*
Saint Anne's day by day: January - December, 2010
*
Thursday, January 27, 2011
Monday, January 17, 2011
Friday, January 7, 2011
Wise Women Also Came
*
Wise Women Also Came
Wise women also came.
The fire burned
in their wombs
long before they saw
the flaming star
in the sky.
They walked in shadows,
trusting the path
would open
under the light of the moon.
Wise women also came,
seeking no directions,
no permission
from any king.
They came
by their own authority,
their own desire,
their own longing.
They came in quiet,
spreading no rumors,
sparking no fears
to lead
to innocents’ slaughter,
to their sister Rachel’s
inconsolable lamentations.
Wise women also came,
and they brought
useful gifts:
water for labor’s washing,
fire for warm illumination,
a blanket for swaddling.
Wise women also came,
at least three of them,
holding Mary in the labor,
crying out with her
in the birth pangs,
breathing ancient blessings
into her ear.
Wise women also came,
and they went,
as wise women always do,
home a different way.
- Jan Richardson
*
Wise Women Also Came
Wise women also came.
The fire burned
in their wombs
long before they saw
the flaming star
in the sky.
They walked in shadows,
trusting the path
would open
under the light of the moon.
Wise women also came,
seeking no directions,
no permission
from any king.
They came
by their own authority,
their own desire,
their own longing.
They came in quiet,
spreading no rumors,
sparking no fears
to lead
to innocents’ slaughter,
to their sister Rachel’s
inconsolable lamentations.
Wise women also came,
and they brought
useful gifts:
water for labor’s washing,
fire for warm illumination,
a blanket for swaddling.
Wise women also came,
at least three of them,
holding Mary in the labor,
crying out with her
in the birth pangs,
breathing ancient blessings
into her ear.
Wise women also came,
and they went,
as wise women always do,
home a different way.
- Jan Richardson
*
Wednesday, January 5, 2011
The Journey of the Magi
~*~*~*~*~~*~*~*~*~*~*
Journey of the Magi
~*~*~*~*~~*~*~*~*~*~*
A cold coming we had of it,
Just the worst time of the year
For a journey, and such a long journey:
The ways deep and the weather sharp,
The very dead of winter.
And the camels galled, sore-footed, refractory,
Lying down in the melting snow.
There were times when we regretted
The summer palaces on slopes, the terraces,
And the silken girls bringing sherbet.
Then the camel men cursing and grumbling
And running away, and wanting their liquor and women,
And the night-fires going out, and the lack of shelters,
And the cities dirty and the towns unfriendly
And the villages dirty and charging high prices:
A hard time we had of it.
At the end we preferred to travel all night,
Sleeping in snatches,
With the voices singing in our ears, saying
That this was all folly.
Then at dawn we came down to a temperate valley,
Wet, below the snow line, smelling of vegetation;
With a running stream and a water mill beating the darkness,
And three trees on the low sky,
And an old white horse galloped away in the meadow.
Then we came to a tavern with vine-leaves over the lintel,
Six hands at an open door dicing for pieces of silver,
And feet kicking the empty wineskins.
But there was no information, and so we continued
And arrived at evening, not a moment too soon
Finding the place; it was (you may say) satisfactory.
All this was a long time ago, I remember,
And I would do it again, but set down
This set down
This: were we led all that way for
Birth or Death? There was a Birth, certainly,
We had evidence and no doubt. I had seen birth and death,
But had thought they were different; this Birth was
Hard and bitter agony for us, like Death, our death.
We returned to our places, these Kingdoms,
But no longer at ease here, in the old dispensation,
With an alien people clutching their gods.
I should be glad of another death.
~T.S. Eliot
~*~*~*~*~~*~*~*~*~*~*
Journey of the Magi
~*~*~*~*~~*~*~*~*~*~*
A cold coming we had of it,
Just the worst time of the year
For a journey, and such a long journey:
The ways deep and the weather sharp,
The very dead of winter.
