Holy Cross Monastery, West Park, NY
Br. Adam McCoy, OHC
Sermon preached at the Requiem for Brother Douglas Brown, OHC
Wednesday 10 May 2006
A Resurrection Life
The essential message of the Easter proclamation has always been: Christ has won the victory. Death has been trampled down by death, and Christ now gloriously risen invites us to join Him in faith, and when we do, His victory will be ours as well. And so it will. The victory of Christ on the Cross has opened to all the world the possibility of resurrection, and our hope as committed Christians is that all will come within the reach of that saving embrace. On Easter morn we sing, "Jesus Christ is risen today, Alleluia. Our triumphant holy day, Alleluia." His rising makes our day holy.
That's our proclamation. But how do we get there? How can we be transformed by the resurrection?
There are so many Easter symbols of new life: The new fire, the flowering cross for the children, the festive food, the Easter eggs and chocolate in baskets, the bunnies and chicks and other soft and fragile offspring which remind us of the newness of spring and the renewal of life. When I was a boy, we used to get new shoes for Easter. The week or so before the great day, the stores would be full of parents and children trying on shoes, which we children would eagerly compare on the great day. The Black Church has an image for heaven: it's the place where all God's children got shoes. All God's children are loved and gifted and privileged. A child's Easter is a festival of sweet and tender newness: The victory of the Resurrection is given as a free gift, from adults to the children, from God to us, new life and love unbounded, uncomplicated, rejoicing love.
But gradually, the complications, the failures, the compromises, the shadows, of adult life gather round and penetrate our souls, till many believe that the Christian proclamation of the Resurrection victory is, in one of St. Paul's favorite words, foolishness: foolishness to Gentiles, to the thinking secular world, and worse, offensive to Jews, to serious religious people. So one righteous man died and was justified, the criticism goes. That gets you off the hook? Absurd. Where's the responsibility for the individual to engage in the struggle? Where's the need to build up social structures, to share with others in human solidarity?
An adult Easter needs to take into account the darkness of our lives. In the words of the great hymn which I heard for the first time on Good Friday, 1976, in St. James' Cathedral in Toronto, so beloved of Douglas, "My song is love unknown, my savior's love to me: Love to the loveless shown, that they might lovely be." We become lovely by being loved, and in turn loving others into loveliness.
The victory may have been won, but appropriating the fruits of victory is no easy task. Douglas Brown was a man who lived into these questions with deep sincerity, and whose life is a paradigm of the answer to the world's criticisms of the Christian faith. He placed himself in the path of the Resurrection, and that path took him to strange and wonderful places. This Chapel, the worship in it and the community which lives its life around it, became Douglas' life, and the strange and wonderful place where he struggled to appropriate the victory of the Resurrection.
Douglas was profoundly liturgical. He loved the ancient liturgies of the Church, the monastic offices, the chanting, the community's times of simple shared prayer, the psalms and canticles and antiphons, the public reading of scripture, the hymns of Anglican worship in all its glorious variety, the shared physical movement of the community in the daily dance of praise, the Peace at the Eucharist which he would share in a great bearlike embrace, the bread and the wine and the fellowship around the Table of the Lord. He found here his heart's center, and in the stability of the forms of monastic prayer I believe he found the strength to take up his cross and follow Jesus. Because the cross is the answer to the criticism of cheap grace: We are offered the Resurrection victory won by Jesus Christ if - "if" - we follow his life and death and make it ours.
Douglas embraced his cross. He allowed himself to die to parts of his life that could not give him life: shyness, insecurity, drinking. His life was a work in progress on all these fronts. I believe that the great gifts he shared with us were made possible by the Resurrection victories won on the crosses of his struggles.
When our Founder, Father Huntington, wrote about the houses of our Order, his first thought was about the spiritual struggle they make possible: "The ladder of the cross is planted firmly within the walls of a religious house and angels pass up and down that stairway. Our house is a house of God; let us strive to make it for ourselves the gate of heaven." Jacob's ladder is the ancient Jewish and Christian symbol of mystical contemplation, and at a deep level, the union with God symbolized by that ladder is the goal of every monk. I think the genius of the image is not so much in the ladder, however, as in the picture of the angels ascending and descending. Up and down, up and down, an interplay of the interior life, which is never simple, always dynamic.
