Sunday, April 29, 2007

WE ARE CALLED


I attended a Mass for Volunteer Appreciation Day at the St Francis Inn in Kensington today with my daughter. What a wonderful event. It seemed almost ludicrous that they are appreciating us. It is such a blessing to be able to volunteer there and be able for a few hours to live the Gospel the way these brothers and sisters live it every single day.

As part of the Mass they sang a hymn (#518) from the Hymnal "Gather". It was called, "We are Called". What a Franciscan Hymn! It is:

We Are Called

1. Come! Live in the light!
Shine with the joy and the love of the Lord!
We are called to be light for the Kingdom,
to live in the freedom of the city of God!

Refrain: We are called to act with justice,
we are called to love tenderly,
we are called to serve one another;
to walk humbly with God!

2. Come! Open your heart!
Show Your mercy to all those in fear!
We are called to be hope for the hopeless
so all hatred and blindness will be no more!
3. Sing! Sing a new song!
Sing of that great day when all will be one!
God will reign, and we'll walk with each other
as sisters and brothers united in love!


Sunday, April 22, 2007

A Reminder from God


Today is Earth Day. So it was with some interest that I read the psalm appointed for Morning Prayer this morning. It was Psalm 148.

Psalm 148

1 Hallelujah!
Praise the Lord from the heavens; *
praise him in the heights.
2 Praise him, all you angels of his; *
praise him, all his host.
3 Praise him, sun and moon; *
praise him, all you shining stars.
4 Praise him, heaven of heavens, *
and you waters above the heavens.
5 Let them praise the Name of the Lord; *
for he commanded, and they were created.
6 He made them stand fast for ever and ever; *
he gave them a law which shall not pass away.
7 Praise the Lord from the earth, *
you sea-monsters and all deeps;
8 Fire and hail, snow and fog, *
tempestuous wind, doing his will;
9 Mountains and all hills, *
fruit trees and all cedars;
10 Wild beasts and all cattle, *
creeping things and wingèd birds;
11 Kings of the earth and all peoples, *
princes and all rulers of the world;
12 Young men and maidens, *
old and young together.
13 Let them praise the Name of the Lord, *
for his Name only is exalted,
his splendor is over earth and heaven.
14 He has raised up strength for his people
and praise for all his loyal servants, *
the children of Israel, a people who are near him.
Hallelujah!


Prayer For the Conservation of Natural Resources

Almighty God, in giving us dominion over things on earth, you made us fellow workers in your creation: Give us wisdom and reverence so to use the resources of nature, that no one may suffer from our abuse of them, and that generations yet to come may continue to praise you for your bounty; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

-Book of Common Prayer




Saturday, April 21, 2007

Nature And Your Health


An article posted on the Why Files web site from the University of Wisconsin talks about evidence that the more time you spend out in "nature" the better your health will be. It cites examples such as the ability to lower the blood pressure and heart rate of healthy people and lowering stress after a medical procedure, all by being "exposed" to nature. That is reportedly best done by being out in a natural environment. Taking a hike in the woods, a walk down the beach, going fishing, doing gardening, going camping etc. are all examples. But the study cited viewing videos or photographs of nature as working nearly as well.

I guess being in the "thinner places" is not only good for our spirit but for our body as well. Get out there and enjoy God's wonderful creations and learn to live longer and happier.

Peace and all good.

Thursday, April 19, 2007

MONKS and PUPPIES


rancis was known for his love of animals. One of the most famous stories involves Francis and the wolf of Gubbio. The wolf was terrorizing the town of Gubbio eating both animals and people. Francis against the warnings of the towns people went out and spoke with the wolf. Francis met him and addressed him as brother wolf. The wolf laid its head in Francis' lap. He told the wolf that the people of the town would not harm him if the wolf would stop terrorizing the town. "All past crimes are forgiven" Francis said. Francis and the wolf went to Gubbio and a pact was made that if they fed the wolf the wolf would live peacefully among the people.


That famous story immediately came to mind when I saw an advertisement for a new show. The Animal Planet cable TV channel has a new show called "Divine Canine". The show is a dog obedience show that has a group of monastic brothers from The Monks of New Skete showing how they put their unique methods of dog obedience to use with their German Shepherds. Although the monks are not Franciscan (they are Eastern Orthodox) they certainly appear to have a Franciscan spirit regarding their love and training of animals.