And the camels galled, sore-footed, refractory,
Lying down in the melting snow.
There were times when we regretted
The summer palaces on slopes, the terraces,
And the silken girls bringing sherbet.
Then the camel men cursing and grumbling
And running away, and wanting their liquor and women,
And the night-fires going out, and the lack of shelters,
And the cities dirty and the towns unfriendly
And the villages dirty and charging high prices:
A hard time we had of it.
At the end we preferred to travel all night,
Sleeping in snatches,
With the voices singing in our ears, saying
That this was all folly.
Then at dawn we came down to a temperate valley,
Wet, below the snow line, smelling of vegetation;
With a running stream and a water mill beating the darkness,
And three trees on the low sky,
And an old white horse galloped away in the meadow.
Then we came to a tavern with vine-leaves over the lintel,
Six hands at an open door dicing for pieces of silver,
And feet kicking the empty wineskins.
But there was no information, and so we continued
And arrived at evening, not a moment too soon
Finding the place; it was (you may say) satisfactory.
All this was a long time ago, I remember,
And I would do it again, but set down
This set down
This: were we led all that way for
Birth or Death? There was a Birth, certainly,
We had evidence and no doubt. I had seen birth and death,
But had thought they were different; this Birth was
Hard and bitter agony for us, like Death, our death.
We returned to our places, these Kingdoms,
But no longer at ease here, in the old dispensation,
With an alien people clutching their gods.
I should be glad of another death.
~T.S. Eliot
~*~*~*~*~~*~*~*~*~*~*
Friday, December 24, 2010
Sunday, December 12, 2010
The Third Sunday of Advent
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Sermon – Advent 3A
December 12, 2010
The Rev. Patrick Markie
Today is the Third Sunday of Advent and Advent is the Season the Church gives us each year to remember, rejoice, and reflect. We remember with joy what we know already happened: Jesus came as a baby, he was placed in a manger, and he changed the world forever.
We rejoice in the sure and certain knowledge of God’s presence with us and among us today, because on the first Easter morning, three women discovered something amazing: the rock had been rolled away from the tomb, and Jesus had risen from the dead.
And we reflect on what is still to come, as we wait in joyful hope, ever vigilant and ever open to the mystery of the second coming of Christ.
John Westerhoff says: “Advent provides us with a moment to reflect on where Christ is trying to break into our lives and into our world…Of course we remember the birth at Bethlehem, but only so that we will not forget the vision of a new possibility that God implanted in our hearts, and the promise of God’s return, upon which we base our hope and for which we watch and wait.”
John the Baptist had been waiting and hoping for the coming of the Messiah for a long time. And in last Sunday’s Gospel he took this message to the people, as an edgy messenger, dressed in camel’s hair with a leather belt around his waist. He ate grasshoppers and wild honey, and he was probably skinny as a rail, with hair and a beard that looked like they’d never been cut. And there he stood, knee-deep in the River Jordan, shouting out as loud as he could, “Repent…prepare…for the kingdom of heaven has come near.”
And last Sunday’s Gospel tells us, “…the people of Jerusalem and all Judea were going out to him…”
Some of it, I’m sure, was plain old curiosity, and the people of John’s time were probably saying, “I just can’t believe what I’ve been hearing about this guy. I’ve got to see it for myself. Nobody really dresses and eats and talks like that, do they?”
But mostly, I think, it was what John was saying: “With many other exhortations, John proclaimed the good news to the people.” And it was good news that gave a waiting and hoping people, faith and trust and joy, and inspired them to respond to John’s call to “bear fruit worthy of repentance,” or as another translation says, “To change the way you’ve been living your life.”
Fast forward to today’s Gospel and we have an entirely different picture of John the Baptist. Here he is, the bold prophet who pointed to Jesus as the One, who called for repentance and baptized many, now sitting alone in Herod’s prison.