This ladder has an ancient pedigree in monastic tradition. St. Benedict gives it 12 steps, and each one of them is an act of humility. The fear of God; leaving behind your own desires; submission to a human superior; obedience under difficult circumstances; the vulnerability to share your inner life with those who have power over you; contentment with whatever comes your way, especially abuse and deprivation; willingness to live by the community's norms; keeping silence when what you want to do is chatter; restraining the laughter of hysteria and self-preoccupation; when you do speak, speaking modestly, gently and briefly; and finally, realizing that we speak not only with our words, but in our actions. They too must be characterized by humility.
This is a big order. It is a sixth century 12 step program of formidable challenges. Ascending this dynamic ladder of humility requires more than one act of faith. It requires first of all that we are willing to give ourselves to God unreservedly, not looking to our own strengths and gifts but allowing God to use us as we are. "Just as I am, without one plea" says the old hymn, and that is the monk's daily song as we struggle up a rung or two of the great ladder. This first act of faith requires us to trust that we, our own essential being, and not what we can say or do or produce on our own, is worth God's trouble. A tall order for a shy, insecure alcoholic. But Douglas took it on.
A second act of faith climbing this ladder requires is that the community will be a faithful partner in the struggle. Submission, obedience, vulnerability, joining in the no doubt flawed life of people no better than you are; all this presupposes a community and leadership whose first focus is on the Cross and its victory, and not on its own power and gain. This is a struggle for all of us in monastic community. But what joy when we all honestly share its tasks: "How good and pleasant it is when brothers live together in unity." It is like the fine oil anointing Aaron, running down in seeming waste all the way from head to foot, signifying not the usefulness of the oil but the overflowing abundance of God's Spirit, not the daily tasks of earning a living and running things and being productive, but the hope of a superabundant overflow of generous, mutual love. A tall order for a man who could so easily analyze the realities of personal dynamics in himself and others, and whose call to leadership was complicated by his understanding of the inner dynamics of the exercise of power. But Douglas took it on.
A third act of faith that climbing the ladder of humility requires is that you only reach the top when you have hit the bottom. St. Benedict famously does not recommend humor to his monks, and if there were one thing I would like to change in the Rule, that's it. I think a joyful approach to life is always welcome, but then, we don't live in the sixth century, with the collapse of the Western Roman Empire a living memory, with the collapse of the successor state of the great and wise Theodoric the Ostrogoth on the horizon and chaos drawing closer and closer, surrounding them like the darkness of an enveloping night. But there is a delicious irony in the thought of a ladder of humility. If the Cross is a paradox, so is the ladder. Imagine: climbing higher and higher to become more and more humble. When you reach the top you are really at the bottom, so to speak. I cannot help but think that this is a parable about leadership as well as a profound observation of the course of a truly redeemed life. Perhaps that could be the monastic message to our leadership shortly to assemble in Columbus (editor's note: the triennal General Convention of the Episcopal Church in the USA). Here is where I think Douglas found his Resurrection victory. He hit bottom. He embraced another 12 step program, one I think not unrelated to Benedict's. He understood that when you reach the top of that program, you're still no better than the day you started. I think he made this his life's work: To see in himself and in others the daily work of grace, grace that picks you up after you've been thrown down, and keeps picking you up, day after day after day. Not an easy way to live your life, but Douglas took it on.
I loved Douglas' ways of being humble. The schlumpfy clothes, the sandals (didn't the man have a single pair of shoes?), the only-occasionally trimmed hair and beard, the muffled voice, which you had to strain to understand sometimes, low like an organ pipe. He didn't much like spending money. I would try to take him out to a nice restaurant near the seminary in Chelsea, and more often than not we would end up in a Chinese place just north of 23rd Street where it was a challenge to bring the bill above $20.00 a person. He loved being a monk, even perhaps playing a little in his ironic way with the outward symbols of humility.
