Lent 2 A - 20 Mar 2011

Holy Cross Monastery, West Park, NY
Br. Charles Mizelle, n/OHC
Lent 2 A - March 20, 2011

Genesis 12:1-4a
Romans 4:1-5, 13-17
John 3:1-17

Love Wins!

In the name of God who calls us to celebration, who calls us to pursue community in our world, and who calls us to compassion in the midst of all human suffering. Amen!

When you grow up in a family of Baptist preachers you hear a lot of stories from the pulpit. One of the most memorable for me was hearing W. A. Criswell preach at a preaching conference at First Baptist Church, Jacksonville, FL., my hometown. Criswell was known as the prince the preachers. He had pastored First Baptist Church in Dallas, TX for over 50 years before retiring. And the occasion of hearing him preach in my home town of Jacksonville in February 1988 turned out to be his last sermon. The story is one of simple old time religion and two mischievous boys who got ahold of the preachers Bible and glued some of its pages together. The preacher got up to the pulpit, opened his Bible, and began reading from Genesis the story of Noah. “...and in those days Noah took unto himself a wife”, then turning what he thought was one page continued reading, “and she was 15 cubits broad, 35 cubits long, made out of gopher wood, and dopped on the inside with pitch”. The preacher then held up his Bible and said “my brothers and sisters I’ve never read that before in the Word of God but if that is what the Word of God says then I believe it!” And with those words a 3000 seat church auditorium, filled with Baptist preachers from all over the country, nearly exploded as they leaped to their feet, raised their hands, applauded and shouted AMEN! to the proclamation that if God’s Word says it, it’s true. For me, there was never more powerful of a moment of what it means to be a Bible-believing, God-said-it-I-believe-it-that-settles-it, kind of Christian. And this story has remained for me a powerful example of how reading scripture literally can get you into big trouble.

And in today’s Gospel we have another example of getting into trouble through a literal hearing of the God’s Word. A Pharisee, named Nicodemus, seeks out an audience with Jesus by coming to him under the cover of night. We don’t know a whole lot about Nicodemus but the text gives us enough clues to tell us he was truly a spiritual seeker. He broke ground with his fellow Pharisees to even risk having a private conversation with Jesus and this is most likely why he came in the darkness of night. Nicodemus is a man torn in two directions. He acknowledges the divine nature of Jesus but he is also unsettled by him. His fellow Pharisees have marked Jesus as trouble and a renegade. I wouldn’t say that Jesus’ reception of his night-time visitor was exactly pastoral. Nicodemus opens the conversation by complimenting Jesus: “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher come from God; for no one can do these signs that you do apart from the presence of God”. And Jesus responds with an off-the-wall comment completely out of left field: “I tell you know one can see the kingdom of God without being born from above”. Poor Nicodemus is knocked off center and bewildered. He exclaims “how can this be, how can you re-enter your mother’s womb and be reborn?” by which Jesus responds with a statement designed to completely destabilize Nicodemus: “no one can enter the kingdom of God without being born of water and spirit”.

This story is our source for the phrase born-again Christian. And it is also the source of the most beloved scripture (and probably the most well-known) in all of the Bible. John 3:16 “For God so loved the world that He gave His only son.” A story and a text so familiar to us we’ve lost the ability to hear its message in our hearts. Cynthia Bourgeault calls Jesus’ statement of needing to be reborn as the Christian equivalent of the famous Zen koan, “What is the sound of one hand clapping?”.

We are only in the third chapter of John but keep reading and you’ll see that Jesus took great joy in paradox and riddle and seemed to love leaving folks scratching their heads. Our modern theologians try to put this in context by framing Jesus as a Wisdom teacher. In many ways Jesus does fit the mold of a wisdom teacher but His intent goes much deeper. Jesus’ discourse on being born again, being born of water AND spirit, and being born from above was not just targeted at Nicodemus, nor the Pharisees, nor just the first century church. It’s target was the egoic mind and the human condition. It’s target is to throw us off kilter and destabilize our tight-knit, everything-fits-into-its-proper-place world. It’s target is to force us to go back and rethink our entire understanding of who God is and how we are in relationship with God.

