke his leg.

The father said his son was sore for a few days, but not seriously hurt. That little story, of falling on the wet deck is a reminder that this business of baptism, of life, and death, and new life, is risky.

Life itself is risky. You never know what’s going to happen. Did Jesus know what would happen in his life, after he submitted to John’s baptism?

The father told me this story of his son’s baptism, while we were standing together at the reception after his son’s funeral. The baptism he described happened about 7 years ago. The young man died tragically just after New Year’s, and I helped with his funeral this week.

There was of course a great deal of sadness over this young man’s death. But in the midst of this, I also heard that the happiest, most fulfilling part of his short life began when he joined that little church, was baptized, and grew into a new understanding of his purpose. He found his identity as a beloved child of God, when he began to live a life that was about serving God, by helping others.

It is so good that he found that little church, and found out who he was meant to be, while he could do something about it.

This morning we have the opportunity in the service to re-affirm the vows of baptism, and to remember again who we are, in God’s eyes. We are, each of us, beloved children of God. Amen

 

A long time ago, in a Galilee far away, or more accurately, a Syria far away, forces of an immense evil empire, at the behest of a power-mad and insecure ruler, attacked and killed scores of innocent, vulnerable people. This is part of our gospel story this morning. It is sadly, also part of the news of the world that comes to us every day. It also resembles one of the first big action scenes in The Force Awakens, episode seven of the Star Wars movie franchise. As I sat with my kids, and some friends, on five dollar Tuesday at Film.ca, I saw the old, old story, or nightmare of fear, abuse of power, and violence against the innocent acted out on screen. The forces of evil came in to destroy a whole village of innocent people, in an effort to root out a threat to the power of their Emperor. (show clip from trailer)

I was 16 when the first Star Wars movie came out, and I loved it. Star Wars movies are like opera, or ancient mythology, or comic books. These art forms often tell a story of the universal conflict of good versus evil, and of ordinary people who find themselves caught in the middle. That really is an unbeatable combination.

I remember going to a hardware store in Windsor with our landlord, a wise, practical, chain-smoking, hard-working, big-hearted old Ukrainian man. Windsor was then, and is still, pretty much a blue-collar town, with a mix of cultures and ethnicities. Most people I met there were fairly open to diversity.

John and I were looking for a kit to install an air conditioner in an attic window. The store clerk had trouble understanding what John wanted, and maybe couldn’t get it all through his accent. It was a frustrating conversation, and we ended up looking elsewhere. As we walked away, we heard the clerk mutter “stupid bohunk”.

John was such a good man. He must have read my face, because I really wanted to go back and have words with the clerk. John shook his head, and gave a look that seemed to express both gratitude for my indignation, and resignation to the cruelty and ignorance of some people.

John said, “Whaddaya gonna do?”

We went on with our mission, picked up what we needed at another store, and installed the air conditioner. It was one of those times when an elder’s wisdom won out. But I still would not have minded having a light saber.

John was right, I think, to have us walk away from the guy in the hardware store. Who knows why the clerk spat out his racial hatred in that moment. As the Scottish Presbyterian theologian Ian McLaren wrote, “Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle.”

People face all kinds of hard battles.

The folks fleeing Syria face the devastation of their home towns, and the rigours of hard travel, and the challenges of starting again, if they can make their way to a safe refuge.

Hospitals and care facilities are filled with folks who struggle with illness, and aging. Families face tough decisions about the care of loved ones. Ailments, accidents, diseases, and illnesses come upon people, and cause devastation with little warning. There is the general creeping along of mortality, as we all age, and face death.

Economic forces mess with people’s lives. The price of a barrel of oil goes up or down a few dollars, and there are either new jobs, or big layoffs.

Huge fuel oil burning container ships stain the water of our oceans, and sully our air, and contribute to global warming. They bring us thousands of tons of cheap consumer goods from places where the workers can’t afford to buy what they make for us.

Executives in the head office of a corporation make decisions to protect the price of their shares, and workers and their families hundreds or thousands of miles away lose their jobs, their security, their health benefits.

Power-drunk military and political leaders strike out against each other, wielding armies like pawns on a chess board, and using ideology and fear, and bad theology to justify their insanity.

There is so much that seems beyond our control, that just happens to us.

It can be quite soothing to read a story, or watch an epic movie with characters with whom we can identify. They are a little bit like us, except they may have the help of magic, or aliens, or fate, or the force and a light saber, and so they can join in the struggle, and make a difference as the forces of good battle the forces of evil. There is vicarious satisfaction in seeing good guys, and gals win. It can warm our hearts to see a lonely orphan child on a desolate desert planet discover their destiny as a hero who will help save a galaxy from an evil fate.

Last week I said I want to focus on teaching about Jesus, and hopefully, dig down through some of the layers of tradition and interpretation, and decoration and embellishment piled on to his story over two millennia. Today we celebrate Epiphany, which is one of the oldest, and I think one of the brightest and best traditions of the early church.

The story the church draws on for Epiphany is the visit of the Magi. Even though Jesus is the heart and reason for the story, most of the action does not directly involve him. This is a bit like an opening scene, or establishing shot in a movie, meant to offer us context. What world is baby Jesus born into?

It is a world in which rich and powerful people make decisions that cause poor people to leave their homes, and seek shelter against the cold night. It is a world in which an evil ruler can hatch plots against real or imagined enemies. It is a world in which violence is perpetrated against innocent and defenseless children. It is a world in which it is possible to feel insignificant, helpless to make things better. In other words, it is our world.

The gospels bring the Good News about God’s love for all people, and were written for people like us, living in a world in which there are many hard battles.

Epiphany is the English word that comes from ancient Greek words “Epi-phanos”, which translate roughly as “manifestation” or “appearance” or “making known”. It means that something previously hidden has been revealed. A sunrise is a kind of epiphany, a moment when darkness is sliced open by light- like a light saber.