It must have been lonely and dirty and very difficult being imprisoned in first century Judea. There were most likely no comforts or conveniences, and the only thing available to John was time—time to think, time to ponder, time to second-guess, and lots of time to doubt. Was Jesus really the One? Was he the real thing? Had I been right, or had my work been in vain?
Things were not turning out the way they were supposed to. The Messiah was supposed to change things. He was supposed to separate the wheat from the chaff in the world. He was supposed to change things so that men like Herod were no longer in power and men like John the Baptist were no longer in prison. Jesus wasn’t doing the things John thought the Messiah was supposed to do, and John was full of disappointment and doubt.
I suppose we’ve all been disappointed with God at one time or another. A loved one gets sick and dies. A terrorist attack takes place somewhere in the world. Tornadoes tear up a town or earthquakes devastate the lives of hundreds, even thousands of people.
Our disappointment comes because of faulty expectations. Sometimes we fail to really see God because we are blinded by the picture we have painted of God in our mind. If we are going to see God at work in the world then we need to remove the blinders of our expectations and look with the eyes of faith. We need to be open to seeing beyond what we have grown to expect.
Doubt is nothing new. Even the most faithful disciples throughout human history have experienced their dark nights of the soul and their season of doubt. Think about Thomas Merton, Mother Teresa, Martin Luther, the Apostle Thomas, and so many other pillars of faith who wrestled with doubt, lived with it and expressed it, and yet did not let it consume them.
John the Baptist, in spite of his imprisonment and uncertain future, refused to wallow in his doubt. He did not allow it to disappoint and embitter him. According to Matthew’s account he sent word by his disciples to Jesus and asked him directly: “Are you the one who is to come, or are we to wait for another?”
A commentary on this text says: “Jesus meets John’s questioning and doubt directly. There are no heavy theological treatises or condemnation of his doubt handed down. Not at all! Jesus provides the answer through the witness of his disciples.” “Go and tell John what you hear and see,” Jesus says. “The blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them.”
Jesus wants John to know that he, Jesus, is indeed the one foretold by the prophets, he wants him to know that something extraordinary is starting to happen, and that John was the one sent by God to proclaim this good news and to prepare the way. But don’t accept and believe just because I’m telling you, Jesus says. Listen to the good news of what’s been happening and then judge, have faith, and believe.
We all need to look with the eyes of faith and see God at work in and through all the ordinary elements of our lives. We need to see God in the face of our neighbors. We need to look for God at work in the world. We need to not allow our faulty expectations to trip us up and cause our faith to falter.
Being disillusioned about God is not necessarily a bad thing. Disillusionment is literally the loss of an illusion. And in the long run, it is never a bad thing to lose the lies we have mistaken for the truth.
Did Jesus fail to give you everything you prayed for? Then perhaps Jesus is not a genie. Did Jesus fail to punish your enemies? Then perhaps Jesus is not a police officer. Did Jesus fail to make everything run smoothly? Then perhaps Jesus is not a mechanic. Over and over our disappointments draw us deeper and deeper into who Jesus really is and what Jesus really does.
Disillusionment, questions, and doubt can be good things. Frederick Buechner says: “Doubts are the ants in the pants of faith. They keep it awake and moving.”
John had to deal with his disillusionment over Jesus. He wanted Jesus to condemn sinners—instead, Jesus ate with them. He wanted Jesus to proclaim fire and brimstone—instead, Jesus preached about God’s love.
Jesus didn’t answer John’s question by coming right out and saying he was the one. But he did tell John to look at the works he was doing and draw his own conclusions.
Barbara Brown Taylor paraphrases Jesus’ answer this way: “People who were blind to the love loose in the world have received their sight; people who were paralyzed with fear are limber with hope; people who were deaf from want of good news are singing hymns.