Check you local TV listings or click on the ANIMAL PLANET link for the show schedule.

Tuesday, April 17, 2007

A PRAYER FOR THE DEAD AT VIRGINIA TECH


Into your hands, O merciful Savior, we commend your servants. Acknowledge, we humbly beseech you, sheep of your own fold, lambs of your own flock, sinners of your own redeeming. Receive them into the arms of your mercy, into the blessed rest of everlasting peace, and into the glorious company of the saints in light. Amen.

May their soul and the souls of all the departed, through the mercy of God, rest in peace. Amen.

-Book of Common Prayer

Friday, April 13, 2007

Images and Copyright

I have made every effort to insure that images and information displayed on this blog are not under copyright, and that I have the freedom to use them. Please EMAIL me if you believe an image was used that was copyright protected. Information that was quoted has a link to the original source.

Scientists playing god?

s creating a human heart valve from stem cells playing God, or using what God has given us to learn, grow and help each other? The British newspaper The Guardian Unlimited reported that British Scientists had grown tissue the same way that human heart valves are created. They report that this is a major step toward creating replacement tissue for damaged hearts.

So, is this the first step in cloning humans, flirting with disaster and playing God? Or is this a first step in taking the skills that God has instilled in humans to the level where we help others to an extent not possible before? The debate has cropped up before with the invention of the artificial heart,
fertilization of human egg cells, and genetically altered food. Some of these are considered to be common place now, but were controversial years ago.

Are the bees disappearing because of genetically altered food, or because they were not native to North America in the first place but brought here by early settlers? Do the medical improvements that man creates improve the quality of life or extend human's lives past where they were ever intended to go? Are we exhausting the earth's resources because we have improved the quality and quantity of human life?

As we use God's gifts to improve our lives we must use the same gifts to look after the environment and examine ways to have humans, animals, and natural resources work symbiotically.

Monday, April 9, 2007

ONE EPISCOPALIAN CAMPAIGN



A partnership has been formed between the Epsicopal Church and the One campaign to end hunger. FROM THE EPISCOPAL PUBLIC POLICY NETWORK website:
BE A ONE EPISCOPALIAN

Sign the pledge and register to be a ONE Episcopalian. When you register you will be sent to the ONE Campaign to sign their pledge as well.


WE BELIEVE that in the best American tradition of helping others help themselves, now is the time to join with other countries in a historic pact for compassion and justice to help the poorest people of the world overcome AIDS and extreme poverty.

WE RECOGNIZE
that a pact including such measures as fair trade, debt relief, fighting corruption and directing additional resources for basic needs education, health, clean water, food, and care for orphans would transform the futures and hopes of an entire generation in the poorest countries, at a cost equal to just one percent more of the US budget.

WE COMMIT
ourselves - one person, one voice, one vote at a time - to make a better, safer world for all.

CLICK HERE TO REGISTER

Sunday, April 8, 2007

HE IS RISEN



5 But the angel said to the women, ‘Do not be afraid; I know that you are looking for Jesus who was crucified. 6 He is not here; for he has been raised, as he said. Come, see the place where he lay. 7 Then go quickly and tell his disciples, “He has been raised from the dead, and indeed he is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see him.” This is my message for you.’
Matthew 28, 5-7

EARTH DAY 2007


EARTH DAY IS APRIL 22, 2007

"The earth is all that we have in common. It is what we are made of and what we live from, and we cannot damage it without damaging those whom we share it. There is an uncanny resemblance between our behavior toward each other and our behaviour toward the earth. By some connection we do not recognize, the willingness to exploit one becomes the willingness to exploit the other... It is impossible to care for each other more or differently than we care for the earth."
- Wendell Berry

Saturday, April 7, 2007

Franciscan Wheat Beer?



I am a fan of the German hefe weissbier or wheat beers. In discussing it with someone recently they told me about Franziskaner. This is an imported German wheat beer that was named after the Franciscan monastery that was next door to the brewery in Munich in 1363. I guess I'm destined to try in now... Beer is proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy. -Benjamin Franklin

Monday, April 2, 2007

Thinner Places


I know it is spring when the Vidalia onions, baseball season and fishing season all arrive. I will soon start backyard barbecues, going to the ballpark as well as fishing at the beach and in local streams. I frequently fish with my son. I have always felt closer to God when I was out in nature, whether it's standing in a stream, the surf or walking in the woods. The Celts called it the Thin Places.