The word epiphany gets used in non-religious ways to point to a moment in which something suddenly becomes clear. A good example is when the apple fell on Isaac Newton, and he had a sudden insight into the existence of gravity. There is a similar story about Albert Einstein struck as a young child by being given a compass, and realizing that some unseen force was making it move.

In the Gospel according to Thomas, an interesting, and strange, and mystical text that did not make it into the New Testament, Jesus is quoted as saying, “I’m the light that’s over everything. I am everything; it’s come from me and unfolds toward me. “Split a log; I’m there. Lift the stone, and you’ll find me there.”

That is a way of expressing the startling news of the Incarnation, the claim the Christian church has made almost from the beginning, that one of the things we learn from Jesus is that God is not distant, and uninvolved, looking down on us from some lofty height. God is with us in the midst of this reality. We don’t wait until we die and depart this existence to meet God. God is in the apples, and compass needles, and in the light, and in the split logs, and in the vulnerable child of Bethlehem, and in you and I. This is not to say that you are God, or that I am. The poetry of the Incarnation says to us that God is here, with us. God is with us, and there is hope. Amen

 

 

 

 

 

We are getting closer to the celebration of the birth of Jesus, so it seems a good timing that the scripture reading for Sunday shows us Mary. We see her on a visit to her cousin Elizabeth, who is also pregnant.

Elizabeth told Mary that at the sound of her greeting, the child in her womb leaped for joy. Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit, and said to her cousin, “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb.”

Mary began the speech for which she is famous. In English we read the opening line as “My soul magnifies the Lord”. In latin, the first word is Magnificat, which is related to the word “magnify”, and means praise. Mary sang that her spirit rejoiced in God, her Saviour. To rejoice means to see joy, or to feel joy, to be joyful.

Today we lit the Advent candle for Joy. It is an invitation to ponder what we mean, when we use that word. I used my Facebook page this week to reach out and ask for definitions.

One of my preacher friends said they had been musing about the same question all week. Another minister friend said joy is having a guest preacher.

Candy, who often guest preaches here, said Joy is her middle name, and it’s been passed on to her daughter and granddaughter. For her, joy is in playing with her grandchildren.

Linda, a church musician friend from Manitoba, whose daughter Jody visited Trinity this fall, wrote, “It’s the feeling you have when you are so involved with something that you forget everything else. “ She said, “that’s what music does for me.”

A woman I met this past summer at a writing conference sent a good quote. “Joy is the echo of God’s life in the soul.” That was said originally by a much revered Irish Catholic Bishop named Dom Marmion, who also said that a person’s love for God is measured by their love for their neighbor.

Wendy, a woman I worked with 25 years ago at a Quaker liberal arts college reminded me Joy is also the perky one in the Disney Pixar movie “Inside Out”.

Have you seen Inside Out? By the end of the story, the bouncy, perky, always smiling figure of Joy has discovered there is actually more to life than being “happy” all the time. To be fair, a Disney movie is not really the place for a lot of deep thought, they have to keep things moving.

Peter Kreeft, a philosopher and teacher at Boston College wrote,

“Joy is more than happiness, just as happiness is more than pleasure. Pleasure is in the body. Happiness is in the mind and feelings. Joy is deep in the heart, the spirit, the center of the self.”

It is worth saying that last part again. “Joy is deep in the heart, the spirit, the center of the self.”

The beauty of this way of thinking about Joy is the reminder it offers that Joy is not as dependent on outside circumstances as happiness. So we can imagine Mary, large with child, and possibly heavy with worry about the fate of her child, and her own fate, can still be filled with joy.

Rumi, the 13th-century Persian poet, jurist, Islamic scholar, theologian, and Sufi mystic wrote: “When you do things from your soul, you feel a river moving in you, a joy.”

The idea is that the soul, that deepest part of us, is the most connected to God, most aware of what God has in store for us. Our soul can trust in God, even when our mind can give us every reason not to, and even though our feelings can change with every wind that blows.

I recently read some faithful reflections on the topic of living with joy, even when life’s circumstances are challenging. One author said,

“Joy is the settled assurance that God is in control of all the details of my life, the quiet confidence that ultimately everything is going to be alright, and the determined choice to praise God in every situation.”

This author offered a scripture quote to make the connection between reliance on God, trust in God, and real joy:

“We’re depending on God; he’s everything we need. What’s more, our hearts brim with joy since we’ve taken for our own his holy name. Love us, God, with all you’ve got — that’s what we’re depending on.” (Psalm 33:20-22 MSG)

Another author said:

“With the continuous updates on what is happening in our neighborhoods, domestically, and around the world, it is easy to become overwhelmed and overcome with fear. But at times like these, I remember to hold onto my faith…. We are being tested and asked to rise to the occasion, dig deep, and be our best selves. We are being asked to place our trust in the Creator. We are being asked to respond from a place of love, patience, and faith. “

This writer also quoted scripture to emphasize the point that we are to place our trust in God. They said, “must go on with a greater awareness and even greater confidence and certainty that is God is with me,” offered these two pieces of scripture:

“And God is the Protector of those Who have faith” [Qur’an, 3:68].

“Certainly, We shall test you with fear, hunger, loss of wealth, lives and fruits, but give glad tidings to the patient – those who, when afflicted with calamity say, Truly to God we belong, and truly to Him shall we return” [Qur’an, 2:155-156].

One of the writers I quoted, along with her choice of scripture from the Quran, is a woman from North Carolina, named Sajdah Nubee, who describes herself as “Muslim, African-American, Interfaith Presenter, Blogger, Seeker of Truth, Promoting Consciousness, Driven by Intuition, Tar Heel Born and Bred”.