Jesus could have just as easily said, “Nicodemus, if you want to enter God’s Kingdom you are going to have to go back to the very beginning, back to square one, and start all over. Where is the beginning? Well in the Biblical narrative it is in Genesis, the book of beginnings, where we go from creation and God saying “it is good” to the fall of Adam and Eve. It was in the fall where man’s sense of self became separated from God’s presence, where man’s identity with God was lost and where man started to develop his own programs for happiness, fulfillment and meaning. And ever since then God has been calling us back to return to our home in God, to our identity in God, to our place of rest in God, yes, even calling us to be born again.

The difficulty for us lies in the reality that this process of being born again is not an easy one. It is so much more than a formulaic prayer designed to give us an assurance of heaven and after-life management. It is a process of transformation and conversion, here and now. It is a process that will even involve pain at times. John of the Cross called this the dark night of the soul or the night of sense. Let’s take another look at John 3:16 “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but have eternal life.” Believes is the key word here because it is a word of consent. What Jesus is really saying to Nicodemus is “do you give your consent for God’s work and action to transform you?” Do you say “yes” to the dying of the false self? Do you say yes to changing the direction of your life and all of the programs you’ve created to find happiness. Do you say yes to allowing God to remove the obstacles in your life that block the flow of God’s grace?

As we move with Jesus through these 40 days of Lent we will soon journey with him in the Garden of Gethsemane. It is in this Garden where Jesus prays in complete brokenness, to the point of sweating drops of blood, asking God if this “cup” can be taken away from him. What is in this “cup” that is so agonizing to Jesus? God was asking Jesus to drink from a cup that no other human would have the capacity to swallow the dregs held in that cup. All of humanities brokenness, all of the pain, all of the evil, all of the holocaust, all of apartheid, all of the Gadhafi’s and Fred Phelp’s in this world, all of the devastating earthquakes and tsunamis, all of the suffering, all of the addictions, all those who have been abused, all of the injustice of all time was in that cup and Jesus said “I’ll drink it!” Why? Because God so loved the world. That is what Jesus is saying to the Nicodemus’s in each of us: Nicodemus you can’t really hear me right now, you don’t have the capacity to understand yet what I’m saying but Easter morning is coming where you’ll come out of your dark night and into the light of day AND LOVE WINS!

Love gets the final word. Love is the consummation of this birthing process. Yes there will be grief and wounds along the birthing canal but Nicodemus will you believe? Will you say yes? Will you give your consent to God’s process of transformation and conversion? Will you be reborn?

We have good assurance that Nicodemus did say yes to Jesus’ call to new birth. We do not hear from him anymore in this dialogue but I am sure he left with much to ponder. But we’re not done with Nicodemus. He reappears in the Gospel narrative and joins Joseph of Arimathea in taking Jesus’ body down from the cross. It was Nicodemus who brought 100 pounds of spices and the linen to wrap the body of his Lord for burial. Nicodemus is no longer afraid, he is no longer moving under the cover and darkness of night. He has come into the full light of day, working openly in front of his fellow Pharisees, doing the very thing that is certain to make them very angry. They were done with Jesus. But not Nicodemus.

For God so loved the world. And God so loves the Nicodemus who lives in all of us. And in the end God’s Love wins.

Epiphany 3A - January 23, 2011

Holy Cross Monastery, West Park, NY

Br. Charles Mizelle, n/OHC

RCL - Epiphany 3A - January 23, 2011

Isaiah 9:1-4

1 Corinthians 1:10-18

Matthew 4:12-23

Just An "Ordinary" Sermon

In the name of God who calls us to celebration, who calls us to pursue community in our world, and who calls us to compassion in the midst of all human suffering. Amen!

