Lent / Easter 2009 - Sunshine Cathedral, Fort Lauderdale, Florida

A Journal of Progressive, Positive, Practical Theology
a publication of
Light University Press
and
The Sunshine Cathedral
www.sunshinecathedral.org
CONTENTS
About Our Contributors...2
Give It Up! (Rev. Elder Nancy Wilson)...4
Repentance: An Ash Wednesday Reflection...6
A Sermon for Holy Thursday (Dr. Angela Bauer-Levesque)...8
Good Grief (Rev. Durrell Watkins)...12
The Pieta (Rev. Dr. Mona West)...13
Muscles Between the Ears (Dr. Ed Allemand)...15
Lenten Disciplines...20
An Open Letter to the Pope (Dr. John McNeill)...22
Memory Lane...28
Easter Blessing (a poem)...36
Dignity Won’t Stay Dead (Rev. Durrell Watkins)...36
Lent/Easter 2009
Lent/Easter 2009
Contributors to this issue:
Dr. Angela Bauer-Levesque is the Professor of Bible, Culture, &
Interpretation at the Episcopal Divinity School. She holds an MDiv
from the University of Hamburg and both the MPhil and PhD from
Union Theological Seminary in the City of New York.
Rev. Durrell Watkins is the Sunshine Cathedral’s Senior Pastor.
Durrell holds a BA from Henderson State University, an MA from
Goddard College, an MDiv from Union Theological Seminary in
NYC, and is currently a DMin candidate at the Episcopal
Divinity School.
Dr. Ed Allemand is Professor Emeritus, School of Computer Science at DePaul University. Professor Allemand has also been a university Dean, Professor of Philosophy, and Chair of the Division
of Philosophy & Religion at De Paul. He holds the BA and STB
degrees from St. Mary’s Seminary University, the MA from De
Paul University, and the PhD from Louvain University in Belgium.
He was a Fulbright Scholar for the 1966-1967 academic year.
Rev. Gail Tapscott is a Unitarian Universalist minister and a graduate of Harvard Divinity School.
Rev. Dr. John J. McNeill co-founded the New York chapter of
Dignity, an affirming organization for LBGT Catholics, 1974. He is
a theologian and a retired therapist. He holds a PhD from Louvain
University and he is the author of five books, the most recent being
Sex As God Intended.
Rev. Dr. Kathleen A. Bishop is a New Thought minister.
Deacon Marian Cavagnaro, MS, MRS is the Outreach Minister for
Sunshine Cathedral. She is currently a Divinity student at Florida
Center for Theological Studies.
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Rev. Michael Diaz holds a BA from Oral Roberts University and
an MDiv from the Episcopal Divinity School where he is currently
enrolled in the DMin program. He is the Volunteer Coordinator at
Sunshine Cathedral.
Rev. Dr. Mona West is the Director of Clergy Development for
Metropolitan Community Churches, a bible scholar, and spiritual
director. She holds a BA from Louisiana College, an MDiv and
PhD in Hebrew Bible from Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, and a Certificate in Spiritual Direction from Columbia Theological Seminary.
Rev. Elder Nancy Wilson is the Presiding Moderator of Metropolitan Community Churches. Rev. Wilson holds a BA from Allegheny
College and an MDiv from Ss. Cyril & Methodius Seminary. She
also studied theology at Boston University and is currently in the
DMin program at the Episcopal Divinity School. She is the author
of Amazing Grace with Fr. Malcom Boyd; Our Tribe: Queer Folks,
God, Jesus and the Bible; the brochure Our Story Too; and she contributed to Race and Prayer (M. Boyd and Chester Talton, eds).
Rev. Robert Griffin is the Director of Religious Education &
Christian Social Action at Sunshine Cathedral and serves as the
Academic Dean of Light University. Robert holds an MDiv from
the Episcopal Divinity School in Cambridge, MA, where he is a
member of the Board of Trustees and he is currently a DMin candidate at Florida Center for Theological Studies.
Lent/Easter 2009............................................................................................................3
Give It Up!
Nancy L. Wilson
I remember the joke I heard as a young person, that what most
people give up for Lent is their New Year’s resolutions.
If you grew up Catholic, or saw “Doubt” recently, you remember
Lent!
Giving up things, sweets, luxuries during Lent was a simple way
the church could drive home the idea of penance, of the seriousness of sin, and sorrow for sin. It was a more socially acceptable
way of “mortifying the flesh,” of expressing the ideas of self-discipline, control over ones desires.
We live in times so far from those ideas, even those phrases – although I did read recently that the Catholic Church is bringing
back the idea of plenary indulgences, and having to introduce a
whole generation of more light-weight Catholics to the idea!
As an MCC pastor and preacher over the years, I have wrestled
with how to re-interpret such ideas. One year, when we had lost
our building (MCC-Los Angeles) in an earthquake, I arranged to
have our Wednesday evening program during Lent at the Comedy
Club in West Hollywood. It only seemed right to do a comedy program, so we did! It was so un-Lent like, and irreverent, but creative
and challenging. And, not only did our own people come, but tourists who did not want to pay the $10 cover charge to hear Richard
Prior came upstairs to hear us instead!
One way to “do Lent,” might be to make a list of things to give up
that would enhance our relationship with God, neighbor and the
planet.
Here is my top ten list of what to give up for Lent:
1)
Thinking I have to have all the answers. It is really the
questions that should fascinate me.
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2)
Believing that if we only had more money, we could solve
every problem.
3)
Plastic grocery bags (and if I leave the cloth ones in the car,
go back and retrieve them!)
4)
Despair about peace in the Middle East, and the world.
5)
Wondering when Ted Haggard will come out, really, or his
wife will figure it out, really.
6)
Fear of failure, fear of success, and the tyranny of both.
7)
Giving away my own power and authority, as a free human
being created in the image of God.
8)
Trying to fix what cannot be fixed.
9)
Limiting God’s amazing power and grace.
10)
Forgetting to be grateful for life, and love in all its abundance.
This was not really as easy to do as I first imagined. Try it today.
The Pope won’t like it very much, which makes it all the more fun.
Especially for Lent...Give it up!
*****
Lent/Easter 2009............................................................................................................5
Repentance: An Ash Wednesday Reflection
Durrell Watkins
Have mercy upon me, O God, according to thy lovingkindness: according to the multitude of thy tender mercies blot out my transgressions.
2
Wash me thoroughly from mine iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin.
3
For I acknowledge my transgressions: and my sin is ever before me.
10
Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me.
11
Cast me not away from thy presence; and take not thy holy spirit
from me.
12
Restore unto me the joy of thy salvation; and uphold me with thy
free spirit.
16
For thou desirest not sacrifice; else would I give it: thou delightest not
in burnt offering.