The other writer I just quoted, along with his quotes from the Bible, is Rick Warren, the founding pastor of one of the largest evangelical churches in North America. He is perhaps most famous for his book the Purpose Driven Life.

What amazed me, and brought me great joy, was how similar these two authors sound. They come from very different ethnic, cultural and religious backgrounds. They honour different traditions, and read different scriptures. They even have different names for God, and different ideas about how God is at work in the world. Even so, I hear in both of them the common theme that true joy is found in placing our trust in God. Amen

 

Your party is about to get rolling. The food smells great, the house is lit up, shiny clean and decorated for Christmas, and guests are arriving. You are setting up to serve drinks when that neighbour comes to the door. The one who has loud, mid-week, late night parties all summer, who burns garbage in the back yard, and whose recycling and compost are always knocked over and strewn on the street. He is at your door asking you to push his car out of a snow drift. You smell holiday cheer on his breath, and are not surprised he got stuck, but what are you going to do?

A peek out your door, and around your neighbour reveals his car is blocking half the road in front of his house, and yours. It’s not even that there is a lot of snow. It’s more that the tires on his old junker are bald. You are pretty sure if you get him moving, he’ll just slide into trouble again. He’s that neighbour. So what are you going to do?

You throw on your coat, step in to your boots, and get out there. After he pulls the car in his driveway, you notice his house is dark. You remember his last partner left him when he got laid off, and his grown kids never visit. You invite him over for a hot drink and a bite to eat, hoping he will decline. But he doesn’t. He follows you home, and dominates the party with very strong, and very loud opinions on politics, and explicit details of last week’s episode of “Orange is the new black”.

Your nice holiday party has taken a turn for the unexpected.

Today’s gospel readings connect us to John the Baptist, who always seems to me an unexpected, and possibly unwelcome intruder in the days leading up to Christmas.

The first reading quotes Zechariah, on the occasion of John’s birth. Zechariah expected big things from his son, who was a kind of miracle baby. Zechariah and his wife Elizabeth are described as both old and childless. It was not expected that they would be expecting. The angel told Zechariah that Elizabeth would bear a son who would be a prophet who would, “make ready a people prepared for the Lord.”

Zechariah found this hard to believe. The angel said because he did not believe, he wouldn’t be able to speak until the baby was born. When the baby was born, Zechariah regained the power of speech, and declared his son would be called John, and that he would,

“go on before the Lord to prepare the way for him, ⁷⁷ to give his people the knowledge of salvation     through the forgiveness of their sins, ⁷⁸ because of the tender mercy of our God,     by which the rising sun will come to us from heaven ⁷⁹ to shine on those living in darkness     and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the path of peace.”

Our second gospel reading shows John all grown up, travelling around the Jordan, “proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.” He is preparing the way, getting the people ready for the big thing coming, which is Jesus. Which is why in the season of Advent, as we prepare to celebrate Jesus’ birth, we end up with John the Baptist at our pre-Christmas party.

Maybe we come to church to help us get into the holiday mood. We want to hear a nice story about baby Jesus, and maybe a drummer boy. The stable is not perfect, but Mary and Joseph make it cozy, and god bless us everyone!

John the Baptist stomps on the scene, as if to say, hey, don’t get too comfortable! There are big problems, in your life, and in the world. Stop sinning. Get more exercise. Turn your life around. Spend less on yourself, and give to good causes. Stop expecting so much, and sharing so little.

In the same way we know we should probably be kind to our annoying neighbour, we probably also know, deep in our hearts that crazy eyed, wild haired John the Baptist is right.

But wouldn’t be great to get through one December without having all the violence and sadness and pain of the world in our face? Why does hardship and difficulty always interrupt our happy interludes, and puncture the illusion that all is right with the world?

We have been hearing stories about the deaths of aboriginal women in every Canadian province and territory that go largely ignored. We are hearing governments negotiate over efforts to slow global warming, but without sacrificing economic growth. We watch reports about hundreds of thousands of refugees risking their lives to flee their homes, and walk across Europe in search of safe refuge. Our relative calm is interrupted with stories of horrific mass shootings in the U.S., and apparently racist, misogynist, fear-mongering bullies competing for the right to run that country.

The story about John the Baptist, and the story of Jesus are told, and retold, to remind us that God is at work in the world. This is a hopeful message, because it reminds that things will not remain as they are. That is also a disturbing message, because things will not remain as they are.

It is easier for us, in our part of the world, to wish for things to stay mostly the same. Most of us live in safe places, have what we need to live, and some extra. We do not usually go to bed hungry, and we have a bed to go to.

I know there are poor people, and refugees, and climate change and all kinds of cruelty and injustice in the world. But I feel helpless to fix all that, and just want some peace, some quiet joy, and maybe some assurance that I do not have to feel guilty all the time, for living in a relatively safe, relatively quiet, mostly good place. Can’t we just have some peace?

Today we lit the candle for Peace. It may help to look at what we mean. Peace is the word often used in place of the Hebrew word Shalom, which means a lot more than the absence of war. Shalom is about the movement towards being on good terms with the whole of everything: God, ourselves, other people, and the world around us. Shalom is a work in progress. The word Shalom is also used as a greeting, and a blessing. In Hebrew, people say, “Shalom aleichem “ which means “well-being be upon you” or “may you be well”.

The concept of Shalom reminds us to work towards being in right relations with God and with ourselves. That is the way towards spiritual peace, which is a needed thing when we are also working towards restored relations with other people, and with the world we live in.

By ourselves, we can’t fix everything that needs fixing in the whole world. I am still pondering the little story we heard last week about the man walking along an ocean shore, stopping every once in a while to rescue beached starfish, and toss them back into the water. Watch this video: Starfish story

There is inner peace, spiritual peace, available to us when we seek to be in closer relations, right relations with God, and to take up the part of the work of Shalom that is for us to do.