Douglas was a holy person. Not a saint, I think, but holy. He let himself be transformed by grace and the Spirit. When his life hit bottom, he saw it as Christ's cross for himself. He saw the ladder of humility planted firmly in the midst of the monastery and embraced it. He trusted the Lord and he trusted the community, not without struggle, but with an admirable constancy.
And as a result, his life became a blessing. He was a rock of integrity to us in the monastic life. His preaching and retreats were beacons of reason and generosity and insight to thousands. His spiritual direction reached deep into the souls of hundreds and hundreds of earnest Christians. His wide sympathies, born of his own sufferings, opened channels of grace which are still flowing with the waters of life. His love of justice and compassion in public life led him to become a voice in the struggles of our day.
In my church we sing a song after the sermon, a song born in the Black Church:
Thank you Lord, for saving my soul.
Thank you Lord, for making me whole.
Thank you Lord, for giving to me
Thy great salvation so rich and free.
.
Thank you, Lord, for saving Douglas. Thank you for making him whole. Thank you for giving to him your great salvation so rich and free. Thank you, Lord, for giving Douglas to us all, for the great gifts his salvation has brought us. Thank you for the Easter life, for the free gifts of childhood, for the Ladder of the humility of the Cross, for the humility which lifts us up, and brings us, finally, to You.
Amen.
Wednesday, May 10, 2006
Sunday, April 23, 2006
BCP - Easter 2 B - 23 Apr 2006
Holy Cross Monastery, West Park, NY
Brother Scott Wesley Borden, OHC
BCP – Easter 2 B - Sunday 23 April 2006
I’m not sure Thomas gets a particularly fair deal in history. For two millennia he has been, more or less, the poster child for doubt: Doubting Thomas - an archetype that has entered the mainstream psyche. All generations will call Mary blessed... and apparently all generations will call Thomas doubting... I’m thinking Thomas needed a better public relations plan...
This is one of those stories that we’ve heard so many times we almost don’t hear it at all anymore. We just hear the echo of it. The echo in my mind is of a belligerent Thomas confronting Jesus - show me the wounds or I won’t believe its you. And of a gentle Jesus showing him the wounds and then almost taunting him - you see and believe, more blessed are those who believe without seeing...
That, of course, isn’t really the story. When Jesus arrives at the home where the disciples are huddled the first thing he does is show everyone his hands and his feet. But Thomas is not there. So when Thomas says he needs to see the wounds, he’s just saying he needs to see what everyone else has already seen. But he doesn’t say this to Jesus. He says it to the other disciples.
When Thomas next meets Jesus, Jesus invites him to look at, to touch, the wounds. Jesus knows Thomas’s heart and knows that Thomas is dying to get a peek. And it seems as though Jesus is as interested in showing the wounds as Thomas is in seeing them.
What strikes me is that maybe doubt is not the point of the story. Maybe this is not a story about overcoming doubt or about having faith. I’m beginning to understand it as being a story about the wounds. The story of Wounded Jesus rather than of Doubting Thomas...
Doubt is no big deal. I have doubts. We all have doubts. It would be a bigger story if Thomas had no doubts. After all, he knew for a fact that Jesus was dead. He should have had a hard time believing Jesus was walking among them again in the flesh. Who in their right mind wouldn’t want some proof.
But what strange proof Thomas seems to want. Show me the puncture wounds, the stab wounds. Its strangely intimate and pretty gory all at the same time. Surely there are other more beautiful and appealing ways that Thomas could have had his doubts allayed.
Jesus does nothing to provide any alternatives to coming face to face, finger to gash, with the wounds. Surely Jesus could have given another sign, or just talked to them, or changed some water into wine... Instead he seems to be saying here I am, look at my wounds, look at my hands and my side.
But as I say, I’m beginning to understand that the wounds may be the central part of this story.
What if Thomas had not been so honest? What if he had said “I have no doubts... I don’t need proof. I have faith.” What if he lied?
Those doubts would still have been there and they would have worked on Thomas. One way or the other he would have been looking for proof. What type of proof might he have sought?
What are some of the ways we seek to prove that we know God?