17
The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit: a broken and a contrite heart,
O God, thou wilt not despise... (Psalm 51, AV)
1
To repent is to change, to turn from something and toward something else, to change an attitude, a thought, a perception, a plan of
action...to make a change, to change one’s mind...that’s repentance.
To change our minds about God, or ourselves, or other people...
to say, “I used to believe that I was unworthy or that other people
where horrible wretches, but now I don’t. Now I believe that we
are all made in God’s image and filled with God’s spirit;” that’s a
change of perception. That’s repentance.
The Psalmist models that same kind of change of perception...He
starts out in Psalm 51 saying, “God, I’m no good. Fix me if you
can. Don’t give up on me!” But later, he seems to have worked it
out and gotten to a healthier place, saying, “You don’t delight in
sacrifice...what you want is for us to tear down the artificial obstacles and to live humbly but joyously with you.”
This Lent, let’s repent daily. Let’s repent of any notion that God is
punishing. Let’s repent of any notion that God has a single soul to
waste. Let’s repent of any notion that God would abandon us for
any reason. Let’s repent of the notion that God favors one nation or
one religion or one gender or one sexual orientation over all others.
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Let’s repent of the notion that God is angry, that God can’t love
us into wholeness as the people we are. Let’s change our minds
and REALLY believe in ourselves and in our potential, and as we
learn to love ourselves, we can then love our neighbors as we love
ourselves. And that’s the kind of repentance that will change the
world.
*****
Lent/Easter 2009............................................................................................................7
A Sermon for Holy Thursday
Exodus 12.1-14a; Psalm 78.14-19, 23-25; Luke 22.14-30
Angela Bauer-Levesque
“Remember the day of your departure from the land of Egypt all
the days of your life!” (Deut. 16.3) Remember the liberation from
enslavement in Egypt! Remember the moment of liberation, the
praxis of liberation, the consequences of liberation!
“We need to remember the past to understand the present to make
possible a future,” says Canon Ed Rodman, professor for Urban
Ministry here.
“The church as a community is all about the matrix of memory,
praxis and hope,” Professor of Theology Christopher Duraisingh
keeps reminding us.
“Do this to remember me,” says the Lukan Jesus.
“Remember me...
Remember who I am, was, and will be; remember the one who
heals the sick, the blind, the lepers; the one who sets the prisoners
free and brings liberation to those who are oppressed;
Remember me, the one who has talked in parables and lived a life
of integrity,
The one who is going to be murdered on the cross, punished for
challenging the status quo of the social order, ... “Remember me...”
Jesus says this at a moment of transition, at a moment of fear...
at the last meal before “I will suffer,” he says, almost “Passover”
—pascho/pascha—so close and yet so far apart.
In this week when Jewish and Christian history touch, overlap,
collide... In this week when one remembrance occasions another,
memory and fear mark the mealtime in the upper room where
preparations have been made.
This Passover meal is to be Jesus’ last meal—
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“I have eagerly desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer; for I tell you, I will not eat it again until it is fulfilled in the
realm of God”—
This is the bread of poverty which our ancestors ate in the land of
Egypt. Let all who are hungry enter and eat; let all who are needy
come to our Passover feast. This year we are here; next year may
we be in the land. This year we are enslaved; next year may we be
free.
“Why does this night differ from all other nights?”
“A wandering Aramean was my ancestor who went down into
Egypt and lived there as an alien, few in number, and there became a great nation, mighty and populous. When the Egyptians
treated us harshly and afflicted us, we cried out to the LORD and
the LORD heard our cry and saw our affliction, our toil, and our
oppression, and brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand and an
outstretched arm, with a terrifying display of power, and with signs
and wonders; and brought us into this place and gave us this land, a
land flowing with milk and honey.” (Deut. 26.4-9)
Memory...memory of liberation, theirs and ours, memory that occasions celebration, care, and commitment. Memory that comes with
signs and symbols—a cloud by day and a fire by night, bread and
cup...
Action of making memory, remembrance, action that asks for
repetition—“whenever you do this...” And a couple of days from
now, remember today, remember tomorrow...
You have got to do it. You have got to love it, and touch it and eat
it and drink it and dance it and be it...
And amidst celebration of liberation, there is anticipation of suffering and death—the last time before I’ll suffer, says Jesus. And this
clarity of certain uncertainty begets fear of what is to come, fear of
who is going to be the one, uncertainty of whom to trust and whom
to suspect, and once that dynamic starts, it spreads.
Lent/Easter 2009............................................................................................................9
Who could be exempt? Not me, and not you, and not those gathered in the upper room.
So during meal conversation, “a dispute arose among them as to
which one of them was to be regarded as the greatest.” On the
threshold of the passion, of monumental happenings, the disciples
worry about who would be the greatest.
Are they out of their minds? Don’t they get it? Where have they
been? From the outside their behavior looks so preposterous. And
yet, we know the reaction all too well ourselves, in the face of being overwhelmed, overwhelmed with fear and worry and sadness,
in moments of being off-center emotionally.
Yes, we switch the topic, talk about ourselves, yourself, myself,
recall the instances where I am left out, treated unfairly; where
someone thinks I am too young or too big or too white, too queer,
too old, or too quiet or too this or too that... It’s like the reversal in
the words to the tune that I can’t get out of my head ... (humming)
“Jesus, remember me, when you come into the kingdom...” Me,
me, me...
I am sure psychology has a name for this kind of replacement, this
escaping from the intense emotions of the moment by switching to
more manageable ones—“a dispute arose among them as to which
one of them was to be regarded as the greatest.”
Jesus at this point doesn’t go there, doesn’t engage the debate but
ends it by saying that it is diakonein, serving, serving the community, that makes one the greatest—the kind of work that those at
the bottom of the social order do, usually women and all enslaved
people at the time. And without further discussion, Jesus proclaims
that what matters is to stand by him in his trials, to take a public
stance, to be out about what is right and important and real. And he
asks everyone, not just those who are thought of as having nothing
to lose.
Yes, Luke knows that the disciples fled, and not just mentally
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by switching the topic. And Jesus fears exactly that, entering the
sequence of events for which he is prepared/is preparing himself—
the sequence that includes denial and leads to death on a cross.
“Do this to remember me.”
A meal of comfort and remembrance at a threshold moment.
Before suffering, as a consequence of a life, lived to effect liberation—and not the other way around!—before facing injustice and
death head on, more signs and symbols, collected along the way to
Golgatha—from the jubilation of last Sunday, the parade into Jerusalem, to the sustenance of relationship and blessing in the anointing by the woman of Bethany and the washing of feet to the last
Passover meal where past and future merge in the food and drink
of remembrance, of memory - memory of the past and memory of
the future, joy, fear, and hope in the here. AMEN.