The beach is a great symbolic representation of life in the world. It is a kind of in-between place, that is changing all the time. We stay there long enough and we see powerful forces at work, that are beyond our control. We look more closely and see little things we could do, to help, We start to discern where the starfish are, and what is needed to help them. We can feel a certain peace when we know that we are doing what we are able to do, as part of God’s bigger wholeness. Shalom.

 

We are not alone,
we live in God’s world.
We believe in God:
who has created and is creating,
who has come in Jesus,
the Word made flesh
to reconcile and make new,
who works in us and others
by the Spirit.
We trust in God.

(from the New Creed of the United Church of Canada)

“Jews demand signs and Greeks look for wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those whom God has called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.  For the foolishness of God is wiser than human wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than human strength.” (1 Corinthians 1:22-25)

In the first centuries following the earthly life of Jesus, gatherings were held to discern which documents Christians would cherish as scripture, to define the nature of the Trinity, and to affirm the divinity of Christ. Creeds were formulated. Doctrine was debated and heresies refuted. It is interesting to note that no conference was held by the early church to make an official pronouncement on the meaning of the Crucifixion.

Over the last two thousand years there has been a range of answers to the question, “How are we saved by Jesus’ death on the cross?”

As a person of faith, and as a preacher, I struggle with hymns, and anthems, and prayers and faith statements, that tend to reflect one particular approach to answering the question. It has been my observation that some interpretations of Jesus’ death on the cross are actually a stumbling block.

During the Good Friday service this year, we looked at some quick snapshots of some perhaps lesser known theologies of the cross.

The Ransom Theory

Before the American Civil War, a physician in the South, in his effort to explain the behaviour of African American slaves claimed many his subjects suffered from mental illness. He said two disorders were prevalent. An uncontrollable urge to escape, and willful destruction of property, disobedience, and refusal to work. His way of seeing the world, and people, was shaped and clouded by his culture.

To borrow an image from a Good Friday hymn, we survey the cross from a distance, something like a surveyor takes a sighting. In order to get an accurate measure, the surveyor needs to know where they stand.

Depending where we stand, we may have different perspective on the crucifixion, and its significance. The various ways of thinking about the crucifixion reflect the culture and spirit of the age in which they emerged, and build on assumptions that may seem strange to us.

The earliest idea was the “Ransom Theory”. It said Jesus offered himself as a ransom, to secure our freedom. The human condition was viewed as one of enslavement to Satan because of the “Fall” of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden.

It was not always clear to whom this ransom was paid. Many early church fathers said the ransom was paid to Satan. This understanding assumes that Satan is not a mythological figure, but an actual being that cannot be overcome by God, and has to be bought off.

The Commercial Theory, and the Penal Substitution Theory

In the ancient Middle East social and business relationships were based largely on reputation. Honour had a value like a commodity that could be traded. A development beyond the ransom theory was the idea that God rewarded Jesus for his sacrifice, and the reward was passed on to humanity. The reward gained by Jesus can be applied against humanity’s debt, for our sinful condition.

Over a thousand years after the earthly life of Jesus, an eleventh century theologian from England named Anselm of Canterbury picked up on this approach. Anselm lived in the midst of a medieval, feudal society. If a servant stole from the lord of the manor, the crime was not only larceny, but an offense against the honour of the lord, and the feudal system as a whole, that demanded to be set right. A debt must be paid, to preserve the honour and integrity of the feudal lord.

Anselm saw the relationship of human beings to God in feudal terms. The offense of human sinfulness, as expressed in the concept of original sin, was so great, humans really ought to pay a great price. Jesus death on the cross, the shedding of his blood, was understood as a substitute sacrifice, to satisfy the honour of God.

The Moral Example Theory

Another way to look at the death of Jesus on the cross is that it saves by offering a powerful showing of God’s love, by which we are inwardly stirred to respond with gratitude and service. Jesus’ death demonstrated the depth of God’s love, by the extent God is willing to enter into our reality.

In this view, Jesus’ death is seen as an heroic, inspiring act, rather than a required part of a business transaction. Modern proponents of this theory see Jesus as the example for us of self-giving love, and what the world might see as foolish vulnerability, is described as holy living. Jesus set aside concern for his own well-being to live and die in service to his people, and calls us to do the same.

Closely related to this theory is martyrdom, the idea that some things are worth dying for. Often references to contemporary figures such as Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr., are made.

The Governmental Theory

This theory suggests Jesus death was required as retribution, to show that sin is displeasing to God. In order to sustain the moral government of the world, God found it necessary to demonstrate holy wrath against sin. Jesus’ death is accepted by God as sufficient, only because God is merciful, and does not require exact justice.

This view, as well as the substitution theory mentioned earlier, depend on the idea of “Original Sin”. This is a shorthand way of saying that because Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden chose to disobey God, every human is tainted or marked by their sin of disobedience.

Setting aside the question of whether the Genesis story Adam and Eve in the Garden should be read as factual, or as a truth-bearing parable, there are many contemporary theologians who work from a completely different premise, they call “Original Blessing’. Everything that God makes, including each person, comes into life with a blessing rather than a curse.

A Note on the word “Atonement”

The Penal Substitution Theory mentioned earlier is usually called the Theory of Penal Substitutionary Atonement, and it is central to the teaching of many of the churches we think of as evangelical or fundamentalist. The thrust of this teaching is that God required Jesus’ death on the cross, to atone for the sins of all of us, the idea we heard earlier, called “Original Sin”. What may be overlooked in discussions of this theory is the word “atonement” was not originally found in the Bible.