“And best and most miraculous of all, tell John that this is not the work of one lonely messiah, but the work of God, carried out by all who believe, and there is no end in sight. Tell him I am the one, if you must, but tell him also that yes, he should look for another and another and another. Tell him to search every face for the face of God and not get tripped up on me, because what is happening here is bigger than any of us. What is coming to pass is as big as the Kingdom of God.”
Jesus is the one. He is the one God anointed to bring good news to the world. He is the one who was called to show and share how much God loves us. He is the one who came into the world to serve. He is also the one who calls us to be the one.
We probably aren’t called to do this on a grand, world-changing scale, but rather by living out our faith every day in ordinary ways.
We can share God’s love by talking to someone who is lonely. We can provide God’s care by visiting the sick. We can show God’s compassion by comforting someone who is grieving. We can demonstrate the peace of God by not retaliating when someone wrongs us. We can show our concern for the poor by giving gifts that help provide food, clothing, and shelter.
Last year on the Third Sunday of Advent we read from Luke’s Gospel a story similar to what we read last week in Matthew’s Gospel. John is preaching and baptizing, crowds are coming out to see him, and he calls upon the people to do good works, because “every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.”
And then, in Luke’s telling of the story, the people are so stirred up by John’s words that they call out, “What then shall we do?” And John tells them exactly what they should do.
“Whoever has two coats must share with anyone who has none; and whoever has food must do likewise.” In other words, in the words of our Baptismal Covenant, “Seek and serve Christ in all persons, loving your neighbor as yourself.”
To the tax collectors he said: “Collect no more than the amount prescribed for you.” In other words, “Strive for justice…among all people.”
And to the soldiers he said: “Do not extort money from anyone by threats or false accusations…” In other words, “Respect the dignity of every human being.”
Today is the Third Sunday of Advent and we light the pink candle on the Advent Wreath. It used to be called Gaudete Sunday from the Latin word “rejoice,” which was the first word of the opening prayer of the Latin Mass for this Sunday.
It is a reminder of the joyful coming of God in the person of Jesus at Bethlehem, a reminder to rejoice in the presence of God with us and among us today, and a reminder that as Christian people we wait in joyful hope for the second coming of Christ.
The message for us today is that we are called to be stewards of this good news, and to be active participants in ushering in God’s righteous reign. “We are charged with telling the world that something new is happening, just as the prophet Isaiah did with these words, ‘Strengthen the weak hands, and make firm the feeble knees.’ Say to those who are of a fearful heart, ‘Be strong, do not fear! Here is your God.’”
The Season of Advent calls us to wait in joyful expectation; of that there is no doubt. Yet that waiting should not be static. We are called to go into the world, strengthened by the Word, strengthened by bread and wine, to tell all people that Jesus comes, that hope abounds, and that there is a place at the table and in the community for everyone. Even as we wait, salvation breaks in around us, and God is active in the world. What good news! Now go and tell!
AMEN
---
Sermon – Advent 3A
December 12, 2010
The Rev. Patrick Markie
Today is the Third Sunday of Advent and Advent is the Season the Church gives us each year to remember, rejoice, and reflect. We remember with joy what we know already happened: Jesus came as a baby, he was placed in a manger, and he changed the world forever.
We rejoice in the sure and certain knowledge of God’s presence with us and among us today, because on the first Easter morning, three women discovered something amazing: the rock had been rolled away from the tomb, and Jesus had risen from the dead.
And we reflect on what is still to come, as we wait in joyful hope, ever vigilant and ever open to the mystery of the second coming of Christ.
John Westerhoff says: “Advent provides us with a moment to reflect on where Christ is trying to break into our lives and into our world…Of course we remember the birth at Bethlehem, but only so that we will not forget the vision of a new possibility that God implanted in our hearts, and the promise of God’s return, upon which we base our hope and for which we watch and wait.”