Some people see proof of God in disasters. A hurricane strikes the Gulf Coast and the City of New Orleans is devastated. Some see this as proof of the hand of God. Not any old God, but a really angry God; and isn’t it convenient that this God is angry at the same folks we’re angry at...
But this is not what Thomas sought. The hand of this angry God has no nail holes in it. This God knows no crucifixion. This angry and punishing God causes suffering. Jesus, with his wounds takes on the world’s suffering.
I’d love to be smug and say I don’t look for this proof - I don’t worship this angry God... but when bad things happen to people I don’t like, somewhere in the back of my mind I want to see the hand of God... How much more healthy to be like Thomas...
Some people see proof of God in unexpected rewards. I suspect many who have won the lottery have felt that they won not by chance alone, but by divine intervention. I know if I ever win the lottery I will thank God... and at some level I might suspect that God stuck a hand in that machine that picks the winning numbers... that the divine fix was in...
But again, this is not the God that Thomas was seeking to know. This God’s hands have no nail holes either. This is the hand of a God who rewards a few and forgets about the rest, rather than a God who died so that all might have abundant life.
Thomas is refreshingly direct about his doubts. He doesn’t require God to destroy his enemies or make him rich. He just needs to see the wounds. He needs to see the loving, sacrificing God who died for all... who wants to punish nobody... who extends grace to everybody.
Jesus does not seem too bothered by Thomas’s doubts. There is no condemnation is the way he talks to Thomas. He is very willing to show the wounds, to even have Thomas touch them. Everybody gets to look at the wounds. Do not doubt but believe. That’s what Jesus says.
Two things happen when Jesus does this. He relieves the disciples doubts and he fixes the wounds permanently in their memories. They can never remember Jesus without remembering that he was crucified... that he was wounded. Those nail holes and gashes will never be separated in their minds from Jesus.
That’s why I think this story is more about the wounds than the doubts. I think this story is Jesus way of saying to us, two millennia later, “remember I was crucified.” We can’t know Jesus without knowing the wounds. Jesus has managed to fix those nail holes and gashes in our minds as well.
The point in remembering the wounds is not sentimental. We are not meant to feel sorry for Jesus or for ourselves. There is not a trace of self-pity in Jesus in this story - or in any story for that matter.
The point in remembering the wounds in not to place blame; though clearly we Christians have been tempted, and have sometimes given into that temptation with horrible consequences, to blame somebody for wounding Jesus. The truth is we are all responsible for wounding Jesus. More importantly, Jesus’ wounds are for all of us. There is no guilt or blame in this story.
Remembering the wounds changes our entire relationship with God. Saint Paul said we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to some and foolishness to others. Our relationship to a crucified God can’t be rational and intellectual, because it doesn’t make sense. Our relationship to a crucified God can’t be based on demonstrations of great might, because a mighty God would not have been crucified.
When we want a God who will smite our enemies we only have to remember the nail holes in the hands. When we want a God who will make us rich, we only have bring the wounds to mind. When we think we know who God likes and who God hates, we have to consider the scourging. When we are indifferent to those who are starving, we have to call to mind the vinegar that was given to Jesus.
Jesus does not show the wounds to Thomas as an accusation. He makes no suggestion that Thomas or anyone else should feel bad because of his wounds.
The wounds remind us that Jesus is Lord and savior of the poor, the injured, the wounded, the sorrowful, the powerless, as well as everyone else. This is the God we worship. The wounds help us get on with living our baptized life. We can not know Jesus without knowing his wounds.
Brother Scott Wesley Borden, OHC
BCP – Easter 2 B - Sunday 23 April 2006
I’m not sure Thomas gets a particularly fair deal in history. For two millennia he has been, more or less, the poster child for doubt: Doubting Thomas - an archetype that has entered the mainstream psyche. All generations will call Mary blessed... and apparently all generations will call Thomas doubting... I’m thinking Thomas needed a better public relations plan...
This is one of those stories that we’ve heard so many times we almost don’t hear it at all anymore. We just hear the echo of it. The echo in my mind is of a belligerent Thomas confronting Jesus - show me the wounds or I won’t believe its you. And of a gentle Jesus showing him the wounds and then almost taunting him - you see and believe, more blessed are those who believe without seeing...