Like many words that found their way into common language, by way of translations or paraphrases of scripture into English, the word “atonement” was invented, or “coined” by the translator William Tyndale. He originally meant for it to be two words at, and onement. He was trying to find a way to convey a number of concepts, including reconciliation, forgiveness, and one from the Hebrew scriptural account of the Jewish Fast of Yom Kippur. The Hebrew word is “Kaper” which means to cover, or remove, or cleanse. In the Yom Kippur ceremony, blood was sprinkled on the lid of the Ark of the Covenant, which was also called the Mercy Seat.

Christus Victor, or the Dramatic Theory

In 1931, Swedish theologian Gustaf Aulen published “Christus Victor”, in which he laid out the history of major theories of atonement. He revisited the most ancient, the Ransom Theory, which he retooled and gave a new name. Instead of Jesus’ death being a price paid as a ransom, Aulen said the Crucifixion was part of the larger conflict between God and the powers which hold humanity in bondage: sin, death and the devil.

Aulen moved away from the idea that Jesus’ death satisfied a debt in a legal, contractual sense. He argued the crucifixion was part of a drama in which Jesus subversively condemned the powers of evil, and revealed their unjust ways, by submitting to death. The victory of Christ came not in the Crucifixion, but in the Resurrection, in which God vindicated Jesus, ultimately clearing him of any wrong-doing.

The Last Scapegoat Theory

Contemporary theologians are greatly influenced by a man who died recently, a French scholar named Rene Girard. Girard observed that human societies advance as members learn to copy each other’s successes. The capacity to copy also causes us to want the same things as others, which leads to tension between individuals and groups.

For a society to thrive, and not be torn apart by rivalry, it occasionally needs to release the tension. Killing one person, or one small group, is a small price to pay compared to anarchy, or a bloody revolution. The society chooses a scapegoat, a minority or a villain to blame for its problems. The sacrifice of the scapegoat relieves the built up tension, and calm is restored, which seems to prove the occasional blood sacrifice is a necessary, perhaps even a divinely inspired thing.

Girard theorized that by his death on the cross Jesus did two things. He exposed the lie of scape-goating , because he was innocent of any wrong-doing that might have made his execution legitimate. He also became the ultimate scapegoat, and eliminated the need to ever turn again to this violent practice.

The Solidarity Theory

A German theologian named Jurgen Moltmann, whose thinking and faith was profoundly influenced by his experience of the second world war, wrote a ground-breaking book called The Crucified God. His view was that in Jesus of Nazareth, God entered fully into what it means to be human- including all the pain, confusion, mortality, and times of feeling totally cut off from hope, and even cut off from God. Moltmann said that in Jesus, God entered into even the feeling of “Godforsakenness”, as an act of ultimate solidarity.

This allowed Moltmann to proclaim that God is with us, even in our feelings of being distant from God. That is a hint of hope, that points towards the greater hope- if God is with us in the human condition as represented in the crucifixion, we are with God as Jesus, human as we are, is raised to new life in the resurrection.

We are called to be the Church:
to celebrate God’s presence,
to live with respect in Creation,
to love and serve others,
to seek justice and resist evil,
to proclaim Jesus, crucified and risen,
our judge and our hope.
In life, in death, in life beyond death,
God is with us.
We are not alone.

Thanks be to God.

(from the New Creed of the United Church of Canada)

The above is a rough survey of some “crucis theologia”- theologies of the cross. It is not exhaustive, and the theories are not mutually exclusive. Many Christians are draqwn to aspects of more than one approach. Nuances have been omitted, for the sake of brevity, and by the limits of this writer’s intellectual grasp of each theory.

Resources consulted included Wikipedia.com; The Heart of Christianity, by Marcus Borg; Saved from Sacrifice: A Theology of the Cross, by Mark S. Heim; and A Better Atonement, by Tony Jones. (Errors or misrepresentations of the theories are not a reflection on the usefuleness of these resources!)

Today is Reign of Christ Sunday, what we used to call Christ the King Sunday. It is the last Sunday on the church calendar. Next week is the first Sunday in the season of Advent, which anticipates the celebration of the birth of Jesus. So the church year is structured to begin with waiting for Jesus, and to end with Jesus as the one we follow. A way from earlier days to express this was to say that Jesus is our King, our Lord. We may not relate to that language, but it is still true we would do well to follow the ways of Jesus, in how we live.

But how do we do that? If Jesus were an earthly king, and we were his loyal subjects, and these were medieval times, following might be easier. We could just do what we are told, by decree, or by royal command. I wonder if we actually would follow orders, if that was the way it worked.

But Jesus is not that kind of king, and following the ways of Jesus, being a faithful person, is not that simple. We have free will, and we exercise that freedom every day with many smaller and bigger decisions, that add up to the general direction of our lives.

Wouldn’t it be great to know we were on track, that we were making good decisions?

I have taken extra training, beyond the basics needed to be a pastor, in order to serve as a spiritual director. Part of what I do with people who meet with me for spiritual direction is try to help them pay attention to how God is already at work in their lives. A wonderful side effect of this work is that it reminds me to do the same about my own life. When I do this, it always leaves me feeling more at peace, more trusting that the universe is a good place to live, more sure that there are reasons to have hope.

Sometimes people meet with me when they are sorting through a major decision in their lives. They often have a pretty good idea of what they should do, are seeking clarity, or confirmation. They are trying to discern that they are on the right path.

I have been doing further study on the spiritual practice of discernment, so I can get better at it in my own life, and so that I can help the people who meet with me for spiritual direction. It seems to me that in our life together as a congregation, it is important that we learn more about how to listen for God, as we discern the way forward.

I have been reading 2 books by a woman named Elizabeth Liebert, who is quite helpful on this subject. She wrote that:

“The Latin root of the verb “to discern” means to discriminate…. in the Christian spiritual tradition, discernment refers to the process of sifting out what is of God, discriminating between that which expresses God’s call and anything that runs counter to it.