John the Baptist had been waiting and hoping for the coming of the Messiah for a long time. And in last Sunday’s Gospel he took this message to the people, as an edgy messenger, dressed in camel’s hair with a leather belt around his waist. He ate grasshoppers and wild honey, and he was probably skinny as a rail, with hair and a beard that looked like they’d never been cut. And there he stood, knee-deep in the River Jordan, shouting out as loud as he could, “Repent…prepare…for the kingdom of heaven has come near.”
And last Sunday’s Gospel tells us, “…the people of Jerusalem and all Judea were going out to him…”
Some of it, I’m sure, was plain old curiosity, and the people of John’s time were probably saying, “I just can’t believe what I’ve been hearing about this guy. I’ve got to see it for myself. Nobody really dresses and eats and talks like that, do they?”
But mostly, I think, it was what John was saying: “With many other exhortations, John proclaimed the good news to the people.” And it was good news that gave a waiting and hoping people, faith and trust and joy, and inspired them to respond to John’s call to “bear fruit worthy of repentance,” or as another translation says, “To change the way you’ve been living your life.”
Fast forward to today’s Gospel and we have an entirely different picture of John the Baptist. Here he is, the bold prophet who pointed to Jesus as the One, who called for repentance and baptized many, now sitting alone in Herod’s prison.
It must have been lonely and dirty and very difficult being imprisoned in first century Judea. There were most likely no comforts or conveniences, and the only thing available to John was time—time to think, time to ponder, time to second-guess, and lots of time to doubt. Was Jesus really the One? Was he the real thing? Had I been right, or had my work been in vain?
Things were not turning out the way they were supposed to. The Messiah was supposed to change things. He was supposed to separate the wheat from the chaff in the world. He was supposed to change things so that men like Herod were no longer in power and men like John the Baptist were no longer in prison. Jesus wasn’t doing the things John thought the Messiah was supposed to do, and John was full of disappointment and doubt.
I suppose we’ve all been disappointed with God at one time or another. A loved one gets sick and dies. A terrorist attack takes place somewhere in the world. Tornadoes tear up a town or earthquakes devastate the lives of hundreds, even thousands of people.
Our disappointment comes because of faulty expectations. Sometimes we fail to really see God because we are blinded by the picture we have painted of God in our mind. If we are going to see God at work in the world then we need to remove the blinders of our expectations and look with the eyes of faith. We need to be open to seeing beyond what we have grown to expect.
Doubt is nothing new. Even the most faithful disciples throughout human history have experienced their dark nights of the soul and their season of doubt. Think about Thomas Merton, Mother Teresa, Martin Luther, the Apostle Thomas, and so many other pillars of faith who wrestled with doubt, lived with it and expressed it, and yet did not let it consume them.
John the Baptist, in spite of his imprisonment and uncertain future, refused to wallow in his doubt. He did not allow it to disappoint and embitter him. According to Matthew’s account he sent word by his disciples to Jesus and asked him directly: “Are you the one who is to come, or are we to wait for another?”
A commentary on this text says: “Jesus meets John’s questioning and doubt directly. There are no heavy theological treatises or condemnation of his doubt handed down. Not at all! Jesus provides the answer through the witness of his disciples.” “Go and tell John what you hear and see,” Jesus says. “The blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them.”
Jesus wants John to know that he, Jesus, is indeed the one foretold by the prophets, he wants him to know that something extraordinary is starting to happen, and that John was the one sent by God to proclaim this good news and to prepare the way. But don’t accept and believe just because I’m telling you, Jesus says. Listen to the good news of what’s been happening and then judge, have faith, and believe.
We all need to look with the eyes of faith and see God at work in and through all the ordinary elements of our lives. We need to see God in the face of our neighbors. We need to look for God at work in the world. We need to not allow our faulty expectations to trip us up and cause our faith to falter.
Being disillusioned about God is not necessarily a bad thing. Disillusionment is literally the loss of an illusion. And in the long run, it is never a bad thing to lose the lies we have mistaken for the truth.