Preached in St. John’s Memorial Chapel,
Episcopal Divinity School, Cambridge, MA
April 12, 2001
*****
Lent/Easter 2009............................................................................................................11
Good Grief: Thoughts for Good Friday
Durrell Watkins
“When they came to the place called the Skull, there they crucified
him...” Luke 23.33
The crucifixion is for me a horrible day in human history. The
Romans (and the Babylonians before them) used crucifixion as
a means of punishment; but that it happened to someone who is
part of our faith history (a spiritual ancestor if you will) makes it
personal for me.
Jesus, who is important to me, was tortured and slowly killed in
one of the most inhumane ways imaginable. Crucifixion was a
tribute to human cruelty, and I don’t believe God required or even
sanctioned such brutality. When Jesus was betrayed, beaten, and
executed, when his mother and his beloved held each other and
cried as they watched him struggle for breath, God was, I must
believe, present, not as the architect of the abuse but as one more
mourner (perhaps God is always the first to cry in response to
injustice) stunned and incredulous that the human family can be so
vicious, so ruthless. To reflect on Jesus’ death, even though it was
so long ago, only be brings me sadness.
My consolation is that a terrible day at Golgotha didn’t put an end
to Jesus’ significance. There is more to come, and we’ll celebrate
that on Easter. Golgotha didn’t have the last word. But as much as
I revel in the healing moment we call Easter, I can’t overlook the
tragedy of Good Friday.
I can love and follow Jesus without glorifying his violent death. I
grieve for the way his life ended, even as on Easter I will rejoice
at how he lives again. But for today, I allow myself to be sad as I
remember the pain and the cruelty of crucifixion.
*****
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The Pieta
Mona West
I remember a day from Lent several years ago. It was a day that
I unexpectedly spent with the Pieta. I didn’t go to Italy, I went to
Oak Cliff, Texas. I went to a Carmelite monastery to spend the day
in prayer and much to my surprise I spent the day with the Pieta,
and with Mary.
Upon arriving in my room for the day I noticed several icons: A
painting of The Virgin of Vladimir and the cross of Taize were
hanging on the walls. A small replica of Michelangelo’s Pieta was
sitting on the writing desk.
As I gazed at the figure of Mary holding her crucified son I was
overcome with feelings for her. How many times had she held
Jesus? An infant at her breast, a small boy who had hurt himself, a
grown man leaving home for ministry....and now a crucified savior.
In this small statue Mary’s breasts seem shriveled, dried up—no
longer able to provide her son with nourishment and comfort. I
can imagine that as she held Jesus’ broken body her breasts ached,
along with her heart. What was the full weight of her son’s body
like, compared to his infant’s flesh?
Her right hand caresses Jesus pierced side. But it does not touch
his flesh. A piece of her garment comes between her hand and her
son—almost as if she has placed it there out of respect, or caution,
or preparation. The span of her hand is out of proportion with the
rest of her body. She bears this holy child of hers with supernatural strength—in death as in conception.
Her face is young and thin. Not turned toward his, but bowed in
prayer. The ponderings of her heart come to rest over the limp
body of her son. Her body is in such stark contrast to his. All
you can see of Mary is her hands and face. The rest of her body
is concealed in the folds of her garment and head covering. The
Lent/Easter 2009............................................................................................................13
naked body of her son is stark in her lap. It is as if her garments
will become his burial shroud.
This statue on my desk is flanked by books I have brought for
the day. On the front cover of one is a 14th century stained glass
rendering of the nativity, with Mary holding her newborn child,
gazing intently into his eyes. Baby Jesus is smiling, Mary seems
perplexed.
As I focus again on Mary’s face in the Pieta, the whole story is
there...from manger, to cross, to mother’s lap. From a perplexed
gaze, to horror, to prayer.
The prayerful gaze on Mary’s face evoked this prayer in me:
O Jesus, may I be your shroud.
May I carry your death in me.
Who has placed you here in my lap?
Do I dare look into your face?
Your face with remnants of anguish, now finally at rest...
With outstretched arms I take you into me.
They become your cross, cradling you now;
Your cross at rest in me.
The weight of you is almost too much to bear,
But there is no other way to hold you this close. Amen.
*****
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Muscles Between the Ears
Some Thoughts on Reason and Faith
Ed Allemand
“Some of you have all your muscles between your ears!” said
“Coach” to the gym class and looked right at me. Yes, this was
one of those awful gym classes we endured. I think I was about
in sixth grade. I felt put down, but he was right, of course, because
my mind was my survival mechanism in school and afterwards. It
got me my lifetime career and has provided a lot of good information on living life. Admittedly, I also missed a point for a long
while because of my reliance on the intellectual. The point was
obvious to many people: that some of the most important things in
life are not accessed through the intellect. Love, beauty, a Higher
Dimension which some call God, and the like. But the role of the
mind in our lives and especially in our spiritual lives has always
interested me. What follows is a brief reflection on that role.
In more formal terms I am discussing the relationship of reason
and faith. This is an old, well-worn subject. The Middle Ages
spent endless hours and God knows how much ink on it. Thomas
Aquinas and Bernard of Clairvaux went on and on about it. The
whole upheaval of the Renaissance and the intellectual tyranny of
the Church over such people as Galileo were about it. One of the
founders of the scientific method because he wed mathematics and
observation, Galileo’s observations of the moons of Jupiter ran
contrary to the supposed revealed truth of religion. His was one of
the first modern scuffles between religion and scientific method.
The Eastern Orthodox, not to mention many traditions of Asian
thought, has wrestled with what we are to do with the mind and
thinking when approaching the deepest Realty or God. Eastern
meditation techniques, especially Zen meditation, all seem to
center on quieting the mind. Not an easy task, for the brain is extremely active, constantly so, even in our sleep.
Lent/Easter 2009............................................................................................................15
More recently there is also some gay perspective on the question
as well and it is perhaps a somewhat new look at the old question.
First of all, several psychotherapeutic writers, talking about “growing up gay,” point out that most of us had to break “out of the box”
(sorry!!!) when we were quite young. Because we didn’t fit in or
didn’t feel we did, we did a lot of thinking about ourselves and our
world. Our mind became a very important tool in figuring out the
question, “How the...do I relate to this world?” and “What is this
that I am feeling?” As a result many of us became thinkers about
religion and the world very early on.
Many of us struggled through a lot of intellectual exploration of
our religious roots. We traveled a considerable journey of reading and thinking, sorting out true spirituality from ecclesiastical
politics, history and myth, ritualistic traditions and moral questions. Often we did so because the religions had not treated us well
but we still felt there was “something there.” The outcome of this
contemporary intellectual effort on the part of gay spiritual thinkers
is a vast new literature on “gay spirituality”.
