Proper 23 A - Oct 12, 2014

Holy Cross Monastery, West Park, NY
Br. Roy Parker, OHC
Proper 23 A, Sunday, October 12, 2014

Isaiah 25:1-9
Philippians 4:1-9
Matthew 22:1-14

Scene from the movie "Babette's Feast"

This first part comes from my days in Berkeley, CA during the 1970s and 80s.

As some will recall, Holy Cross brothers, at the invitation of the Dean, Fred Borsch, once occupied a suite of rooms in Parsons Hall on the campus of the Church Divinity School of the Pacific in the 1970s and 80s where we participated in the life of the student body, offering spiritual mentoring, monastic witness, and occasional special events such as Sunday waffle suppers for Parsons residents during intersemesters. CDSP, as itʼs called, is a member of the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley, CA.

When students would remark the sparse attendance at the 10 a.m. Eucharist in All Saintsʼ Chapel, the generallyexpressed opinion was that the dayʼs real liturgy was actually lunch, when people felt drawn together in a different sort of way, the meal itself a vehicle for the satisfaction of hungers which had little to do with physical hunger, a reminder of the motto once displayed on the refectorian readerʼs desk of this monastery - Cibor Melior Cibor (Food Better Than Food).

In those days closer to Vatican II when ecumenism was relatively alive and well, students at the Jesuit School of Theology a couple of blocks away enjoyed teaming up with those at the Church Divinity School to plan services which integrated the eucharistic rite into a sit-down meal in such a way that the entire event was a seamless whole.

Those who took these models into their field work parishes were astonished at the enthusiasm with which they were greeted . . . as if ancient hungers were satisfied in ways the traditional rites could not provide. Underlying this cooperative Jesuit and Episcopalian enterprise was the principle taught at the Jesuit School of Theology that the eucharist was crippled by wrenching the bread and wine out of the context of a meal.

A meal: Why were meals and their table fellowship so central to Jesusʼ ministry? Because sharing a meal has always been one of the most effective means of achieving and celebrating reconciliation, and of bonding in general, and one of the great symbols for well-being. Hence the disturbance which this practice exerted on Jesusʼ opponents who were always asking the disciples, Why does your teacher eat and drink with all that despicable riff raff? Well, because those on the straight and narrow donʼt need a physician, but those who are sick, and their healing occurs in the reconciliation and bonding achieved in sharing a meal by which they are reconciled and bonded to God, incorporated into Godʼs very self.

It goes back to the vision of Isaiah that on the holy mountain God will make a feast of rich food for all peoples, rich meats served with oil, marrow extracted from bones, and of course choice wine - a menu calculated to alarm the health-conscious today but in those days standard fare for a banquet. Furthermore, Isaiah proclaims that this banquet accomplishes the defeat of death, the wiping away of tears, the eradication of the disgrace of Godʼs people, in short - the salvation which we await.

God lays on a rich banquet, above all possibilities, as the instrument par excellence for the defeat of death, the wiping away of tears, the reconciliation of enemies, and the bestowal of great well-being.

It should be no surprise, therefore, that the host of the wedding banquet in Matthew would be, to say the least, ticked off by the disdain of those invited. Folks, this is not a McDonaldʼs Happy Meal.

Do you remember the popularity of the film “Babetteʼs Feast” when it was current in theaters some years ago? This beautifully-made Danish film was so appealing then, and remains so, because it depicts the divine chemistry by which a banquet accomplishes everything described about the Supper of the Lamb, why the wretched of the earth were so drawn to Jesusʼ table fellowship.

At a certain point in the feast, General Loewenhieln, a distinguished guest, is so transformed by the magic of the occasion that he must rise to make this rhapsodic utterance, a kind of impromptu eucharistic prayer: 

Mercy and truth, my friends, have met together. Righteousness and bliss shall kiss one another. Humanity, my friends, is frail and foolish. We have all of us been told that grace is to be found in the universe. But in our human foolishness and shortsightedness we imagine divine grace to be finite. For this reason we tremble before making our choice in life, and after having made it, again tremble in fear of having chosen wrong. But the moment comes when our eyes are opened, and we see and realize that grace is infinite. Grace, my friends, demands nothing from us but that we shall await it with confidence and acknowledge it in gratitude. Grace, sisters and brothers, makes no conditions and singles out none of us in particular; grace takes us all to its bosom and proclaims general amnesty. See! that which we have chosen is given us, and that which we have refused is, also and at the same time, granted us. Aye, that which we have rejected is poured upon us abundantly. For mercy and truth have met together, and righteousness and bliss have kissed one another.

Mindful that a eucharistic prayer is a kind of extended toast to God, one can see that the unconditional grace of Jesus embodied in Babetteʼs Feast, as in any such intentional meal, inevitably expresses itself in a kind of eucharistic prayer such as that offered by the General.