I’m finding Epiphany to be a rather complicated season. It’s about 3 Kings (who weren’t actual Kings) following a star (that astronomers have never identified and don’t think actually existed) showing up with some not-so-practical-gifts (I can hear Mary now saying I’ve got a newborn here, couldn’t you have brought diapers? what am I to do with frankincense?). But the complication with Epiphany is that it is layered and complex. Epiphany is also the celebration and observance of the Baptism of Christ AND it is when we commemorate Christ first miracle at the start of His earthly ministry: the wedding feast at Cana and the turning of water into wine. Three very significant events in salvation history, spanning 30 years of the life of Christ, three events that really don’t seem to have much of a link.

And today we name this Sunday the “Third Sunday of Epiphany”. But in reality what that really means is that we are in the third Sunday of Ordinary Time. Ordinary Time is that time of year when the Church is neither preparing for or celebrating Christmas or Easter. In Advent we prepare for Christmas and in Christmas we celebrate God-With-Us in the Incarnation. In Lent we prepare ourselves for Holy Week and going through it we emerge in Easter, celebrating the resurrection of Christ life in us. In a way we define Ordinary Time by what it is not: it is not Advent or Christmas or Lent or Easter. It is not therefore, the time when the Church is directly engaged with the preparations and celebrations of the birth, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

Now we protestants want to turn Epiphany into a season. We have Christmas-tide and we have Easter-tide. But the idea of Epiphany-tide just never caught on. Some theologians want to elevate Epiphany to a greater feast than Christmas. After all it is when we come to understand the Incarnation as an event of God coming for all humankind, Jew and Gentile alike. But the decorations are gone, the simplicity of our Chapel has returned and we wear green to mark that this really is just ordinary time.

In addition to defining Ordinary Time by what it is not we can just as well define it by what it is: it is the season that makes up over half of our Church year—up to 34 weeks each year. It is the time, just like Peter and Andrew in today’s Gospel reading from Matthew, where we are called to follow Jesus. It is the time we take the birth, death and resurrection of Christ and live fully into its reality in the here and now of our daily lives. It is a time of being formed in Christ. It is a time of formation and conversion. It is a time of living into God’s call on our lives. It is a time when we take our Incarnation and Resurrection celebrations and work to make a difference in the world. It is also a time of repentance.

Repentance—now there’s a word we really don’t like. Actually its a word we can’t stand. What an inconvenient time for Jesus to say to us “repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near”? Doesn’t Jesus know that the idea of repentance makes us uncomfortable and this is no place to begin a new work? Starting here is a sign of sure failure. Wouldn’t it had been a wiser choice for Christ to begin by telling us God is love? And how can we call this ordinary time if we are going to kick it off in such a non-affirming way by saying we need to repent?

It is no liturgical accident that after Christmas and Epiphany and before Lent and Easter that Jesus tells us to repent and follow Him. And for the next four plus weeks we will be hearing Jesus preach from The Mount where He will unpack for us just what the Christian life is and if we choose, how we will be converted by it. It is also no accident that it is in these weeks of Ordinary Time where we loose so many would-be followers of Christ. We’ve all seen it. The pews are packed out for Christmas and Easter services. It is a joyous time of celebration, we even get new outfits to mark the occasions. But after the feast are over and we are back to our green season of Ordinary Time, where are all those people?

When the reality of the Christian life sets in and we start talking about things like repentance, following Christ, changing the way we live, being formed to become more like Christ the crowds thin out. If you pay attention when you read through the Gospel narratives you’ll see the same dynamic at work during Christ earthly ministry. When the wine was flowing and people were getting fed and healed the throngs were magnificent. But when Christ started talking about changing your ways, doing justice, changing your heart, and putting your money where your faith is, those throngs became a small handful of people. Later we’ll even see that Peter, the very one called to follow Christ in today’s Gospel ends up denying Christ 3 times when it meant his own life would be put on the line.