Sometimes this intellectual analysis of religious belief means spiritual pain and crisis. I can remember many moments when I read
something and my first reaction was, “Some church leaders have
misled me (sometimes I used a stronger word like ‘lied’). “ For
some time, usually short, I “lost faith”. I had some readjusting to
do.
Let me cite two examples. The first was many, many years ago in
a seminary class on the book of Genesis. The professor, utilizing
the best of the new scriptural scholarship, was talking about the
famous Sodom and Gomorrah story. He began by saying, “At the
south end of the Dead Sea there are a set of salt stalagmites. This
story of Sodom and Gomorrah is a theological parable built around
these natural phenomena.” My reaction was an internal “Wow!”
This was my first time ever realizing that Scripture was not always
historical and literally true, but had other intentions such as making
a theological point. It took some adjusting.
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Another realization came when I read a noted New Testament
scholar who demonstrated that there were many early Christian
communities, that there were indeed many “Christianities” in the
first two decades after the death of Jesus of Nazareth. Each of
these communities had fashioned its literature around its view of
Jesus. Those views ranged widely. Some early Palestinian groups
pictured Jesus simply as a peasant teacher and healer. There was
no allusion in their literature to a death and resurrection. Others, in
a different locale to the north and following the Hellenistic paradigm of the noble death like that of Socrates as portrayed by Plato,
developed a more elaborate myth of Jesus’ martyrdom in Jerusalem. Still others and a few decades later came to see him as divine.
This reading, admittedly one scholar’s take on the subject but one
respected for its careful analysis of the texts, made me realize that
what I had always read as biography contained multiple and different developments by early Christians. It simply was not entirely
fact-based as though it were the Evening News report on Jesus in
Galilee and Judea in the 30’s A.D.
Some people have reacted very negatively to such rational, scholarly work which has produced these different views of Jesus. For
some this painstakingly worked out information became simply
one more proof of the absurdity or the primitive irrationality of religion. They took a kind of “I told you so!” attitude. It became yet
another reason to condemn the intellectual blindness of religious
people.
For still others the work of such scholars “spoiled it all” and they
didn’t want it spoiled. Their practice of religion involved a lifetime of beliefs and, especially, practices that had great emotional
appeal. For them all this scholarship just spoiled the whole thing.
For still others this work on the scriptures is a kind of blasphemy.
Belief and rational work for them are opposed. For them the gospels and indeed the entire canonical Bible were the Word of God
and not to be tampered with. This scholarly work angers them.
Lent/Easter 2009............................................................................................................17
Surely there are limits to what the mind can do and what is its valid
territory. The tough job is marking those limits and showing the
boundaries of that territory.
Philosophy has worked hard on the “limits of the mind”. A great
deal of the philosophical work of the last four centuries is devoted
to attempting to define precisely what the mind can know and can’t
know. The so-called “epistemological question” -- what can we
know with certitude--has worried philosophers from Descartes in
the 1600’s onward. The “scientific method” has been worked over
and over. Immanuel Kant, in typical German fashion, produced
several volumes trying to detail exactly what the mind using the
scientific method can know and what it simply must leave as true
but of a moral order known by a moral power, the realm of a practical reason which is not scientific.
The uses and limits of language and logic preoccupied many of
the twentieth century thinkers. The great Wittgenstein forced us to
face the question of whether we can know anything beyond what
we can formulate in well founded language. Late in the century
the French structuralists suggested that all knowledge has its cultural bias, its culturally based literary structure. Thus, even
science was a form of speaking about realty tied to the Western
rational experience.
What is the function of the mind? What is the relation of reason
and faith? If the intellectual process brings us from time to time to
disturbing facts or conclusions that upset previous beliefs, what is
its good? My own experience is that it clears the ground. It rids
my thinking of what is not true or what I don’t have to believe.
It pushes me “beyond”. It seems that the intellectual journey
brings us to the limits of our knowledge and then presents us with
a choice: is there something more? Is there a beyond or above?
Does that beyond or above lead me to a course of action?
To return to my previous example: having realized that there
were in the early decades of our common era many “Christianities”
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each with its own “take” on Jesus, I am pushed to the point where I
can ask, “Is there something in this Jesus and in his teaching
which I can take in and act upon?” Indeed, I will have a choice
of the particular “Jesus” I choose. But I now choose with a mind
freed of dogmatic pressure. My intellectual journey has brought
me to a free moment of acceptance and affirmation which I might
call “faith.”
*****
Lent/Easter 2009............................................................................................................19
Lenten Disciplines
Durrell Watkins
Traditional Lenten disciplines include daily prayer, weekly fasting, self-denial, and “alms-giving.” How can we take these ancient
practices and employ them in meaningful, 21st ways? Here are a
few suggestions:
1. Daily Prayer. If you already have a practice of daily prayer, then
keep it up. Some people read prayers from a book while others
read and reflect on daily devotional writings in such publications as
Daily Word, Creative Thought, or Sunshine Cathedral’s own Spirit
& Truth. Others pray the Rosary. Some use affirmations, visualization, or chanting. There are many ways to pray and as a priest once
instructed me, “to try to pray is to pray.” So, to have the intention
of prayer is to already be praying. If you don’t have a discipline of
daily prayer, here’s something that you can easily do: Sit down and
be quiet. It’s that simple...just center yourself, follow your breath,
quiet your mind, and just be. Can you do it for a minute? 5? 10?
15? Just sit. You will find you are communing with the Sacred
Energy (what you call it is your choice) and that is prayer.
2. Weekly Fasting. This usually means that on Fridays one avoids
meat and eats less overall. But I remember that wonderful passage
in Hosea: “I desire love, not sacrifice...” (6.6). Maybe what we are
to abstain from isn’t dessert, but negative attitudes and behaviors
that aren’t life-giving. Rather than denying ourselves nutrition,
why not fast from complaining, gossiping, or feeling hopeless!
Why not offer Love instead of sacrifice?
3. Self-Denial. Who hasn’t given up something for Lent? Listen, if
there is something destructive in your life and Lent is your motivation for trying to let it go (smoking? Drinking too much? Over-eating?), then by all means, give it up (but then, don’t use Easter as an
excuse to pick it back up!). But otherwise, maybe what we should
“deny” isn’t some simple pleasure for a short time, but instead,
let’s deny whatever lie we’ve allowed to torment us. If we’ve heard
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that same-gender love and attraction are sinful...let’s deny that horrible lie and give it no power in our lives! If we’ve heard that we
are limited by our past mistakes or by the judgments others have
made about us...let’s deny that such statements have any truth for
us. If we’ve believed that we are unworthy of joy in our lives...
let’s deny that there is any truth in that misplaced belief. Instead
of “self” denial, let’s deny whatever keeps us from being our best
Selves!