 Whenever we seek to answer such questions as “How is God present here?” or “How can I know what God is calling me to do?” or “Is this just me, or is this really God?” or “Is God calling us to go forward with our plan?” we are engaging in discernment.

 Discernment… is the process of intentionally becoming aware of how God is present, active, and calling us as individuals and communities so that we can respond with increasingly greater faithfulness.”

Last Sunday we acted out the story of God calling to the little boy Samuel, who lived in the temple with Eli. The voice kept waking up Samuel, and Samuel kept waking up Eli, who finally said to him, if it is God calling you, say, “Speak Lord, your servant is listening.”

I believe that God is calling to us all the time, in soft and quiet voices we do not always even notice, in the busy rush of our lives. Many times a day we are offered the choice between a good path to follow, and a path that may not be right for us, and others.

Jesus, in the Gospel lesson we heard today, promised God would be present with us as a comforter, as a guide, to help us find our way.

One of my favourite shows, that used to be on CBC radio, was called the Dead Dog Comedy hour. It was set in a coffee shop on First Nations land in Alberta. The show had a slogan, a motto that the characters said at the end of every episode. Do you remember this?

“Keep Calm, Be Brave, Wait for the Signs.”

That’s pretty good advice, even if came from a comedy show.

 The author I have been reading, Elizabeth Liebert lays out a process for doing spiritual discernment. I am distilling her work down into something less than the 350 or so pages of her two books. I know that in doing this I lose much of the depth and nuance of what she teaches.

This process works best when a person is trying to decide between two options or choices. Each may have pluses or minuses to them, but each are possible, and each have good in them.

Seek spiritual freedom, the inner disposition upon which discernment rests and which creates the climate for discernment. “Indifference” which means knowing that whatever the outcome, we are still held in God’s love.

This spiritual freedom becomes not only a place of calm to begin from, but also a factor in any choice we finally discern, because it changes who we are- we are people who trust in God, and see the work of God in the world as one of the factors we include in our discerning.

If we can’t imagine any other world than we presently inhabit, we will not desire more. To move toward deeper desires, then, we must school our imagination, learn to imagine that which is not yet.

1. Discover and name the issue or choice you face. What is really at stake is not always self-evident. Carefully framing the issue not only helps to clarify the matter for discernment, but it also actually begins the process of sifting and discriminating that is at the heart of discernment. Framing the question into something you can actually work with is very freeing. A lot or parents of grade 12 high school students are having conversations lately about what their child is “going to do with the rest of their lives”. Putting it that way is crazy making. It may be helpful to narrow the question to something like, “further study, or a break from school”, or “college or university”.
2. Gather and evaluate appropriate data about the issue. Discernment is not magic. We have to do our homework.-gather information, talk to people who know things we don’t. Because we are trying to discern what might be possible in a world that includes the reality that God is at work, our sources of information are wider. We can learn from our memories of other times we have needed God’s help. We can pay attention to what our intuition may be telling us- when we make surprising connections, have interesting dreams, get a hunch or a feeling. We don’t need to leap on these, but can add them to the information we collect. We can pay attention to what our body says. If talking about a particular option makes us energized, or really tired, what does that mean. If talking about something leaves us feeling ill, what does that mean? If talking about something fills us with joy and excitement, what is our unconscious, and our body telling us?We can also gather input from our imagination, from our logic and reason, from our religious traditions and stories.
3. Reflect and pray. Actually we have been praying from the outset. We pray for spiritual freedom. We select and frame the issue for discernment in prayer. We prayerfully select and consider the relevant data. But as we begin the process of discrimination in a more focused way, it is important to renew our attention to prayer.
4. Formulate a tentative decision. Many different methods can help us come to a decision, and therefore aid our discernment.
5. Seek confirmation. In this step, we bring the work we have done, including the decision that is emerging, back to prayer, asking God to confirm it. That is, we await the inner sense that we are on the right track. We look for the presence of indicators, the touchstones or norms that the tradition suggests are signs of the Holy Spirit’s work. We bring our tentative decision to the community of faith, checking our sense with others who know us well. In confirmation, we “discern the discernment.” We “test the leadings.”
6. Assess the process. Revise as needed. Still discernment does not end. We look back over and examine the entire process. Was there anywhere that we acted without spiritual freedom? Any place where peace deserted us? Any part filled with anxiety? We let some time pass and look to see what kind of fruit has appeared in our lives and the lives of others as a result.

But if something went awry, we can become alert to how that happened and therefore more attentive to preventing it in the future. Nothing need be lost.

It is also okay to discern further, and revise our conclusion, to adapt. God is with us in all of it. Amen

Day by Day

See thee more clearly,

Love thee more dearly,

Follow thee more nearly,

Day by day.

Check out this clip of a “flash mob” version of a medley from Godspell, that includes “Day by Day”

Godspell Flash Mob

At the heart of Christianity is the invitation to be in a relationship with God, who passionately loves each of us, cares what we do with each moment, each day of our lives, and who has hopes and dreams for us, and this world, that we can take part in.

How do we listen to God? How do we know we are making decisions that fit well with God’s hopes and dreams?

This is a good question for each of us as individuals. It is also a question for us collectively, as a congregation. I have been talking lately at meetings of the church council about spiritual discernment. The council, the people who work on a daily basis all year round to manage the church, its employees and its property, accept the responsibility to do that with an openness to serving God.

Our church is more than just a group of people that meets once a week to pray and sing together. We are here to serve God’s people. We are here to live out a mission.

It takes spiritual discernment to know what is required of us, and what decisions to make. There are major decisions coming up in the life of this congregation. In my own prayer life, and in my pondering about how best to serve God, in this place, with you, it has become clearer to me that I should teach more about how we can be like little Samuel, who learns to say, “Speak, Lord, your servant is listening.”