When it comes to all things Christians are known for talking about the concept of sin and repentance is so highly charged it is like stepping into a field of land mines and IED’s. Quite frankly it’s toxic to bring up the idea of repentance in almost any context. In our post-modern, post-critical, even post-christian world we have gone out of our way to extricate repentance from both our religious practice and our moral culture. I have a friend who refuses to sing the great hymn Amazing Grace. She said to me in no uncertain words one day “I’m not a wretch saved by grace! I’m not a wretch at all and I won’t sing those words!”

It is absolutely true that the more than 100 references in scripture about repentance have been used to clobber those we dislike and to brow-beat those we judge. There is an entire genre of preaching that is about delivering the bad news before you give the good news. And in order to gain entrance into their church fold one must sufficiently prove an experiential encounter with Christ that is heavy laden with repentance. It all reminds me of the adage I overheard a Brother saying “We haven’t seen a good smiting in quite some time now”.

Jesus was completely sensitive to this. And when He says “repent” He is neither brow-beating us nor judging us. We are just so hyper-reactive to hearing the word repentance that it stops us from being able to hear the rest of His statement: “for the kingdom of heaven has come near”. Jesus is saying I have something better, I have that which will last, I can give you true peace and joy and fulfillment, real happiness. Jesus is saying you don’t have to die to go to heaven. It is near right now. And you can have it in this life if you want it. But Christ is actually saying something even deeper. He is answering the eternal question of what is real, what is it all about, where can we find truth. And what is His answer. Turn around and enter God’s Kingdom.

The word for repent in Greek is metanoia and it means to think differently, to turn around, to change the direction in which you are going. Fr. Thomas Keating says that what Jesus is really doing is inviting us to change the direction in which we are looking for our happiness. From the moment we are born our psyche is hard wired to seek fulfillment of our needs and desires. Security, affection and control dominate our endless search for fulfillment. The predicament of the human condition is that it doesn’t take very long for us to make a mess of our lives in how we go about seeking security, affection and control. As soon as we think we are secure circumstances change and we become very insecure. The affection and love we long for is never completely satisfied. And for being in control...forget it...no matter how much you think you are in control life’s taskmaster will be there to show you’re not in control and you never were in control.

Those who seek power to gain security, affection and control only find they never have enough power. Those who seek wealth to gain security, affection and control live in fear of never having enough. Those who claw their way to the top of the corporate ladder are never satisfied with the view from the top. Framing the act of repentance as letting go of our endless need for more, doing an about face in what we hold important, changing the direction in how we look for happiness and fulfillment is much more than a new age recast of old fashioned religion.

Repentance is answering Christ’s call to conversion that you don’t need the latest gadget but that the local food pantry needs your time and resources. Repentance is answering Christ’s call to conversion that instead of clawing your way up the corporate ladder you’ll claw your way down to the local prison and befriend someone who has never known what it means to have someone else truly care about them. Repentance is learning you can live on less so you can help relieve the suffering of those who go without.

Last week I heard Christ call to repentance in an unexpected moment. As an introduction for a presenter/speaker at the Trinity Institute Theological Conference a short video was shown. The video profiled a community in Nigeria that quite frankly looked poorer than poor. No paved roads, shabby buildings, classrooms poorly outfitted, poorly lit. Plain tattered clothes and cars so old I would have a hard time trusting them. But as poor as they were in “things” and commodities they were rich in joy, love, happiness. They weren’t just smiling for the camera but their joy they knew deep within simply shone through. When I noted this juxtaposition between the wealth of America and the seeming lack of Nigeria another person correctly noted that they are sad for us. They are sad that we have so much yet lack real happiness and fulfillment. They are sad for us over our complicated, frantic and unsatisfied lives. Little did I know that a simple film, profiling a village in Nigeria would be Christ whisper to me for repentance in simplicity and a return to what is really important.