4. Alms-giving. Generosity is an important spiritual discipline and
need not be limited to Lent. If we are not yet in the habit of financially supporting the place that nurtures us spiritually, then let’s use
Lent to develop that habit. Of course there are charities, organizations that work for justice and peace, institutions of higher learning and other good causes that we can support as well. Generous
living helps us to develop a generous spirit, and that is something
that will always sustain us and bless others. Generosity isn’t just
a Lenten discipline, it’s a spiritual discipline that we can joyously
experience in all seasons of our lives.
Let’s not make Lent a needlessly somber, depressing, and painful
experience. Let’s use Lent to develop life-long practices that will
add hope, joy, and empowerment to our lives. May our Lenten
journeys lead us to Resurrection possibilities!
*****
Lent/Easter 2009............................................................................................................21
An Open Letter to Pope Benedict XVI,
Cardinal Levada, Cardinal George and all Bishops of
the Roman Catholic Church in the World on the
Issue of Homosexuality
John J. McNeill
My initial open letter of November 2000 was addressed to the
American Bishops at their annual conference. In the past eight-plus
years, the contents of the letter have taken on greater relevance
and force in the light of new scientific discoveries concerning the
nature of homosexual orientation and the psychological and spiritual needs of GLBT people, their families and loved ones, as well
as recent statements from the Roman Catholic Church’s teaching
authority out of touch with those discoveries.
As a result, I would like to readdress the letter to the following:
Pope Benedict XVI; Cardinal William Levada, prefect of the
Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF); Cardinal Francis George, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops
(USCCB) and his fellow American bishops and, finally, to all the
bishops of the Roman Catholic Church in the world.
Catholic gay and lesbian people demand that, if the Church wants
to be seen as their loving mother, mediating to us God’s unconditional love, the Church has no choice except to enter into dialogue
with its gay members.
In 1974, the delegates of DignityUSA’s first national convention
requested in a letter that a dialogue be opened between the American bishops and the members of the Catholic gay and lesbian community. With very few exceptions that letter was ignored.
Now, 38 years later, once again I call for open dialogue.
For over 38 years, I have ministered as priest and psychotherapist
to lesbians and gays. I helped found Dignity/New York to provide
a safe and loving community within the Catholic Church for gay
22............................................................................................................Sharing the Light
people. For over 33 years, I have given retreats for lesbians and
gays at Kirkridge, an ecumenical retreat center.
I have written four books on gay spirituality: The Church and the
Homosexual; Taking a Chance on God; Freedom, Glorious Freedom and Sex As God Intended: A Reflection on Human Sexuality
As Play. I also published an autobiography on my own spiritual
journey as a gay priest. As a result of my experience, I have come
to the conclusion that what is at stake at this point in time is not
only the spiritual and psychological health of many gay and lesbian
Catholics and other lesbian and gay Christians, as well as their
families and loved ones. What is at stake is your moral authority to
teach on the issue of homosexuality.
In the past, when you undertook a listening process to hear what
the Holy Spirit was saying through the People of God, you won
our respect. We respected you when you made your statements
on the economy, on nuclear warfare and, especially, your aborted
effort to draw up a letter on the role of women in the Church. You
listened carefully to what women had to say, and drew up your
statements responding to what you heard from women. These actions gave us gay and lesbians reason to hope that the Holy Spirit
would lead you into a spirit of willingness to listen to us gay and
lesbian Catholics.
What is at stake now is your own moral authority! Unless we gay
and lesbian Catholics receive the message that you take us seriously and are willing to listen carefully to what the Holy Spirit
is saying to you through our lives and our experience, your judgments on homosexuality will be ignored, for the most part, and you
will lose what authority you have left to deserve to be listened to
with respect on this issue.
I have never heard the same level of courage from the American
bishops in dealing with the Vatican as that shown by the Major
Superiors of Religious Men in response to the egregious document
issued by The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, entitled,
Lent/Easter 2009............................................................................................................23
“Some Considerations Concerning Homosexual Persons” as follows:
“We view (this document) as a hindrance to the Church leaders of
the United States in this most difficult and sensitive area of human
living. We are shocked that the statement calls for discrimination
against gay men and lesbian women. We find the reasoning for
supporting such discrimination to be strained, unconvincing and
counterproductive to our statements and actions to support the
pastoral needs and personal dignity of such persons. Far from a
help to the bishops and other religious leaders in the United States
Catholic Church, the statement complicates our already complex
ministry to all people.
“Moreover we find the arguments used to justify discrimination
based on stereotypes and falsehoods that are out of touch with
modern psychological and sociological understandings of human
sexuality. We regret such actions by the CDF and we reaffirm our
support for the human rights of all our brothers and sisters.”
As a gay Catholic theologian and psychotherapist, I am fully aware
of the enormous destruction recent Vatican and USCCB documents, and news items, as well as actions taken by the USCCB
and several state Catholic Conferences in the U.S. leading up to
the November 2008 elections, have caused in the psychic life of
young Catholic gays, and of the violence they will provoke against
all gay people. This was compounded further by the initial Vatican
reaction and announced opposition to the United Nations proposal
sponsored by France and backed by 27 European Union nations
which seeks to end the practice of criminalizing and punishing
people for their sexual orientation—their very human nature and
spiritual being. I find myself in a dilemma—what kind of faith and
trust can I place in a teaching authority that I see clearly acts in an
unloving, hateful and destructive way toward my gay family and
is more interested in defending its institutional interest than it is in
truth and justice?
In the name of the thousands of gay and lesbian Catholics and
other Christians to whom it has been my God-given privilege to
24............................................................................................................Sharing the Light
minister, I make this statement: At this point, the ignorance and
distortion of homosexuality, and the use of stereotypes and falsehoods in official Church documents, forces us who are gay Catholics to issue the institutional Church a serious warning. Your ignorance of homosexuality can no longer be excused as inculpable; it
has become a deliberate and malicious ignorance. In the name of
Catholic gays and lesbians everywhere, we cry out “Enough!”
Enough! Enough of your distortions of Scripture. You continue
to claim that a loving homosexual act in a committed relationship
is condemned in Scripture, when competent scholars are nearly
unanimous in acknowledging that nowhere in Scripture is the problem of sexual acts between two gay men or lesbian women who
love each other, ever dealt with, never mind condemned. You must
listen to biblical scholars to find out what Scripture truly has to say
about homosexual relationships.
Enough! Enough of your efforts to reduce all homosexual acts to
expressions of lust, and your refusal to see them as possible expressions of a deep and genuine human love. The second group
you must listen to are competent professional psychiatrists and
psychotherapists from whom you can learn about the healthy and
positive nature of mature gay and lesbian relationships. They will
assure you that homosexual orientation is both not chosen and unchangeable and that any ministry promising to change that orientation is a fraud.