We are cautious around the idea that God is speaking to us. While it does happen that people hear God speaking in actual words, most of us are careful, skeptical, curious about this possibility.

It does happen. People do hear words that are important for them to hear. God does speak.

Most often, for most people, this communication between God and us is a more subtle, nuanced experience.

We can all use practice in paying attention, so that when we say in our hearts, “Speak Lord, your servant is listening,” that we will actually be ready to listen.

This listening to God depends on a few things:

1. Conviction that God is real, and intimately interested and involved with us.
2. Openness to the possibility that we may hear something that changes us.
3. Spiritual freedom- a willingness to go with it, rooted in the sense that God is with us, and that this is all we really need.

For most people, paying closer attention to God at work in their lives leads to deeper trust, and gratitude. Seeing a little of God at work today, helps us believe God will be active in our lives tomorrow. Last month I shared this story about “Sleeping with Bread”.

During the bombing raids of World War II, thousands of children were orphaned and left to starve. The fortunate ones were rescued and placed in refugee camps where they received food and good care. But, many of these children who had lost so much could not sleep at night. They feared waking up to find themselves once again homeless and without food. Nothing seemed to reassure them. Finally, someone hit upon the idea of giving each child a piece of bread to hold at bedtime. Holding their bread, these children could finally sleep in peace. All through the night the bread reminded them, “Today I ate and I will eat again tomorrow.”

As the trust develops that God has been active in our life today, and will be tomorrow, we may begin to experience the sense of spiritual freedom, that we can follow God.

The kind of listening to God we can grow into may be about hearing words, but is not limited to that. We can learn to use all of our faculties to pay attention, to notice, and to see, hear, taste, feel, remember that God is present. We can grow in our awareness of how we are actually experiencing God all the time.

We are going to do a spiritual exercise together, called the Examen. It was developed by Saint Ignatius of Loyola, the founder of the Society of Jesus, also called the Jesuits. He is probably the 2^nd most famous Jesuit in the world today. The most famous being Pope Francis.

You don’t have to be a Pope, or a Jesuit, or even a Catholic, to benefit by this exercise.

Practiced on a regular basis, it can help us grow in ways that are important to the work of discernment, of knowing what God would have us do, day by day.

Settle comfortably in your seats.

Breathe.

Follow the directions we will see on the screen, or in the booklet I have for each of you to take home.

Watch and pray along with the video.

the examen

One of my children came home from school not long ago, and told me their teacher said there was really no point to any of our recycling, or efforts to reduce our consumption of energy, to shrink our carbon footprint. His argument was the difference we can make as individuals is miniscule, especially when measured against the immensity of the problem. So we needn’t bother trying.

The teacher is of course entitled to their opinion. I also think it is sad and irresponsible of him to waste the opportunity he is given, as a teacher, to influence thinking, and behaviour. I also believe he is wrong.

Our gospel story today is a great one. The story of the widow’s mite. The woman of limited means, who gives as much, or more than she can really spare, is held up in contrast with the wealthy, who may give more in terms of the amount, but much less, if there donation is considered as a percentage of their net worth.

The woman gave all that she could. The others in the story gave much more in amount, but much less than they could afford.

The phrase, “my 2 cents worth” has its origins in this story. Often when a person would use that phrase, it is in the manner of false, or feigned humility, to disarm a person’s fears before you speak, as if to say, ”don’t worry about what I say, it won’t have much bearing or significance, it’s just my little 2 cents worth.”

But the story itself is not really about that. It does not put the woman down for giving so little. It honours that she gave of herself, and that she gave sacrificially, and took a risk in doing it. Her gift was valued over the others, because what she gave was precious to her.

It is a good gospel story to hear on this Sunday before November 11, a day when we are encouraged to remember the sacrifices, the risks, the willingness to give something precious, of many people who have served in times of conflict.

The story offers a reminder of the dignity and meaning of giving all that you can. The story also points to what intentions need to be behind the giving.

The kind of giving that we are honouring this week was likely done out of very human, complicated motives. We rarely, I notice, do things for just one clear and pure reason. The story offers a warning to examine our motives. The sacrifice does not have quite the same spiritual meaning or power if it is made out of pride, or the desire to self-promote, or to make another person look bad.

Why we do things, the real intent behind our actions deserves examination and reflection, first and second, and third thought, especially when a country is considering the decision to send people into harm’s way, to be involved in armed conflict.

If we enter a war out of pride, or greed, or in pursuit of revenge, these are less than noble reasons. We need to have really clear, and appropriate reasons to put lives at risk.

The widow only had a few coins, so each was precious. She had to think carefully about what to do with the rare and precious things.

The people who wield decision making power, and who exercise the authority to send people to war, are dealing with the precious commodity of human lives.

What fights are really worth entering? What is really worth risking lives over?

What is worth not just risking lives, but potentially taking the lives of people who find themselves on the other side of a conflict?

Religious thinkers have, for millennia, struggled in their thinking about how, and when it is a legitimate choice to engage in war.

In the Western World, much of the discussion of whether or not there can be a just war, is rooted in the thinking of Thomas Aquinas, a Roman Catholic philosopher and theologian who lived in Italy in the thirteenth century. He laid out three basic principles, which have been expanded upon, and added to over the centuries since. They are Proper Authority, Just Cause, and Right Intention.

Proper Authority Just war must be waged by a properly instituted authority such as the state.

This contains the implication that if a government decides to enter a war, but the people disagree, then the government is no longer legitimate, as it does not reflect the will of its people. As someone born in 1961, who grew into a thinking person during the American involvement in Viet Nam, a lot of my thinking about the legitimacy of war has been influenced by seeing a country tear itself apart on generational, class, and racial lines, over the justness of that war.