Letʼs imagine ourselves at such a supper on a given Saturday night. Of what happened in the evening nothing definite can be stated. None of us later on will have any clear remembrance of it. We only know that the room had been filled with heavenly light, as if a number of small halos had blended into one glorious radiance. Taciturn old people received the gift of tongues; ears that for years had been almost deaf were opened to it. Time itself had merged into eternity. 

Long after midnight the windows of the house shone like gold, and golden song flowed out into the night air. It never occurred to any of us that we might have been exalted by our own merit. We realized that infinite grace had been allotted to us and we did not even wonder at the fact, for it had been but the fulfillment of an ever-present hope. The vain illusions of this earth had dissolved before our eyes like smoke, and we had seen the universe as it really is. We had been given one hour of the millennium.

Dedication - Oct 4, 2014

Holy Cross Monastery, West Park, NY
Br. Scott Borden, OHC
Feast of the Dedication of our monastery church, October 4, 2014

The chancel in the St Augustine church at Holy Cross Monastery

Today we celebrate the dedication of this church – and I could do no better than to echo Jacob quoted in Genesis... “how awesome is this place. It is none other than the house of God and gate of heaven.”

Of course, back when this church was dedicated that sentence would have read a little differently – how awful is this place... which conjures somewhat different images of the place... and even before it was awesome or awful, the King James translation used the word “dreadful”. How dreadful is this place... At least to my modern ears, that takes all the celebration right back out of the day.

In fact, through the awesome and awful miracle of Google, I can tell you that this place is awesome, fearful, terrifying, sacred, terrible, holy, and so on and so forth. Translators clearly struggle to find just the right word. How awesome is this place.

The problem is not with the translators... the problem is that a single word is not enough. All of these various words are good and bring particular insight in describing this place – it is awesome and dreadful and terrible and holy. For it is the house of God – who is beyond description and comprehension.

For nearly 100 years people, specifically monkish sorts of people, have prayed in this awful place. Just because I think in terms of numbers, I had to do some calculations and I discovered that, over that time, perhaps 120 thousand hours of corporate prayer and worship have been offered. That is something like 15 solid years of prayer... how sacred is this place.

But when it comes to being the house of God, the gate of heaven... well I think we then have to have Jesus in mind – in today's Gospel reading he is quite angry that God's house is turned into a den of thieves. We could comfort ourselves by reminding ourselves that he has in mind the folks nestled around the temple in Jerusalem – so that lets us off the hook... except it doesn't. If we think God is confined to just the inside of this house, we are wrong. God wanders the neighborhood and the entire planet for that matter. Can we be proud of how the world is functioning today? Do we live in a land where peace and justice flow like a mighty river to cover the entire earth? How dreadful is this place.

Some times I wonder at Jesus walking among us and visiting the great and marvelous edifices we have built more or less just for him... the cathedrals and shrines and sprawling mega-churches, and yes, monasteries with their chapels... And I hear Jesus asking “what has this got to do with me?” Worse still, there is the history we must not forget of exclusion – when in this country, for example, some churches were built with special galleries so that black people could be kept away from the white people... in Jesus name. Or when, to get a little closer to home, in this very church a gallery was built at the back so that women could be kept away from men... in Jesus name. How terrible is this place...

When this church was built it had many steps... you could not enter without facing a barrage of challenges... those who had mobility challenges would have struggled mightily, or just stayed away. But now, at fairly great expense, we are barrier free so that all may enter. How accessible is this place... (no, I didn't find that word in any known translation, but I think it belongs).

This monastery church or “minster” if you will – for that is just a corruption of monastery – is certainly worthy of honor and praise. It is a very prayerful place. But it is not the stones and timber and parging and paint that make it holy. It isn't the various crosses and icons. It isn't even the altar standing at the east. This place is holy because this is where we gather to praise God.

Two thousand years ago in Bethlehem a group of shepherds gathered to make a stable holy by greeting Jesus, praising God in heaven, and praying for peace on earth. That is what makes this place awesome and awful, dreadful and sacred, frightening and accessible. Here we do just what those shepherds did – nothing more and nothing less. Here we meet Jesus. Here we pray glory to God in the highest. And having met Jesus – having become one flesh with Jesus in the mystery of the Eucharist – we go forth from this holy place to make peace on earth.

Isaac Watts – one of the great hymnodists of all time – penned a text some centuries ago that I want to leave us with:

How sweet and awful is the place with Christ within the doors,
while everlasting love displays the sweetest of her stores.

While all our hearts and all our songs join to admire the feast,
each of us cries, with thankful tongues, Lord why was I a guest?