Did Jesus fail to give you everything you prayed for? Then perhaps Jesus is not a genie. Did Jesus fail to punish your enemies? Then perhaps Jesus is not a police officer. Did Jesus fail to make everything run smoothly? Then perhaps Jesus is not a mechanic. Over and over our disappointments draw us deeper and deeper into who Jesus really is and what Jesus really does.
Disillusionment, questions, and doubt can be good things. Frederick Buechner says: “Doubts are the ants in the pants of faith. They keep it awake and moving.”
John had to deal with his disillusionment over Jesus. He wanted Jesus to condemn sinners—instead, Jesus ate with them. He wanted Jesus to proclaim fire and brimstone—instead, Jesus preached about God’s love.
Jesus didn’t answer John’s question by coming right out and saying he was the one. But he did tell John to look at the works he was doing and draw his own conclusions.
Barbara Brown Taylor paraphrases Jesus’ answer this way: “People who were blind to the love loose in the world have received their sight; people who were paralyzed with fear are limber with hope; people who were deaf from want of good news are singing hymns.
“And best and most miraculous of all, tell John that this is not the work of one lonely messiah, but the work of God, carried out by all who believe, and there is no end in sight. Tell him I am the one, if you must, but tell him also that yes, he should look for another and another and another. Tell him to search every face for the face of God and not get tripped up on me, because what is happening here is bigger than any of us. What is coming to pass is as big as the Kingdom of God.”
Jesus is the one. He is the one God anointed to bring good news to the world. He is the one who was called to show and share how much God loves us. He is the one who came into the world to serve. He is also the one who calls us to be the one.
We probably aren’t called to do this on a grand, world-changing scale, but rather by living out our faith every day in ordinary ways.
We can share God’s love by talking to someone who is lonely. We can provide God’s care by visiting the sick. We can show God’s compassion by comforting someone who is grieving. We can demonstrate the peace of God by not retaliating when someone wrongs us. We can show our concern for the poor by giving gifts that help provide food, clothing, and shelter.
Last year on the Third Sunday of Advent we read from Luke’s Gospel a story similar to what we read last week in Matthew’s Gospel. John is preaching and baptizing, crowds are coming out to see him, and he calls upon the people to do good works, because “every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.”
And then, in Luke’s telling of the story, the people are so stirred up by John’s words that they call out, “What then shall we do?” And John tells them exactly what they should do.
“Whoever has two coats must share with anyone who has none; and whoever has food must do likewise.” In other words, in the words of our Baptismal Covenant, “Seek and serve Christ in all persons, loving your neighbor as yourself.”
To the tax collectors he said: “Collect no more than the amount prescribed for you.” In other words, “Strive for justice…among all people.”
And to the soldiers he said: “Do not extort money from anyone by threats or false accusations…” In other words, “Respect the dignity of every human being.”
Today is the Third Sunday of Advent and we light the pink candle on the Advent Wreath. It used to be called Gaudete Sunday from the Latin word “rejoice,” which was the first word of the opening prayer of the Latin Mass for this Sunday.
It is a reminder of the joyful coming of God in the person of Jesus at Bethlehem, a reminder to rejoice in the presence of God with us and among us today, and a reminder that as Christian people we wait in joyful hope for the second coming of Christ.
The message for us today is that we are called to be stewards of this good news, and to be active participants in ushering in God’s righteous reign. “We are charged with telling the world that something new is happening, just as the prophet Isaiah did with these words, ‘Strengthen the weak hands, and make firm the feeble knees.’ Say to those who are of a fearful heart, ‘Be strong, do not fear! Here is your God.’”
The Season of Advent calls us to wait in joyful expectation; of that there is no doubt. Yet that waiting should not be static. We are called to go into the world, strengthened by the Word, strengthened by bread and wine, to tell all people that Jesus comes, that hope abounds, and that there is a place at the table and in the community for everyone. Even as we wait, salvation breaks in around us, and God is active in the world. What good news! Now go and tell!
AMEN
---
Friday, December 10, 2010
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