Edward Sellner wrote
"The early Celts believed in "thin places": geographical locations...where a person experiences only a very thin divide between past, present, and future times; places where a person is somehow able, possibly only for a moment, to encounter a more ancient reality within present time; or places where perhaps only in a glance we are somehow transported..."

In simple terms the "Thin Places" are somewhere between here on earth and closer to God, to heaven. Not quite fully in one or the other but yet present in both. I picture standing on a mountain top with a fine mist. Close enough to feel God.

To me I feel at home and with God when it is just you, your thoughts, your God and things that God created. I remember after a stressful work week, standing in a stream with my rod catching nothing but grateful for the quiet and the serenity. It was so quiet that I could hear a noise that did not sound familiar. I eventually saw that it was two dragonflies banging into each other. I watched in wonder. What great things God has created.

May you all have time to relax, be with your God and be able to stand in a thinner place. On the way home listen to the ball game and have a burger with a Vidalia onion...

Sunday, April 1, 2007

Archbishop of Canterbury weighs in

Church must be 'safe place' for gay and lesbian people, Archbishop of Canterbury says

ORGINALLY PUBLISHED IN THE EPISCOPAL LIFE ONLINE
[Lambeth Palace] The Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr. Rowan Williams, has said that the churches of the Anglican Communion must be safe places for gay and lesbian people. His comments come in a welcome to an interim report on the Anglican Communion's Listening Process, a commitment to listen to the experience of homosexual people.

Williams warns that the challenge to create the safe space for the voices of gay and lesbian people to be heard and for their dignity to be respected is based on a fundamental commitment of the Communion.


"The commitments of the Communion are not only to certain theological positions on the question of sexual ethics but also to a manifest and credible respect for the proper liberties of homosexual people, a commitment again set out in successive Lambeth Conference Resolutions over many decades," he said. "I share the concerns expressed about situations where the Church is seen to be underwriting social or legal attitudes which threaten these proper liberties.


Williams said that it is impossible to read the interim report "without being aware that in many places -- including Western countries with supposedly 'liberal' attitudes -- hate crimes against homosexual people have increased in recent years and have taken horrifying and disturbing forms."


"No one reading this report can be complacent about such a situation, and the Church is challenged to show that it is truly a safe place for people to be honest and where they may be confident that they will have their human dignity respected, whatever serious disagreements about ethics may remain," he said. "It is good to know that the pastoral care of homosexual people is affirmed clearly by so many provinces."


In his statement, Williams paid tribute to the work of the Rev. Canon Phil Groves and the team at the Anglican Communion Office involved in coordinating the Listening Process. The interim report, comprising summaries of the Communion's 38 Provinces' progress on the issue, can be found here


Williams' full statement follows:

"I am profoundly grateful to Canon Phil Groves and all at the Anglican Communion Office who have worked so hard to produce this preliminary account of what the Communion has done to honour its commitment at Lambeth 1998 to listen to the experience of gay and lesbian people. It is a commitment that has been repeated many times but it has not proved easy to set up an appropriate process that will involve the whole Anglican family.


"The sensitivities of this exercise are obvious. Social, cultural and legal contexts are very varied indeed. And in the present climate of the Anglican Communion, there is inevitably a suspicion either that this is just window-dressing, or that it is a covert programme for changing doctrine and discipline. Real - and mutual - listening is hard to achieve. There are contexts where it is difficult to find a safe place for gay and lesbian people to speak about their lives openly. There are contexts where people assume the debate is over. The report shows that listening is possible, but also that there is a great deal still to be done. The work continues, but we have a solid start here.


"The commitments of the Communion are not only to certain theological positions on the question of sexual ethics but also to a manifest and credible respect for the proper liberties of homosexual people, a commitment again set out in successive Lambeth Conference Resolutions over many decades. I share the concerns expressed about situations where the Church is seen to be underwriting social or legal attitudes which threaten these proper liberties. It is impossible to read this report without being aware that in many places - including Western countries with supposedly 'liberal' attitudes - hate crimes against homosexual people have increased in recent years and have taken horrifying and disturbing forms.