That, of course, isn’t really the story. When Jesus arrives at the home where the disciples are huddled the first thing he does is show everyone his hands and his feet. But Thomas is not there. So when Thomas says he needs to see the wounds, he’s just saying he needs to see what everyone else has already seen. But he doesn’t say this to Jesus. He says it to the other disciples.
When Thomas next meets Jesus, Jesus invites him to look at, to touch, the wounds. Jesus knows Thomas’s heart and knows that Thomas is dying to get a peek. And it seems as though Jesus is as interested in showing the wounds as Thomas is in seeing them.
What strikes me is that maybe doubt is not the point of the story. Maybe this is not a story about overcoming doubt or about having faith. I’m beginning to understand it as being a story about the wounds. The story of Wounded Jesus rather than of Doubting Thomas...
Doubt is no big deal. I have doubts. We all have doubts. It would be a bigger story if Thomas had no doubts. After all, he knew for a fact that Jesus was dead. He should have had a hard time believing Jesus was walking among them again in the flesh. Who in their right mind wouldn’t want some proof.
But what strange proof Thomas seems to want. Show me the puncture wounds, the stab wounds. Its strangely intimate and pretty gory all at the same time. Surely there are other more beautiful and appealing ways that Thomas could have had his doubts allayed.
Jesus does nothing to provide any alternatives to coming face to face, finger to gash, with the wounds. Surely Jesus could have given another sign, or just talked to them, or changed some water into wine... Instead he seems to be saying here I am, look at my wounds, look at my hands and my side.
But as I say, I’m beginning to understand that the wounds may be the central part of this story.
What if Thomas had not been so honest? What if he had said “I have no doubts... I don’t need proof. I have faith.” What if he lied?
Those doubts would still have been there and they would have worked on Thomas. One way or the other he would have been looking for proof. What type of proof might he have sought?
What are some of the ways we seek to prove that we know God?
Some people see proof of God in disasters. A hurricane strikes the Gulf Coast and the City of New Orleans is devastated. Some see this as proof of the hand of God. Not any old God, but a really angry God; and isn’t it convenient that this God is angry at the same folks we’re angry at...
But this is not what Thomas sought. The hand of this angry God has no nail holes in it. This God knows no crucifixion. This angry and punishing God causes suffering. Jesus, with his wounds takes on the world’s suffering.
I’d love to be smug and say I don’t look for this proof - I don’t worship this angry God... but when bad things happen to people I don’t like, somewhere in the back of my mind I want to see the hand of God... How much more healthy to be like Thomas...
Some people see proof of God in unexpected rewards. I suspect many who have won the lottery have felt that they won not by chance alone, but by divine intervention. I know if I ever win the lottery I will thank God... and at some level I might suspect that God stuck a hand in that machine that picks the winning numbers... that the divine fix was in...
But again, this is not the God that Thomas was seeking to know. This God’s hands have no nail holes either. This is the hand of a God who rewards a few and forgets about the rest, rather than a God who died so that all might have abundant life.
Thomas is refreshingly direct about his doubts. He doesn’t require God to destroy his enemies or make him rich. He just needs to see the wounds. He needs to see the loving, sacrificing God who died for all... who wants to punish nobody... who extends grace to everybody.
Jesus does not seem too bothered by Thomas’s doubts. There is no condemnation is the way he talks to Thomas. He is very willing to show the wounds, to even have Thomas touch them. Everybody gets to look at the wounds. Do not doubt but believe. That’s what Jesus says.
Two things happen when Jesus does this. He relieves the disciples doubts and he fixes the wounds permanently in their memories. They can never remember Jesus without remembering that he was crucified... that he was wounded. Those nail holes and gashes will never be separated in their minds from Jesus.
That’s why I think this story is more about the wounds than the doubts. I think this story is Jesus way of saying to us, two millennia later, “remember I was crucified.” We can’t know Jesus without knowing the wounds. Jesus has managed to fix those nail holes and gashes in our minds as well.
The point in remembering the wounds is not sentimental. We are not meant to feel sorry for Jesus or for ourselves. There is not a trace of self-pity in Jesus in this story - or in any story for that matter.