I grew up in a faith tradition that preached a lot on repentance and always offered an altar call as an opportunity for one to change their ways. My step-father, a very prominent Baptist preacher, loved to goad me about my “strange Episcopal ways”. One day the goading was why we Episcopalians never have an altar call. I must have tired of the teasing because after a moment of silence I just looked at him and said “you know, we Episcopalians have more altar calls than the Baptist”. “No you don’t” he replied. I said “yes we do!”.

Then I explained to him that every time we come together to celebrate the Eucharist we have an altar call. It is a time were we make a decision to follow Christ. We physically walk in an new direction. It is an act of metanoia, of turning around and going in a new direction. The very act of partaking of the Body and Blood of Christ is an act of opening ourselves to the Holy Spirit and entering a process of conversion.

That was the last time he teased me about altar calls. But you know its true that in a few moments when we gather around this altar behind me we will be yielding the Christ’s call to turn and go in a new direction for our happiness and fulfillment. It is even an act of turning over our needs of security, affection and control and letting it go. It is our acknowledgement that this Sunday is no ordinary time at all.

Amen

The Feast of the Exultation of the Holy Cross

The Crucifix Cross in the Monastic Enclosure Gardens

Holy Cross Monastery, West Park, NY

Br. Charles Mizelle, n/OHC

Feast of the Exultation of the Holy Cross, September 14, 2010

Isaiah 45:21-25
Galatians 6:14-18
John 12:31-36a

The Old Rugged Cross of Hollywood

In the name of God who calls us to celebration, who calls us to pursue community in our world, and who calls us to compassion in the midst of all human suffering. Amen!

Los Angeles is famous for its freeway corridors and one of its most infamous is the Cahuenga Pass—the Cahuenga Pass is a 2 mile stretch slicing through the Hollywood Hills connecting the city of Los Angeles with the San Fernando Valley. Traffic moves so slowly through this freeway link you’ll have time to take in some of LA’s most notable landmarks: Universal Studio’s and the City Walk theme park, the Hollywood Bowl, the John Anson Ford amphitheater, and then that celebrity hotspot that will always be near and dear to my own heart, “Charles For Total Image”, the first day spa I ever owned. (It was the 80’s.)

But one of the most notable Hollywood landmarks in Cahuenga Pass is a large white cross, up on a hill, (a hill that could even mimic Golgatha), illuminated at night, impossible for drivers to miss regardless of which direction they are driving, standing silent witness and watching over all of Hollywood.

I lived in LA for over 22 years and I most likely drove by this cross a thousand times. Occasionally I wondered who put there, who cares for it, and why hasn’t some anti-christian, separation-of-church-and-state-fanatic, complained. But I never once heard about this cross in the news. It just endured. Like a patron saint for freeway drivers the cross was always there looking over our frantic lives. And if my recent Google Search was accurate the old rugged cross of Cahuenga Pass is still standing and watching over Hollywood.

Now a bit more than 100 miles outside of Los Angeles stands another cross. This one stands in the middle of absolutely nowhere. It is maybe seen by a handful a people a year. But chances are YOU have heard of this cross. It stands on a small patch of land in the Mojave Desert as a war memorial cross. It has not faired nearly as well as the Hollywood Cross. In 2001 a self-identified Roman Catholic brought a law suit claiming the presence of the cross on a government owned preserve violated the First Amendment. The ACLU got involved and quickly two opposing sides formed: one for religious freedom and liberty, another to remove all images of religion from public places. The saga of the Mojave Desert War Memorial Cross has been covered by national media, the subject of political talking heads, with its destiny ending up at the Supreme Court. Even some last minute wrangling to change ownership of the land where the cross stood met with defeat.

When it comes to symbols of the Christian faith, there is no more powerful of a symbol than the cross. The mere mention of a cross can insight devotion, reverence, hope, even awe, but for others it is despised, maligned, ridiculed, discounted, denied, and yes, hated. For Christians the cross holds an incredible special place in their faith. But I am not so sure the cross belongs to just the Christian community. As symbol the cross is complex, multi-layered, multi-dimensional, and is so much bigger than we can understand.