Just Cause War must occur for a good and just purpose rather than for self-gain or as an exercise of power, or to punish, or for revenge.

The proponents of going to war have to be clear about the “why”. The invasion of Iraq was based on the premise, later argued to be false, that the government of Saddam Hussein had stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction. That rationalization may have prevented actual dialogue and debate on other motivating factors.

Right Intention Peace must be a central motive even in the midst of violence.

Asking the Just War questions is an exercise of the freedom that has been defended by our military. It also is a necessary and important part of how we honour their sacrifices, to make sure that we do not ask that those sacrifices be made for anything less than just and honourable reasons.

The widow’s mite story reminds us that it is good and faithful to give sacrificially, when it is done for the right reasons.

As people of faith, we are called to be like the widow in the story, and give as we are able, not out of pride, but because we know it is the right thing to do. The widow in the story is held up as an example of the way we should live.

The widow in the story is the reason why I think the teacher who told their class that they should not bother doing the right things to respect the environment, has it all wrong. He sees each little effort as not enough, when compared to the greater problem.

But he misses the bigger picture, that we can see from our perspective as people of faith. We do what is right, because it is right to do. Not because we expect a result, or a pat on the back, but because living the right way matters for itself.

We make a difference in the world by offering our two cents worth. God is able to take your two cents, and yours, and yours, and yours, and mine, and something more comes of it. We become living examples to each other, of the kind of living, that is worth living. Amen

 

“What truly feeds us?”

A few years ago, I read a beautiful and very simple book called, Sleeping with Bread. It was written by Dennis and Sheila Linn and Dennis’ brother, Fr. Matthew Linn S.J. The title of the book came a following story they recount early in the book:

During the bombing raids of World War II, thousands of children were orphaned and left to starve. The fortunate ones were rescued and placed in refugee camps where they received food and good care. But, many of these children who had lost so much could not sleep at night. They feared waking up to find themselves once again homeless and without food. Nothing seemed to reassure them. Finally, someone hit upon the idea of giving each child a piece of bread to hold at bedtime. Holding their bread, these children could finally sleep in peace. All through the night the bread reminded them, “Today I ate and I will eat again tomorrow.”

 “Today I ate and I will eat again tomorrow.”

Please indulge me a moment, and say these words with me.

“Today I ate and I will eat again tomorrow.”

“Thanks be to God.”

I do give thanks, each day, that I can say these words. In the life I lead with my family, the only reason we might not have food in the house, is that we have neglected to stock the pantry, and I need to go shopping. This happens sometimes! But even in those times, it is never the case that there is no food in our house, perhaps just food we do not care to eat today.

In the house I grew up in, actually, in the series of houses I grew up in, it did, actually happen, on thankfully very few occasions, that there was nothing in the house to eat. My parents worked hard, and I do not remember a time when either of them were unemployed for any long period. But there were definitely times when they were under-employed, or when what they earned simply did not stretch far enough.

I don’t know how aware of this my younger siblings were, as we grew up. As the eldest, I have clear memories of looking through the cupboards while both my parents were out at work, searching for something to prepare, to feed my brother and sister for lunch.

This was not a daily occurrence, but it happened enough that I remember it. Enough to carve something in my soul, a wound that still opens sometimes when I am at the grocery store. I do a lot of the food shopping for my family, partly because it’s something I am good at, and partly because it brings me great joy to be able to provide for my loved ones.

I have noticed something the last few times I have taken one of our children with me to buy groceries, and the old wound has opened. The old feeling of pain, the old fear of not having food enough, these have largely been transformed into gratitude, because we do have enough. Sometimes I celebrate, and share the joy by telling which ever child is with me that they can choose anything they want in the store, anything to eat or drink, and I will buy it, with no questions asked, and no parental nutritional advice attached.

Sometimes I tell my kids how amazed and overwhelmed I am at being able to walk into a grocery store with the means to buy basically anything I might want. I do not, and cannot take this for granted. Not in a world in which 800 million people will go to bed hungry tonight.

“Today I ate and I will eat again tomorrow.”

The story about placing bread in the hands of traumatized children, so they could sleep through the night without fear stays with me.

That story gave the title to this book called “Sleeping with Bread”, which actually has very little to say about food. The book is about spiritual practices, that feed the soul, by helping a person pay attention to all that God has provided in their life.

God offers us so much. There is love, and beauty, and freedom, in our lives. There are opportunities to learn, and to heal, and to grow, and to be of service to others. There are opportunities to overcome fear, and to grieve well, and to mature. There are opportunities to pause, and breathe, and to look at the gift of our lives, and to do the wonderful spiritual work of giving from what we have, for the sake of the health and well-being of others. There are so many blessings.

It makes sense the book would begin with a story about bread, because when a person is physically hungry, and because of their life experience, are also truly despairing that any food is likely to come their way, it must be so hard to recognize the other blessings in life.

That little story can remind us that hunger is a spiritual issue. How would it change our openness to God, and to God’s blessings, if we lived like one of those hungry children, but there was no kind person to offer us the comfort of bread to hold?

When someone visits our home, if we truly want them to feel welcome, what do we do? We offer food or drink or both?

When we are beginning a new friendship, or starting a romance, what do we do? We invite the person to eat with us- we take them out for a bite to eat.

When Jesus wanted to encourage his friends to remember him, and to live with confidence in God’s continuing presence with them, what did he do? He broke bread and poured the cup of communion.

Food is such an essential part of being human, and being human with each other. We can use the gift of food to make the world a better place.

I want to show you a video about a place in Hamilton, called the 541 Eatery and Exchange. It has been developed and is being run by people connected to a church. They understand the spiritual power of food, and the importance of passing on blessings.

541 Eatery and Exchange

Here is a link to the actual restaurant:

the restaurant