The point in remembering the wounds in not to place blame; though clearly we Christians have been tempted, and have sometimes given into that temptation with horrible consequences, to blame somebody for wounding Jesus. The truth is we are all responsible for wounding Jesus. More importantly, Jesus’ wounds are for all of us. There is no guilt or blame in this story.
Remembering the wounds changes our entire relationship with God. Saint Paul said we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to some and foolishness to others. Our relationship to a crucified God can’t be rational and intellectual, because it doesn’t make sense. Our relationship to a crucified God can’t be based on demonstrations of great might, because a mighty God would not have been crucified.
When we want a God who will smite our enemies we only have to remember the nail holes in the hands. When we want a God who will make us rich, we only have bring the wounds to mind. When we think we know who God likes and who God hates, we have to consider the scourging. When we are indifferent to those who are starving, we have to call to mind the vinegar that was given to Jesus.
Jesus does not show the wounds to Thomas as an accusation. He makes no suggestion that Thomas or anyone else should feel bad because of his wounds.
The wounds remind us that Jesus is Lord and savior of the poor, the injured, the wounded, the sorrowful, the powerless, as well as everyone else. This is the God we worship. The wounds help us get on with living our baptized life. We can not know Jesus without knowing his wounds.
Sunday, April 9, 2006
BCP - Good Friday C - 09 Apr 2006
Holy Cross Monastery, West Park, NY
Brother Scott Wesley Borden, OHC
BCP – Good Friday C - Friday 09 April 2006
The week between Palm Sunday and Easter Sunday is quite a roller coaster of experience. Last Sunday things were going pretty well. Jesus makes the triumphant trip into Jerusalem - he doesn't even have to walk, he gets a Donkey to ride on.
And Easter Sunday causes the joy of Palm Sunday to pale in comparison. For there simply is no greater wonder, no greater joy, no greater promise of hope, than the promise of Easter. We are the resurrection people. This coming Sunday is at the very core of our lives as followers of Christ.
But here we are somewhere between the two. And for Jesus and his followers things have gone terribly wrong. Between the pinnacles, here we are in the very deepest of valleys.
Of course we know something about today that the followers at the actual event didn't know. We know that this is not the end of the story. We know about Easter - about the resurrection. They might have suspected - Jesus dropped a few hints along the way. But they didn't know what was coming next.
All they could have known is that just when things were going really well, just when Jesus was starting to receive the kind of royal recognition he deserved, just when they were making this triumphant ride into Jerusalem, their world was shattered. Their dream was destroyed. Their vision was obliterated. What despair, what inconceivable sorrow they must have known. We can't really know that feeling because we know the story does not end.
And so we are pulled in two directions - either glossing over the events of today as something we have to get through in order to get to Easter; or delving into the utter horror of the events - the cruelty, the gore, the inhumanity, the ugliness.
I have to confess I'm far more drawn to the former - I'm far more interested in getting on to Easter; getting on with life. And I think Mel Gibson in his current film "The Passion" is far more drawn to the latter; the violence and the gore. And much as I would love to congratulate myself and criticize Mr. Gibson, I have come to believe that the Gospel message is not complete without both intentions.
Without a realization of the shocking horror, the abject inhumanity, the depravity of which we are capable, the Gospel is just a bit bland. If I'm not all that bad then my salvation is not all that big a deal. But the reality is that there is no evil in the world, no darkness, no horror, that also doesn't have at least a little place in my heart. When we, as the crowd shout "crucify" it is utterly appropriate for me. I have to face full on the fact that I could have been part of that crowd. Worse still, like Peter, I could have denied my Lord. It is even possible that I could, like Judas, have been the betrayer. And to be really honest, I have to admit that there are times in my life when I have - and will - deny Christ, betray Christ, do my part to crucify Christ. That darkness - the whipping, the blood, the treachery - is part of the Gospel story and it is part of me. But thank God it is not the whole story.
The part of the story that most appeals to me - the forgiveness of sin, the building of God's kingdom, the just and brilliant Jerusalem where the gates are open in every direction, where there is no night, where all is good - the Gospel hope, is all the more dazzling given the darkness where we start.