One symbol of the cross I find most fascinating is the cross as jewelry. Throughout my professional career I had a hobby of noticing how frequently a cross was worn as jewelry. Just about every woman I knew, and many men, have a cross in their jewelry collection. Rarely was it worn as symbol of faith. Maybe it was grandmothers cross, a family heirloom, a gift from a significant other, or just a treasured piece of jewelry from a favorite designer. Crosses are “in” when it comes to jewelry. Part of my hobby in observing this cultural phenomenon is knowing that the crucifixion of Christ on a cross happened in a very small window of time. If Christ had lived only a few decades earlier or later, most likely he would not have been put to death by crucifixion on a cross. Most likely he would had been stoned. The gospels give us several accounts of Jesus slipping through the hands of an angry mob who were ready to stone him to death. Shortly after his death, resurrection and ascension we have the account of Stephen being stoned to death in the book of Acts. So here’s my question: If Jesus had been stoned instead of hung on a cross, would we all want to wear little rocks around our neck? (Maybe I should leave that as a rhetorical question.)

Today is an important Feast Day for us. After all our name is the Order of the Holy Cross. And we celebrate this feast at Holy Cross Monastery. And as Christians the sacrificial act of Christ giving his life on a cross is the center point of our faith. So why am I fascinated with jewelry crosses worn by millions more as a cultural symbol than a symbol of faith and religion? Because it goes to the point that the cross is embedded in our psychic DNA. And when I say “our psychic DNA” I do not mean us as Christians, but us as human beings. The cross is a symbol that reaches beyond the walls of churches and cathedrals into the wider culture. It is a symbol that has permeated all of humankind, both Christian believer and non-believer. When the Red Cross arrives to give aid in an emergency they will be a welcome sight to both Christian and non-Christian. I never heard of anyone refusing to fly SwissAir airlines because their logo is a big white cross. Even the Persian rug in my cell, woven by nomadic peoples of Iran, has a plethora of crosses in it. So many that the cross is actually a dominant design theme of the rug. Think about it--there is no corner of the globe, there is no 3rd or 4th world country you can escape to where the symbol of the cross is not known. Crawl into a cave to see the hieroglyphics of long ago or look at the graffiti of today and you’ll find the symbol of the cross. As symbol the cross is inescapable. It is as if God has impregnated the cross for all time and for all people. Why?

The cross is the great symbol of the Christian tradition but it is also a great symbol of the human experience. Wether you encounter the cross over a freeway or in a desert it says so many things to each of us at the same time it is hard to unpack its full meaning. To a Christian the cross speaks of salvation, redemption, forgiveness, transformation, even union with God. But to all of humankind it speaks to our interconnectedness, our oneness with all. It speaks to our brokenness, to the dilemma of the human condition, and shows the way to hope. Like it or not, accept it on not, the cross is constantly calling to all of humankind to return to our home in God.

Today’s Gospel text from John records Jesus as saying “when I am lifted up from the earth, I will draw all people to myself”. Biblical scholars have always seen this as a direct reference to Moses and the young Hebrew nation lifting a serpent on a cross to bring protection and healing during their 40 years of roaming the Sinai Desert. This pre-Babylonian symbol remains to this day as the symbol (logo) of the American Medical Association. There is another symbol of the cross the Hebrews gave us during their 40 years of being lost in the desert. God instructed them to build a tabernacle, a place of worship, a place to encounter God’s direct presence. Many engineers have tried to replicate the design of the wilderness tabernacle according to the blueprint that God gave to Moses and is recorded in the Book of Exodus. If you have ever launched on a read-through-the-Bible-campaign in a year it is these laborious chapters of Exodus, seemingly filled with only minutia where many give up on trying to read through the Bible. But there is a beautiful gem there that mostly goes unnoticed. God gave explicit instructions as to how the 12 tribes of Israel were to set up their camps around the tabernacle. Three tribes to the north, 3 tribes to the south. Three tribes to the west and 3 to the east. From God’s “arial” point of view this would form the shape of a perfect cross moving through the wilderness. And in the cross section of this human cross was where God tabernacled with His people. The story of the Exodus and the people of Israel wandering through the wilderness is the most frequently repeated story in scripture. And I see it as the first parable of scripture.