Enough! Enough of your efforts through groups like Courage and
other ex-gay ministries to lead young gays to internalize self-hatred
with the result that they are able to relate to God only as a God of
fear, shame and guilt and lose all hope in a God of mercy and love.
What is bad psychology has to be bad theology!
Enough! Enough again, of your efforts to foster hatred, violence,
discrimination and rejection of us in the human community, as well
as disenfranchising our human and civil rights. We gay and lesbian
Catholics pray daily that the Holy Spirit will lead you into a spirit
of repentance. You must publicly accept your share of the blame
Lent/Easter 2009............................................................................................................25
for gay murders and bashing and so many suicides of young gays
and ask forgiveness from God and from the gay community.
Enough! Enough, also, of driving us from the home of our mother,
the Church, and attempting to deny us the fullness of human intimacy and sexual love. You frequently base that denial by an appeal
to the dead letter of the “natural law.” Another group to whom you
must listen are the moral theologians who, as a majority, argue that
natural law is no longer an adequate basis for dealing with sexual
questions. They must be dealt with within the context of interpersonal human relationships.
Above all else, you must enter into dialogue with the gay and lesbian members of the Catholic community. We are the ones living out
the human experience of a gay orientation, so we alone can discern
directly in our experience what God’s spirit is saying to us.
Today, in life-enriching, supportive environments and networks,
you have gay and lesbian Catholic communities of worship and
prayer who are seeking individually and collectively to hear what
the Spirit is saying to them in their gay experience—what experiences lead to the peace and joy of oneness with the Spirit of God
and what experiences lead away from that peace and joy!
God gave you the commission of discerning the truth. But there is
no mandate from Jesus Christ to “create” the truth. We pray daily
that the Holy Spirit will lead you to search humbly for the truth concerning homosexuality through dialogue with your lesbian sisters
and gay brothers.
The only consolation I can offer gay and lesbian Catholics in the
meantime is the profound hope that the very absurdity and hateful
spirit of recent Vatican and USCCB documents, news items and
political actions will lead gay Catholics to refuse them and recognize the contradiction of their message, and that of Jesus, who never
once spoke a negative word concerning homosexuals.
I work, hope and pray that lesbian and gay Catholics and other gay
Christians will exercise their legitimate freedom of conscience,
discerning what God is saying to them directly through their gay ex26............................................................................................................Sharing the Light
perience. I hope, too, that they will be able to de-fang the poisons of
pathologically homophobic religion, accepting the good news that
God loves them and accepts them as gays and lesbians and refusing
to be caught in the vortex of self-hatred vis-à-vis a God of fear.
I believe that we are at the moment of a special “kairos” [ancient
Greek for ‘right and opportune moment’] in this matter. The Holy
Spirit is “doing something new.” I was the guest at a gay ecumenical community that established homes for adult developmentally
challenged people in the city of Basel in Switzerland. The extraordinary spirit of love and compassion that permeated that community
was a foretaste of what lies in the future. I believe there is a vast
reservoir of human and divine love that has remained until now untapped because of prejudice and homophobia. The Spirit is calling
on you to help release that vast potential of human and divine love
through your actions. Please be assured that the actions of Soulforce and DignityUSA at USCCB national conferences are based
in profound respect and love. The worldwide prayerful vigils in
December 2008 were to raise our concerned voices over the initial
non-supportive posture announced by the Vatican U.N. delegation
towards the proposal for decriminalization of homosexuality. We
are encouraged by that part of the delegation’s statement of December 19, 2008, which states, “The Holy See continues to advocate
that every sign of unjust discrimination towards homosexual persons should be avoided and urges States to do away with criminal
penalties against them.”
We pray and hope that the same Holy Spirit who has graciously
liberated us who are gay to self-respect and self-love will liberate
in you, our Catholic leaders, a profound love for your gay brothers
and lesbian sisters and melt away all prejudice and judgmentalism
in your hearts. May you make us welcome as full members in your
family in Christ.
May God bless your efforts!
Sincerely in Christ,
John J. McNeill
Lent/Easter 2009............................................................................................................27
Memory Lane: Spirit & Truth
Reflections from Sunshine Cathedral’s
Devotional Magazine, Spirit & Truth
Lenten Reflections
What’s This, Lent? (2007)
Robert Griffin
“Give, and it will be given to you.”
Luke 6.38
I grew up Baptist. Lent was not high on the Liturgical Calendar
for my church (as if we had a Liturgical Calendar!). It wasn’t until
I joined the U.S. Navy that I began to observe Lent as a period of
fasting and prayer. It became for me a time of self-sacrifice.
Later in life I realized that instead of giving up something, I could
give something: time, talent, and treasure to people or organizations
I believed in. When I refocused my initial understanding of Lent
from giving up to just giving, Lent and I got along much better.
God, make me an instrument of your service. Help me, through
prayer and meditation, to be what I need to be. May I give in
ways that bring me closer to you.
*****
Remembering (2008)
Michael Diaz
“Do this in remembrance of me.”
1 Corinthians 11.24b
In our love feast, the ritual sharing of bread and wine, we remember a Jesus who incarnated the Divine in his life and who epitomized the God kind of love. Although he was executed on a cross
by the Roman Empire, the lasting memory of his life couldn’t keep
him dead in the hearts of his friends. In the love feast, we remem28............................................................................................................Sharing the Light
ber Jesus, but we are also able to remember all our friends, past
and present, who epitomize Divine love and remain alive in our
hearts. Remembering Jesus and all our friends in our love feast reminds us that all humanity is to take part in the communal sharing
of God’s love.
Today, I remember all those who remain alive in my heart,
Jesus and all my friends who embodied your love, God. May I
and the rest of humanity continue to make your love real to all
people, now and forever. Amen.
*****
We Are One (2008)
Durrell Watkins
“Our own pulse beats in every stranger’s throat, and also there
within the flowered ground beneath our feet...” Barbara Deming
We sometimes make the mistake of thinking that because someone
has different beliefs about God, or because their mutually loving
relationship doesn’t look exactly like ours, or because they worship
God with different symbols or they call God a name other than one
we use, that person must be our adversary. In reality, we are all children of the same Universe. We are one, and healthy religion helps
us remember and celebrate this truth. Progressive Religion agrees
with the lyrics of the song that affirms, “There ain’t no good guys;
there ain’t no bad guys. There’s only you and me and we just disagree.” We’re all one and we’re all made in the image of the One.
There is one Life, one Source, one Principle, one infinite Wisdom and we are each part of the One. I am one with all people
and for this truth, I give thanks. Amen.
*****
Lent/Easter 2009............................................................................................................29
Journey to Divinity (2007)
Durrell Watkins
“...God became human and...human beings became God and
sharers in the divine nature. The only-begotten Son of God...[took]
our nature on itself and became human in order to make humans
gods.”