So what do we do to avoid being drawn to the pure prurience of dwelling too much on the horror of the crucifixion while at the same time not denying the wanton ugliness.
For me, the powerful way to experience the events of today's Gospel is to try to put myself in the position of the disciples. What if all I knew today is that Jesus is crucified, dead, and buried? What if Christ died today, April 9, 2004? What if I didn't yet know about the resurrection that we will celebrate on April 11, 2004? What would happen in my life? What would I be afraid of losing? What might I think I had gained?
If Christ died today and didn't rise, my comfortable life here in a Christian Monastery, would be in doubt. Our grand Episcopal liturgical celebrations with great choirs, thundering pipe organs, beautiful vestments, sweet smelling incense, would all be rather pointless. Some of the finest pieces of architecture, of music, of art, would be stripped of meaning and future artists would not be inspired - in the true sense of that word.
You may be noticing a problem with my list (and perhaps the list you have been making in your own mind along with me...)... These are all nice things, but they are not of the essence of living out my baptismal covenant. They are not essential to being a Christian.
Who would I pray to? And what would I pray for if Christ died today and did not rise? This is a more essential set of questions - but honestly I already struggle with these questions. In fact if Christ died today and did not rise, I might find it a bit of a relief to no longer have to struggle with this pair of questions.
Would my life have purpose, meaning, and direction? Well I know people who have no particular belief in God who's lives have purpose, meaning, and direction. So I suppose my life could go on and be quite fulfilling if Christ died today and did not rise again. And I suppose this is some of what the disciples were pondering in the aftermath of the crucifixion - how to get on with their lives.
But what could not survive, at least for me, is the vision of the Gospel, of God's kingdom - in this world or the next - of salvation. I don't know what kingdom I would be building if Christ died today and did not rise. For me this is the question that is almost too hard to ask. What vision would I have for this world if Christ died today and did not rise?
Christ doesn't die and stay dead. The gospel can not be killed - by us or by anyone.
Today in the midst of horror and hope, sadness and joy, despair and elation... today might be a good day to take stock of what it means to be loved by Jesus and to love and to follow Jesus - the essential qualities, not the nice qualities.
Perhaps in that reflection we will find parts of our vision of Christ and our vision of our relationship with Christ that need to die and not resurrect so that we are more fully alive for the resurrected Christ.
And we will find visions of Christ and our relationship with Christ that are so essential, so powerful, so life-giving, that we really can't think what we would do if Christ were not alive in our lives. It is in the facing of death that we become most aware of life.
Lord Jesus, you are so present with us that we can sometimes take that presence for granted. In these next few days help us to be more keenly aware of you and of what you are calling forth in our lives so that we may be your resurrection people and the builders of your kingdom. Amen.
Brother Scott Wesley Borden, OHC
BCP – Good Friday C - Friday 09 April 2006
The week between Palm Sunday and Easter Sunday is quite a roller coaster of experience. Last Sunday things were going pretty well. Jesus makes the triumphant trip into Jerusalem - he doesn't even have to walk, he gets a Donkey to ride on.
And Easter Sunday causes the joy of Palm Sunday to pale in comparison. For there simply is no greater wonder, no greater joy, no greater promise of hope, than the promise of Easter. We are the resurrection people. This coming Sunday is at the very core of our lives as followers of Christ.
But here we are somewhere between the two. And for Jesus and his followers things have gone terribly wrong. Between the pinnacles, here we are in the very deepest of valleys.
Of course we know something about today that the followers at the actual event didn't know. We know that this is not the end of the story. We know about Easter - about the resurrection. They might have suspected - Jesus dropped a few hints along the way. But they didn't know what was coming next.
All they could have known is that just when things were going really well, just when Jesus was starting to receive the kind of royal recognition he deserved, just when they were making this triumphant ride into Jerusalem, their world was shattered. Their dream was destroyed. Their vision was obliterated. What despair, what inconceivable sorrow they must have known. We can't really know that feeling because we know the story does not end.
And so we are pulled in two directions - either glossing over the events of today as something we have to get through in order to get to Easter; or delving into the utter horror of the events - the cruelty, the gore, the inhumanity, the ugliness.