"No-one reading this report can be complacent about such a situation, and the Church is challenged to show that it is truly a safe place for people to be honest and where they may be confident that they will have their human dignity respected, whatever serious disagreements about ethics may remain. It is good to know that the pastoral care of homosexual people is affirmed clearly by so many provinces.


"I welcome this document as a valuable first stage in our collective response to the challenge that the last Lambeth Conference put before us, and I hope that it will be part of the 'deep and dispassionate' study of issues in sexual ethics for which an earlier Lambeth Conference called."

Poor Nations Suffer as World Warms

An article from the NY Times by Andrew C. Revkinon April 1, 2007 spoke of the world's leading nations and how they have contributed the most to global warming.

They have, by their size and wealth, been the most likely to limit the consequences
of their damage to the environment within their own countries . A report is due next Friday from the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change on the effects of global warming. “Like the sinking of the Titanic, catastrophes are not democratic,” said Henry Miller, a fellow with the Hoover Institution at Stanford University. “A much higher fraction of passengers from the cheaper decks were lost. We’ll see the same phenomenon with global warming.”


COMMENT: We live in a global society. This is demonstrated more and more every day. The conflicts, epidemics, politics and economics act and react with each country in time frames and manners that were inconceivable just a decade ago. It is time that we look out for each other...

Presiding Bishop's Homily

Presiding Bishop's homily at House of Bishops' closing Eucharist

ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED:
[Episcopal News Service]

The Most Rev. Katharine Jefferts Schori
Presiding Bishop and Primate
The Episcopal Church

Homily for Closing Eucharist
House of Bishops' Meeting
Camp Allen, Texas
March 21, 2007
Thomas Ken


I look around here and see lots of folks with glasses. And some of us who don't obviously wear them have contacts or have had our eyes adjusted surgically. Most of us have had our eyes change over the years.


When I first learned to fly, my vision tested as 20/10 in one eye and 20/15 in the other. I could see farther and more accurately at a distance than the norm. But in the last few years I've been wrestling with the changes 35 years have made in my eyes. I can see just fine up close - to read or have an intimate conversation - but I can no longer see the nuance of emotion on a face at 50 feet. I have to use other lenses to do that, and it can be both frustrating and annoying. That shift in focus doesn't happen automatically anymore - it takes conscious effort, and outside assistance.


In some ways I think our church has presbyopia as well. I don't just mean "old eyes," which we certainly need if we're serious about valuing our tradition. Our tired and aging eyes mean that we don't have the ability to rapidly change focus, to look both back and forward, near and far away, in the space of a few instants. Our eyes have grown accustomed either to looking at the world over our shoulder, or toward the future, and we've lost some of our Anglican ability to look in both directions, to hold both perspectives in tension.


Our current struggle gives evidence of a competition between perspectives or worldviews. One of them looks at the world through an Enlightenment lens and expects to see predictability, understandability, and definability. Another view of the world comes through a postmodern lens, one that sees constant change and a significant degree of unpredictability as intrinsic to creation. Those two worldviews seem to many people to be incapable of being used together or even held in tension. To many people, they feel fundamentally distinct and irreconcilable. The two worldviews may also lead to different understandings of our lives as Christians, but before we go there let's consider what a Godly worldview might look like.


Recall Rublev's great icon of the Trinity, and the way in which each of the members of the Trinity looks in a different direction. They are not gazing out into space, however, but at another being, at another of those present around the circle. If we are created in the image of that social God, we too are invited to look as God does, toward another image of God, to turn our eyes upon Jesus - and also on the many images of God all around us.


The ability and willingness to focus on those many images of God around us is fundamental to our lives as Christians. God has the ability to hold all of us together in one field of view, affirming each one as child and beloved. Our baptism into the life of God is about seeing as God sees, with integrity.