St. Thomas Aquinas
After Jesus’ baptism, the tradition goes, he went into the wilderness
to battle temptation. He emerged from the experience, we’re told,
ready to begin a ministry that would change the world. The angels
of his higher nature ministered to him; he defeated the doubts and
fears of the Ego, and embraced the truth of his oneness with the
Source of all Life, all Good. Jesus’ wilderness journey helped him
wake up to his own divine greatness. May our Lenten journeys do
the same for us.
I give thanks for the journey that leads me to the awareness of
the Divine Nature within me.
*****
Why God Loves Us (2007)
Michael Diaz
“You are not required to put on evening clothes to meet God.”
Austin O’Malley
Many times we are told God loves us for who we are, but then told
we have to change who we are in order to keep God’s love. We
accept God’s love by being ourselves, but then we’re required to
clothe ourselves in a more respectable fashion? Huh? What if we
take God seriously and realize that God really does love us for who
we actually are! God loves our goodness, our humanity, and our
divineness (yes, even our divinity). We cannot turn to God and let
go of the reasons why God loves us. Let us lift up ourselves and
others knowing that God knows we are good, we are human, and
we are divine.
30............................................................................................................Sharing the Light
Divine One, as I draw nearer to you, help me to realize you
love me for all that I am. Amen.
*****
Where is God When Things are Bad? (2007)
Durrell Watkins
“Jesus cried out in a loud voice...’My God, my God why have you
abandoned me?’”
Mark 15.34
Decades after Jesus’ execution, a hopeless rebellion against Rome
ends with the Temple in Jerusalem being destroyed. About this
time, Mark’s gospel is written. Where is God when our hearts are
breaking? That was Mark’s question, and so he has a tortured Jesus
pray the opening line from the 22nd Psalm in his drama about Jesus’ life. But Mark knew that the psalm that begins with “why have
you abandoned me?” ends with, “posterity will serve the Eternal
and will be told about the All Good...” Why has the Universe abandoned me? Oh, that’s right, It hasn’t! I live in It. It lives in me. The
difficult moment will not last forever. Things will improve, and
until they do, we are not alone.
Infinite, pure Being – where are you when things are difficult?
Oh, now I remember; you are right where I am! I will dare to
hope for better days. Amen.
*****
Easter Reflections
Christ Was Raised (2007)
Durrell Watkins
“...The truth is, Christ was indeed raised from the dead, the first of
many who will one day wake up from their long sleep.”
1 Corinthians 15.20
Lent/Easter 2009............................................................................................................31
Paul’s Christology is very personal, experiential. He encounters a
living Christ Presence in his intellect, his imagination, his experience of life, his interactions with people who have been influenced
by Jesus. Paul knows that death didn’t end Jesus’ importance, influence, or significance. It won’t end ours either. Christ lived in Paul’s
experience, and Christ lives in ours. The Christ Nature is alive
indeed, and so it is that our Truth will live beyond the appearance
of death. Christ was raised to eternal significance, as you and I will
be as well. That remains Good News on this Easter Sunday!
Alleluia! Christ is risen; Christ is risen indeed. Alleluia! And
so it is that I will rise to my full potential and to all that I am
meant to be. Alleluia! Amen.
*****
Happiness is Like a Butterfly (2008)
Marian Cavagnaro
“Happiness is like a butterfly which, when pursued, is always
beyond our grasp, but, if you will sit down quietly, may alight
upon you.”
Nathaniel Hawthorne
Happiness can come free and unexpectedly – we must not seek
it too desperately but relax and it will appear. Happiness’ path is
paved with our dreams and desires; down this path lies creativity,
love, and long life. Happiness does not depend upon getting other
people’s approval; it depends upon getting our own approval. Mahatma Gandhi said, “Happiness is when what you think, what you
say, and what you do are in harmony.”
I affirm that my happiness is from being able to grow, develop,
and share my love and my life. God, I sit quietly in harmony
with your Divine Presence.
*****
32............................................................................................................Sharing the Light
Miraculous Living (2007)
Durrell Watkins
“The Mind we use is the Mind of the Universe.”
Ernest Holmes
I get in the car. I turn on the radio. I hear a song or a news report
or witty repartee between co-hosts of a program and their celebrity
guest. The radio program comes from Charlotte or Dallas or San
Francisco, and yet I’m hearing it in Fort Lauderdale. The technology is so common it hardly seems miraculous anymore; but actually, it’s quite amazing, even in a world where we send instant text
messages across vast areas of space and are able to fly across the
globe. Yesterday’s miracles are today’s common occurrences. Such
is the power of divine Mind.
I believe in miracles! Why not? I experience them everyday.
*****
Everyday Miracles (2007)
Gail Tapscott
“When you drink water, remember its source.”
Deng Ming-Dao
One of the great figures in my tradition of Unitarian Universalism
was Ralph Waldo Emerson. He often referred to what he called
“everyday miracles” and said that one of the most mystical experiences he ever had was looking at and thinking about water which
is of course key to all life and comprises a huge part of our bodies.
We literally come from water and are water. It cleanses us inside
and out and brings us pleasure in a sensual way. Swimming in it
can keep us healthy. We do not need to look for big miracles. Every time we wash our hands or take a drink of water we should feel
reverence for a miracle. After all, a big part of being spiritual is not
taking things for granted. In some parts of the world, people long
for access to clean, safe water.
Lent/Easter 2009............................................................................................................33
Source of all, we give thanks for the simple miracle of clean
water. Let us never take this miracle for granted.
*****
The Easter Miracle Continues (2007)
Durrell Watkins
“The God of our ancestors raised Jesus...God exalted him...”
Acts 5.30-31
Acts 5 provides one of my favorite biblical explanations of the
Resurrection. Jesus was raised by God, exalted even though he
had been tortured, humiliated, and executed in the most brutal
fashion. Raised by God to eternal significance, Jesus is lifted up as
a symbol of everlasting hope – that’s what the story of the Resurrection is meant to be, or at least how one biblical writer seems to
understand it. Applied to our lives today, that means simply that
when we fall, it is possible to get back up. Life will raise us to new
heights, new hope, and new possibilities. And so the Easter miracle
continues. Alleluia!
Resurrection Power is alive in me, lifting me above the regrets
of the past and the difficulties of the present. The Light of Life
shines through me now; and so it is!
*****
Awaiting the New Heaven (2007)
Kathleen A. Bishop
“How embarrassed we shall be if, while we are getting ready for
the coming of the kingdom of God and are admonishing others to
get ready for it, some [person] of vision taps us on the shoulder
and remarks: ‘Pardon me...but you are a bit late, for the kingdom
has already come!’”