Later, the temples built by both David and Solomon followed this design element. In fact, it is a design element that has endured to this day. When you enter a Cathedral, an arial view will reveal it is shaped like a cross with the nave forming the vertical bar, the transept forming the horizontal. The intersection of the two is where you will find the altar, where God wants to tabernacle with us.

Not even a Dan Brown novel could reveal to us all the places the symbol of the cross appears throughout the world. Like the seemingly unnoticed, unbothered, old-rugged cross of Hollywood the cross is always before us. Sometimes it is obvious, sometimes it is hidden. In every land, every culture, every demographic, every time zone and every climate zone the cross of Jesus is there calling us back to God. Calling us to the intersection of life where God waits tabernacle with you and I.

Amen!

RCL - Annunciation - 25 Mar 2010

Holy Cross Monastery, West Park, NY
Br. Charles Mizelle, n/OHC
RCL - Annunciation - Thursday 25 March 2010


Isaiah 7:10-14
Hebrews 10:4-10
Luke 1:26-38

Favored One

In our pantry we have a “gadget” called Holy Toast. It looks more like a cookie cutter. The idea is you press the mold into a piece of bread and as you toast it an image of Mary will appear. Well one day my curiosity got the better of me and I tried it. I pressed the mold into a slice of bread, put it into the toaster and waited. When my toast popped up no image of Mary had emerged. I shrugged my shoulders and thought...Mary does not make appearances to a Baptist.

Left behind in our pantry by an impish guest. Unconvincingly tested by an ex-Baptist monk...

When you grow up Southern Baptist you learn quickly that Mary is just a “B” actress in God’s theater. A bit player with only a small part to play. Jesus is what the show is all about and the only central character. All others simply have a small minority role.

When I was about 12 or 13 years old a Catholic family moved into our Baptist neighborhood. They went to church on Saturday afternoons, went to the beach on Sundays, had a house full of kids. They had many strange behaviors that made them all very suspect in our Baptist world. One of their sons was the same age as I and we became friends. I’ll never forget my Grandmothers reaction when she learned I had gone to church with him on a Saturday afternoon. I thought I would get extra credit for the additional time in church but she scolded “You didn’t pray to Mary did you? We don’t pray to Mary! We pray to Jesus!” The message was very clear--I had truly done something wrong by just being in a Catholic church.

So I must begin this morning by noting God’s great sense of humor in that the first sermon I am preaching in my monastic journey is about Mary. To this day, in fact as recently as last week, I still get questions of concern from my family about just where Mary fits into my faith, my worship, and my devotion. So I’ve learned to give a very evangelical response. In the God said it, I believe it, and that settles it philosophy of my upbringing I just say “God’s Word says Mary is the favored one and that settles it for me”.

Today is known as the Annunciation, the announcement of a divine birth by the archangel Gabriel. Gabriel is quite busy in this opening chapter to Luke’s gospel. He makes two visits to announce two different births; that of John the Baptist and that of Jesus. The stories hold both remarkable similarities and remarkable differences. But aren’t we in the middle of Lent? Isn’t Holy Week and our commemoration of Christ Passion quickly approaching? Shouldn’t the announcement of Christ’ birth come at the beginning of Advent? Here lies another conundrum for one who grew up Baptist and has embraced Liturgy late in his Christian formation. A little math will help us. Christ birth is celebrated on December 25th. Backing up 9 months from there we land squarely on March 25th.