Twas that same love that spread the feast that sweetly drew us in.
Else we had still refused to taste and perished in our sin.

Pity the nations, O our God, constrain the earth to come.
Send your victorious Word abroad and bring the strangers home.

St Michael and All Angels - Sep 30, 2014

Holy Cross Monastery, West Park, NY
Br.Robert James Magliula, OHC
St. Michael and All Angels, transferred to September 30, 2014

Genesis 28:10-17
Revelation 12:7-12
John 1:47-51

St Michael Archangel defeating Satan

As human beings, we really need this strange festival of angels and archangels. It’s a reminder of how crucial it is for us to be able to use our imaginations. We need our imagination, especially in our tendency to believe only in the tangible. When our religion is material, unbounded faith in human progress and in our own accomplishments, it is faith without imagination. It was imagination alone that enabled Nathaniel to recognize Jesus as “Son of God” and “King of Israel” when he had no other evidence than his imaginings of a Messiah.

In the same way, the author of Revelation draws a vivid picture of something that cannot be seen by the eye, but only in the imagination of mind and heart. Living in a time of terrible persecution and turmoil, the vision of victory for God, the belief that God is winning despite all the losses piling up at hand, sustains the author and his community. It gives meaning to a difficult life. The attempt to believe in God’s triumph was what made the story of Michael and All Angels.

In the story from Genesis, Jacob, a fugitive, falls asleep in his flight. His anxiety and concern don’t rest, but rise from his subconscious in a dream. He sees an image of angels and knows that God has reached him, found him, touched him. He knows that God is not confined and that no matter how far his flight, nor how long, he will never be far from God, nor God from him.

A few of decades ago, in a time that felt for many not unlike that described by the author of Revelation, Tony Kushner set out to dramatize the terror and agony of AIDS that robbed so many of us of those we loved. He found that it was impossible to do so without allowing human suffering a dimension beyond itself and beyond time and space. Only by going beyond the tangible could meaning be found for such suffering. In Angels in America he forced open our imaginations by making Western art return to its ancient roots in Greek tragedy where whatever happened on stage had a meaning beyond itself. There the voices of the chorus sang as the voices of the gods, or the gods themselves walked the higher reaches of the stage.

For so many of us at that time, it opened a door to deeper meaning and the finding of an inner strength to endure. As with Jacob one felt God’s presence despite the anxiety and fear. As with those early Christians, one glimpsed God’s victory, despite the losses.

In our day we need to see angels take their place among us, bringing back dimension and depth to our living and dying, our loves and betrayals, our breaking hearts and vulnerable bodies. We need to own the realization that in Christ we are bearing the mystery of the suffering of humanity, it’s sad woundedness, but we are also bearing the very glory of God---and even sharing in the divine nature.
We are a living paradox of divine and human just as Jesus was.

The Eucharist is the ongoing celebration of the Cross and Resurrection---not one but both”. When we eat it, we eat the good and bad, dark and light, suffering and ecstasy. With Jesus we find the power to hold the pain of life until it transforms us. It is too much to think or understand with the mind alone.
We can only eat it until the very eating of it changes us into Christ.

Since angels come primarily to guide or to warn us, we would also do well on this feast to ask ourselves about the times in our lives when we have been guided or protected---often from our worst selves. When we remember, then we need to recall the people we encountered at those times, realizing in them we were encountering angels as well. Their wings and their glory were hidden, their voices were familiar and they spoke of everyday things. Yet when we remember such times and such people, we realize how much we have been guarded, protected, and guided, most often when we were completely unaware.

Scripture is full of all sorts of people who recognized these encounters as meetings with these ministers of grace. In the comings and goings of our daily lives, may our ears be open to the beating of wings, both visible and invisible.  +Amen.

Proper 21 A - Sep 28, 2014

Holy Cross Monastery, West Park, NY
Br. Peter Rostron, OHC
Proper 21 A, Sunday, September 28, 2014

Exodus 17:1-7
Philippians 2:1-13
Matthew 21:23-32

Rublev's Trinity

What do I believe? Well, I believe that this building will remain standing today. I believe that the bank will safeguard the monastery’s money. And I believe that my brothers would care for me if I became ill. I maintain these beliefs because I willingly put my trust in others. Construction workers, the town’s building codes and inspectors, the bank, and the prior of this monastery all have my trust, which means they also have some degree of power or control over me by virtue of their control of things that are important to my well-being, such as money, health care, shelter, and safety. Having power or control means having authority. There are, in fact, a great many people, institutions, and systems that have authority over us because they have our trust, because we believe they will be there for us and will ensure our well-being. Some of them, like the examples I gave, are readily apparent, while others exert very subtle power and control: advertisements, movies and television shows, news stories, peer behavior, family expectations. We all live within a great landscape of beliefs and authorities, most of which we have freely chosen or have willingly given our trust.