Ernest C. Wilson
34............................................................................................................Sharing the Light
Are you living a life in waiting? Waiting for the right mate, the
right job, the right home, the right lottery numbers? Wilson says,
“Life is not material but spiritual. This is the most important discovery of the age. It leads to freedom from sickness, poverty, and
unhappiness.” If you want to live a heavenly life, begin by living
a spiritual life! “A life of smiles, good will, good works, good
thoughts...helpfulness and service – these are the currency of the
kingdom.”
I am in the Kingdom right here and right now! Thank you,
God.
*****
Seeing the Resurrection (2007)
Durrell Watkins
“Our job is not to set things right, but to see things right.”
Eric Butterworth
Not everyone saw Jesus’ Resurrection, but his friends did. Isn’t
that amazing? People who knew and loved him continued to
experience him beyond his death. His friends didn’t change what
was, they saw what was. The Christ Principle that Jesus lived and
demonstrated couldn’t die. The Christ Nature that shone through
Jesus never left. The Christ Power that was the Truth of Jesus’ being remained true, regardless of circumstances. The Goodness and
Hope that Jesus represented lived on, and those who saw it in Jesus
before his death continued to see it afterward. To see the on-going
miracle of life regardless of circumstances is to live in
Resurrection Power.
Dear Jesus, may your life and teachings continue to inspire me
and through me, others. May your ever-living Truth help me to
see the Christ in me and in all people. Amen.
*****
Lent/Easter 2009............................................................................................................35
Easter Blessing
Durrell Watkins
The sun will rise.
When we fall, we will get back up.
The memory of a departed loved one surfaces again bringing the
gift of love remembered.
Winter must give way to spring.
Life continues; it must. It will.
And so the Phoenix rises.
And so the bud bursts forth as a new flower.
And so the tomb of despair is found empty as hope rises again.
Alleluia, Christ is risen; Christ is risen indeed. Alleluia!
May Resurrection Power bless us all this Easter. Amen.
(April 8, 2007, www.kweerspirit.blogspot.com)
*****
Dignity Won’t Stay Dead
Durrell Watkins
On Palm Sunday, we usually hear the story of Jesus riding into
Jerusalem. He’s a wise teacher, healer, and prophet. In his presence
people experience the power of God somehow. People in hopeless situations are having their hope renewed. The buzz is growing
and people are starting to suspect that he may be the deliverer they
have been waiting for. Maybe he’ll raise an army and confront the
Roman Empire and declare freedom for the Jewish homeland.
And so as he enters the holy city, his fans are greeting him, and
the commotion they are causing attracts others to come see what
all the fuss is about. They are shouting “Hosanna” which means,
“Save us.” And they are quoting a line from the Psalter, “blessed is
36............................................................................................................Sharing the Light
the one who comes in God’s name!”
Of course, drawing large crowds and being called a king was just
the kind of publicity that could cause a lot of trouble for Jesus. To
make matters worse, Jesus goes straight to the Temple and causes
a scene.
The Temple had money-changers, or money exchangers we could
say. Travelers could exchange their foreign currency for local coinage that could then be used to buy the sacrificial animals.
But Jesus seems to think that the money changers are cheating people. Perhaps they weren’t exchanging the money for free. Maybe
they were charging to exchange the money and then charging again
for the animals they were selling...that kind of double dipping apparently infuriated Jesus. So, he throws a tantrum and overturns the
tables and calls the money changers thieves.
The Temple priests were part of the Roman power structure, so to
cause a scene in the Temple is basically the same as vandalizing a
government building...it’s a major offense.
So, this Jesus who is called Messiah and who can attract crowds
and heal the sick and have people call out to him to save them from
Rome, who is so bold as to walk into a Temple and disturb the
peace and damage the property...he’s now attracted the notice of
some powerful people, people who quickly become his enemies;
and they immediately conspire against him.
A few days later it’s Good Friday. Jesus is betrayed, arrested, tried,
condemned, and executed.
But that’s not the end of the story! Some women show up at the
tomb thinking that was the end only to discover a new beginning.
What they experienced was Resurrection. They didn’t see Jesus being resurrected. They didn’t witness whatever happened to Jesus...
they just discovered an empty tomb and a reminder that life is full
of possibilities. Resurrection wasn’t a quantifiable event that they
observed, it was a qualitative experience that they had. They disLent/Easter 2009............................................................................................................37
covered that Golgotha is no match for God.
Golgotha isn’t necessarily part of God’s plan, but if it should happen, God has a plan so that Golgotha doesn’t get the last word.
You’ll never hear me say that God desired or required Jesus’ death
on the cross...but I do believe that God shared in Jesus’ suffering
on the cross, and that Resurrection is God’s response to it. When
you’re hurting, that’s not God’s will, but God is with you in the
difficult moment, and is responding to your pain with Resurrection
power and grace.
I don’t believe that Resurrection is about a moment in history. I
don’t believe that it’s about what happened to one person, one
time. That story had already been told. Julius Caesar, Hercules,
Osiris...each had stories about being raised to new life after death.
The hero who dies a sacrificial death and who is raised to new life
is an old story; but those stories are about the hero. Jesus’ story is
something more.
The story of Jesus’ resurrection isn’t about just him escaping
death...its inclusive of the community. The women at the tomb
experience it. Later the brothers will experience it. As they go
forward to Galilee and beyond, they will continue to experience it
and to share it.
The disappointments and difficulties happen, but they can’t define
us nor must they be the end of our story. Golgotha is real and it is
horrible and it is not the last chapter.
Osiris is raised and it’s good for Osiris. Hercules is raised and it’s
good for Hercules. Caesar is raised and it’s good for Caesar. But
Jesus is raised and its good for US.
His resurrection is our own. He lives in us, with us, for us, creating
a symbiosis that gives hope and power to us all. By experiencing
Jesus beyond the grave, his friends experienced more of God in
their own lives, and that’s the point. Jesus isn’t one more hero who
cheated death...the story books are full of those. Jesus is the friend
who says in life and beyond, “I’m with you and together, we can
38............................................................................................................Sharing the Light
do anything.”
Jesus didn’t save the people from imperialism by confronting
Rome with guerrilla warfare. He saved them, and us, from the
degrading and demoralizing effects of oppression by proving in
the lives of his friends and followers that dignity won’t stay dead!
And that’s a gift that he gives us today...Jesus affirms our dignity
and reminds us that dignity won’t stay dead. With that, we can face
today and tomorrow and every obstacle in life. Dignity won’t stay
dead – not Jesus’, not ours.
Whatever difficulty we’ve faced, whatever disappointment we’ve
endured, our hope and our dignity and our joy can be resurrected
in this holy instant. Dignity won’t stay dead. In life and beyond
life, Jesus affirms our dignity and that is what can flourish no matter what else is going on in our world. Jesus’ resurrection is ours,
and it’s ours today. We can claim it and live in its power starting
right now.
Lent/Easter 2009............................................................................................................39