I have always heard the Annunciation as a story about Jesus’ divine incarnation. To me it had always been a story about the miracle of a virgin birth, about God becoming man, and about God coming to live on earth among us. Today, I am no longer convinced that was Luke’s only agenda. The story Luke tells is very much a family story. It is a story of family scandal.

It is the story of a teenage girl, betrothed to be married. Not engaged in our sense of romantic love and weddings. Betrothal was a family arrangement where two families unite together. For Mary to turn up pregnant before the marriage takes place would be devastating news to both patriarchal families. It would result in great shame, humiliation and dishonor. This is the backdrop for Gabriel’s news for Mary.

This is the backdrop when Gabriel speaks to Mary saying “Greetings, favored one! The Lord is with you.” At that moment Mary had none of the status symbols required of her society to deem her a “favored one”. She had neither husband nor child to validate her existence. She was among the powerless people of her society. She was young in a world that values age. She was female in a world ruled by men. She was poor in a stratified economy. To say that Mary was perplexed by Gabriel’s greeting is one of the greatest understatements of all time. Not to mention that Mary also had to wrap her mind around the fact she was holding a conversation with an Angel.

Add it all up and you’ll see the facts conspire against Mary being a favored one.

Today, many assume and some erroneously preach that those who God favors will be blessed with social standing, wealth and good health. To be favored by God is equated with the good life. Yet Mary, God’s favored one, was blessed with having a child out of wedlock. And next week we will follow that child as he is executed as a criminal. Status, comfort and prosperity have never been the trademarks of God’s blessing. This is a family story of scandal. The story has become so familiar to us that is familiarity masks the scandal.

If we read further in this first chapter of Luke we would see that Mary immediately goes to visit her Aunt, Elizabeth, who is six months pregnant with John the Baptist. Again our familiarity with the story masks the scandal. Is this the story of a divine encounter between two mothers-to-be carrying infants with a divine mission? Or is this the story of a family sending a young teenage girl off to stay with a distant relative because of an untimely pregnancy? Or is it a story about both?

Gabriel had a window into Mary’s mind and heart which is why he called her “favored one”. Under normal circumstances Gabriel’s announcement would have been devastating news. In calmness and composure Mary only asks one simple question; “How can this be, since I am a virgin?”. I wish we had time to set the annunciation story of John the Baptist, which occurs at the beginning of this chapter, side by side with Gabriel’s annunciation to Mary.

In a similar story Zechariah questions how Elizabeth, his wife, will be able to conceive a child. But Zechariah asks a very different question than that of Mary’s. He questions “How will I know that this is so?”. Both Zechariah and Mary want to know how God will overcome the obvious obstacles of the physical body; one of old age, another of virginity. But Zechariah’s question goes further. He asks for proof. He asks for a sign. He asks in disbelief. And the archangel Gabriel was not amused. Zechariah’s disbelief left him mute and unable to speak until after John’s birth.

We see into the mind and heart of Mary from her response to Gabriel’s reply to her. “Then Mary said, ‘Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word.’” If Mary embodies a family scandal she also exemplifies the obedience that should follow from blessing. In the Rule of Benedict, our model for obedience in the monastic life, it states that obedience itself is a blessing.

As I have prayed over these texts the past several weeks this is the passage that kept surfacing for me. “Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word.” Mary’s “yes” is unequivocal. It is an answer of profound faith. It is a statement of consent and of giving oneself fully to God. It is no-holds-barred obedience and the setting aside of her own fears and giving herself freely to God’s wishes. Her response was immediate. And in doing so Mary models for us detachment. She models for us the ultimate “letting go” of her concerns for herself and trusting God for the outcome.

The conundrum of this Advent story falling at the end of Lent is solved in seeing that the glory of Christmas and the glory of Easter are really about ordinary people saying “yes” to God. They are stories of what happens when we give our unequivocal consent. In doing so we are the ones scandalized as we allow God to lay full claim to our lives.

In Christ Name, Amen.