This leads us, then, to the question: Where does God fit into this landscape of beliefs and authority? We are Christians because we believe that Jesus was God incarnate, fully possessing God’s authority on earth. The chief priests and elders did not share that belief. In today’s gospel reading, they challenged Jesus’s authority, and he brilliantly turned that challenge back on them. Although they could not come up with an answer, they were, unknowingly, submitting to God’s authority in Jesus simply by accepting the challenge and attempting to respond. Furthermore, in their state of unbelief, they felt their own power and authority being threatened, and they lived in fear of those people who did believe in Jesus and in his forerunner, John the Baptist. The gospel passage ends with Jesus pointing out to the chief priests and elders that their unbelief would put them last in line behind the tax collectors and the prostitutes. He makes it clear that, even though God, in John the Baptist and in Jesus, is in fact their ultimate authority, their choice whether to believe that or not matters greatly in their lives, and our choice matters just as much.

So, Jesus is challenging us: What do you believe? Do you fully believe that God is your ultimate authority? It is easy to say the words, I believe, but what does that really mean? Do we really live our lives as if that is the case? Jesus’s parable about the father and his two sons makes the point that beliefs are expressed more through actions than words. So, perhaps What do I believe? might better be translated into What do I do? Do I volunteer to serve the poor at my church or in my neighborhood? Am I enticed by the latest advertising to spend too much money on the latest gadget or fashion? Do I write letters or attend rallies or make phone calls or convince my friends to push for greater social and economic and environmental justice? Do I spend time other than Sundays reading the Bible or other spiritual works and in prayer? Am I careful to always recycle and turn off the lights when leaving a room and consolidate errands into one trip? Do I treat others, even strangers, with genuine kindness and patience? 

Answering these kinds of questions can give us a window into our beliefs. We may not entirely like what we see, but we are, after all, imperfect, and God knows this. God calls us back to him again and again in mercy and forgiveness, knowing that we will never get there until our last day. But in the striving, we will strengthen our belief. So we should remember to be gentle on ourselves, but also to keep moving toward God, aiming to give God full authority in our lives and to make our actions truer reflections of our belief in God. For us to know God’s mercy and his will for us, though, we must listen closely for God’s voice.

I keep in my choir stall this small icon of Rublev’s Trinity. I’ll leave it up here afterward in case you want a better look. It depicts the three angels who visited Abraham and told him that Sarah would bear a son. That icon is also often interpreted as a representation of the Holy Trinity: the Son seated in the center with the Father and the Holy Spirit on either side. As I sat in my stall during my first profession of the monastic vow in July, the angels spoke to me. They told me how glad they were that I was finally taking a seat at the table with them. I had been standing by the table for quite awhile, but now I was choosing to place myself firmly in their company, more fully ready to listen to and interact with them. This astonished me, and I interpret it is a reflection to me of the state of my beliefs. It deepened my belief that God loves me, that God invites me to sit with him, and that he wants me to be an agent of his love in the world. I’m still working out exactly what that means, but God’s call has already led me to this monastery, as it is now leading me to pursue a course of study, starting in just a few days in fact, that I hope will enable me to work as a chaplain in a hospital or hospice.

Abraham turned from the chores that undoubtedly kept him busy in the camp in order to offer hospitality to three strangers. He listened to God in those three strangers, and he believed and acted. Moses turned from his path to pay attention to a bush ablaze with light. That was the beginning of an amazing, ongoing relationship, and we heard in our first reading today one example of Moses listening to God, believing, and then acting. Jesus listened to God in profound prayer and, as we heard today so eloquently expressed in Paul’s letter to the Philippians, in extreme humility, and he believed and acted. You and I, of course, are present-day, ordinary humans. We are not Abraham or Moses or Jesus, so perhaps we can be satisfied with setting our sights a little bit lower than theirs. But we can certainly use them as inspirations for what it means to listen to God’s word, to believe in the presence of God within us, and to act in accordance with God’s will for us.

So that is it, boiled down into three words: Listen, believe, and act. That is Jesus’s challenge to us, and in doing so we will enable God’s authority to bear fruit in our lives. There are angels and burning bushes all around, we need only choose to turn and listen. That requires that we pay attention to what is truly important. The angels and burning bushes aren’t always the loudest or brightest things around us. There are many voices competing for our attention, so we must filter out and silence those that lead us to what might be called false beliefs, in order to focus on the still, small voice of God. So take care, then, where and in whom you place your trust. Be intentional in whom and in what you give authority in your life. Be aware of the power of the words you use, but know that your actions are the greater reflection of your beliefs. Listen, believe, and act with God as the ultimate authority in your life.