I have to confess I'm far more drawn to the former - I'm far more interested in getting on to Easter; getting on with life. And I think Mel Gibson in his current film "The Passion" is far more drawn to the latter; the violence and the gore. And much as I would love to congratulate myself and criticize Mr. Gibson, I have come to believe that the Gospel message is not complete without both intentions.
Without a realization of the shocking horror, the abject inhumanity, the depravity of which we are capable, the Gospel is just a bit bland. If I'm not all that bad then my salvation is not all that big a deal. But the reality is that there is no evil in the world, no darkness, no horror, that also doesn't have at least a little place in my heart. When we, as the crowd shout "crucify" it is utterly appropriate for me. I have to face full on the fact that I could have been part of that crowd. Worse still, like Peter, I could have denied my Lord. It is even possible that I could, like Judas, have been the betrayer. And to be really honest, I have to admit that there are times in my life when I have - and will - deny Christ, betray Christ, do my part to crucify Christ. That darkness - the whipping, the blood, the treachery - is part of the Gospel story and it is part of me. But thank God it is not the whole story.
The part of the story that most appeals to me - the forgiveness of sin, the building of God's kingdom, the just and brilliant Jerusalem where the gates are open in every direction, where there is no night, where all is good - the Gospel hope, is all the more dazzling given the darkness where we start.
So what do we do to avoid being drawn to the pure prurience of dwelling too much on the horror of the crucifixion while at the same time not denying the wanton ugliness.
For me, the powerful way to experience the events of today's Gospel is to try to put myself in the position of the disciples. What if all I knew today is that Jesus is crucified, dead, and buried? What if Christ died today, April 9, 2004? What if I didn't yet know about the resurrection that we will celebrate on April 11, 2004? What would happen in my life? What would I be afraid of losing? What might I think I had gained?
If Christ died today and didn't rise, my comfortable life here in a Christian Monastery, would be in doubt. Our grand Episcopal liturgical celebrations with great choirs, thundering pipe organs, beautiful vestments, sweet smelling incense, would all be rather pointless. Some of the finest pieces of architecture, of music, of art, would be stripped of meaning and future artists would not be inspired - in the true sense of that word.
You may be noticing a problem with my list (and perhaps the list you have been making in your own mind along with me...)... These are all nice things, but they are not of the essence of living out my baptismal covenant. They are not essential to being a Christian.
Who would I pray to? And what would I pray for if Christ died today and did not rise? This is a more essential set of questions - but honestly I already struggle with these questions. In fact if Christ died today and did not rise, I might find it a bit of a relief to no longer have to struggle with this pair of questions.
Would my life have purpose, meaning, and direction? Well I know people who have no particular belief in God who's lives have purpose, meaning, and direction. So I suppose my life could go on and be quite fulfilling if Christ died today and did not rise again. And I suppose this is some of what the disciples were pondering in the aftermath of the crucifixion - how to get on with their lives.
But what could not survive, at least for me, is the vision of the Gospel, of God's kingdom - in this world or the next - of salvation. I don't know what kingdom I would be building if Christ died today and did not rise. For me this is the question that is almost too hard to ask. What vision would I have for this world if Christ died today and did not rise?
Christ doesn't die and stay dead. The gospel can not be killed - by us or by anyone.
Today in the midst of horror and hope, sadness and joy, despair and elation... today might be a good day to take stock of what it means to be loved by Jesus and to love and to follow Jesus - the essential qualities, not the nice qualities.
Perhaps in that reflection we will find parts of our vision of Christ and our vision of our relationship with Christ that need to die and not resurrect so that we are more fully alive for the resurrected Christ.
And we will find visions of Christ and our relationship with Christ that are so essential, so powerful, so life-giving, that we really can't think what we would do if Christ were not alive in our lives. It is in the facing of death that we become most aware of life.
Lord Jesus, you are so present with us that we can sometimes take that presence for granted. In these next few days help us to be more keenly aware of you and of what you are calling forth in our lives so that we may be your resurrection people and the builders of your kingdom. Amen.
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