We're celebrating the feast of Thomas Ken today. His biography in Lesser Feasts and Fasts begins like this: "Thomas Ken was born in 1637. Throughout his life he was both rewarded and punished for his integrity." The examples cited are about his persistence in advocating a particular and centered moral position wherever he looked, even in the face of potential or real royal wrath. There may be some parallel with our current situation in this church. Thomas Ken was not loath to publicly rebuke his king or to refuse a royal order. He understood that a personal oath made to one king was not transferable to another, which cost him his post as Bishop of Bath and Wells. And despite his trials ecclesiastical and political, Thomas Ken kept on singing. He was able to bless even that which the world thought of as wretched, demeaning, and hopeless.


Integrity means soundness and wholeness, being undivided. It implies that ability to look in more than one direction, or to focus on more than one object, yet see only oneness. It is a Godly view of things.


That Godly view of things underlies the apparently different worldviews of today's gospel. The story is set in the midst of a crowd, all of whom are seeking healing, trying to touch Jesus, looking for hope and help. And then it says, "Jesus looked up" at his disciples. He looks up from the crowd around him, sees that motley crew of misfits and begins to pronounce blessing. He sets together ailing crowd and failing disciples, poverty and blessing, hunger and blessing, grief and blessing, persecution and blessing, hate and joy. How can he look at the abject absence of abundance in the midst of that crowd and find hope, joy, and blessing?


That divine vision sees beneath the surface, beyond what the world sees as loss or death or rejection. That vision of blessing sees the fundamentally gracious nature of reality, it sees the ground of loving being that continues to arc toward justice in spite of the emptiness or evil of the world's current reality. To envision poverty as blessedness sees potential, sees the fulfillment - the filling full of empty bellies and sightless eyes - that God expects and hopes for and encourages this world to make real. Seeing the blessing comes from the ability to see both lack and possibility in a kind of multilayered reality. That multiple reality is present - the kingdom of God is all around you - but it takes eyes that can see at multiple focal lengths.


It is the same kind of seeing that has begun to understand light and all electromagnetic radiation as both particle and wave. There are occasions when it makes more sense to treat light as a wave, and other times when using particle physics is more fruitful. Both are accurate, neither is sufficient.


The MDGs are about that kind of multifocal vision. They announce prophetic judgment on the world's need, but they also announce prophetic possibility - yes, the hungry can be filled, and the ill healed, and the rejected restored to community.


Living in community also requires multifocal lenses, and we've had some small experience here in doing that. We've looked beyond ourselves to the Anglican Communion, and internally toward our varied members. We are trying to see with others' perspectives, and sometimes it can be both painful and annoying. We don't see as clearly or easily when we gaze on unfamiliar depths, when we are invited to hold together both Radner and Grieb, both unchanging truth and continuing revelation.


There are some kinds of fish and other aquatic animals that actually have bipartite eyes - they see at the same time both above and below the surface of the water, and their brains figure out how to interpret those quite different images and make a coherent whole. As a body, we are wrestling with a collection of images - perhaps even more like the eye of a social insect, with multiple facets - but most of us assume that the image we form most easily is the only right and true one. The blesser of the gospel, however, sees more than that one, easy image. The blesser of all invites us into that deeper seeing as well - stretch, strain, imagine, and you, too, can begin to see like the Three do, like the One does.


When we have seen that blessing, however briefly, it begins to rise into more easily visible depths, it comes more clearly into focus and into what we call "normal reality." To see as God sees is to begin to make real, whether it is the work of the MDGs, the work going on now in Louisiana and Mississippi, caring for the homecoming soldier, or liberating those in chains. To see as God sees is to bless what is into the reality of the God's reign.


One of the curiosities of very small particle physics is that measuring the position or speed of a particle changes it. Seeing the particle changes it to something else or somewhere else. Seeing with the eyes of God, or blessing another, changes or moves both the blessed and the blesser.


Thomas Ken sang praises to the God of blessing. May we bless with the eyes of God, bless the world into greater reality, more closely into the reign of God.


Praise God from whom all blessings flow
Praise God all creatures here below
Praise God above, ye heavenly host
Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.



COMMENT: What always attracted me about the Episcopal/Anglican Church was that it was a bridge between the Protestant Church and the Catholic Church. It was was also a place that accomodated many "flavors". You could be high or low church but all worshiped from the Book of Common Prayer and were accepting of others thoughts and values. Have we lost that, OR ARE THE VOICES OF REASON JUST BEING DROWNED OUT?