Every once in a while

I like to re-post my first post, the one that started this off over a decade ago and 2600+ posts ago. Here it is.

Sunday, March 8, 2009

My first post

Sitting under the Castor Oil Tree (March 7, 2009)

The character in the Bible I have always been drawn to in Jonah. I identify with his story. Like Jonah, I have experienced being taken where I didn't want to go by God and I've been disgruntled with the way things went. The belly of a big old fish isn't a pleasant means of travel either!

The story ends (in case you don't know it) with Jonah upset and complaining on a hillside over the city of Nineveh, which God has saved through Jonah. Jonah didn't want to go there to start with--hence the ride in the fish stomach--and predicted that God would save the city though it should have been destroyed for its wickedness. "You dragged me half way around the world," he tells God, "and didn't destroy the city....I knew it would turn out this way. I'm angry, so angry I could die!"

God causes a tree to grow to shade Jonah from the sun (scholars think it might have been a castor oil tree--the implications are astonishing!). Then God sends a worm to kill the tree. Well, that sets Jonah off! "How dare you kill my tree?" he challenges the creator. "I'm so angry I could die...."

God simply reminds him that he is upset at the death of a tree he didn't plant or nurture and yet he doesn't see the value of saving all the people of the great city Nineveh...along with their cattle and beasts.

And the story ends. No resolution. Jonah simply left to ponder all that. There's no sequel either--no "Jonah II" or "Jonah: the next chapter", nothing like that. It's just Jonah, sitting under the bare branches of the dead tree, pondering.

What I want to do is use this blog to do simply that, ponder about things. I've been an Episcopal priest for over 30 years. I'm approaching a time to retire and I've got a lot of pondering left to do--about God, about the church, about religion, about life and death and everything involved in that. Before the big fish swallowed me up and carried me to my own Nineva (ordination in the Episcopal Church) I had intended a vastly different life. I was going to write "The Great American Novel" for starters and get a Ph.D. in American Literature and disappear into some small liberal arts college, most likely in the Mid-Atlantic states and teach people like me--rural people, Appalachians and southerners, simple people, deep thinkers though slow talkers...lovely for all that--to love words and write words themselves.

God (I suppose, though I even ponder that...) had other ideas and I ended up spending the lion's share of my priesthood in the wilds of two cities in Connecticut (of all places) among tribes so foreign to me I scarcely understood their language and whose customs confounded me. And I found myself often among people (The Episcopal Cult) who made me anxious by their very being. Which is why I stuck to urban churches, I suppose--being a priest in Greenwich would have sent me into some form of shock...as I would have driven them to hypertension at the least.

I am one who 'ponders' quite a bit and hoped this might be a way to 'ponder in print' for anyone else who might be leaning in that direction to read.

Ever so often, someone calls my bluff when I go into my "I'm just a boy from the mountains of West Virginia" persona. And I know they're right. I've lived too long among the heathens of New England to be able to avoid absorbing some of their alien customs and ways of thinking. Plus, I've been involved in too much education to pretend to be a rube from the hills. But I do, from time to time, miss that boy who grew up in a part of the world as foreign as Albania to most people, where the lush and endless mountains pressed down so majestically that there were few places, where I lived, that were flat in an area wider than a football field. That boy knew secrets I am only beginning, having entered my sixth decade of the journey toward the Lover of Souls, to remember and cherish.

My maternal grandmother, who had as much influence on me as anyone I know, used to say--"Jimmy, don't get above your raisin'". I probably have done that, in more ways that I'm able to recognize, but I ponder that part of me--buried deeply below layer after layer of living (as the mountains were layer after layer of long-ago life).

Sometimes I get a fleeting glimpse of him, running madly into the woods that surrounded him on all sides, spending hours seeking paths through the deep tangles of forest, climbing upward, ever upward until he found a place to sit and look down on the little town where he lived--spread out like a toy village to him--so he could ponder, alone and undisturbed, for a while.

When I was in high school, I wrote a regular column for the school newspaper call "The Outsider". As I ponder my life, I realize that has been a constant: I've always felt just beyond the fringe wherever I was. I've watched much more than I've participated. And I've pondered many things.

So, what I've decided to do is sit here on the hillside for a while, beneath the ruins of the castor oil tree and ponder some more. And, if you wish, share my ponderings with you--whoever you are out there in cyber-Land.

Two caveates: I'm pretty much a Luddite when it comes to technology--probably smart enough to learn about it but never very interested, so this blog is an adventure for me. My friend Sandy is helping me so it shouldn't be too much of a mess. Secondly, I've realized writing this that there is no 'spell check' on the blog. Either I can get a dictionary or ask your forgiveness for my spelling. I'm a magna cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa ENGLISH major (WVU '69) who never could conquer spelling all the words I longed to write.

I suppose I'll just ask your tolerance.

Alleluia, He is Risen!

Virtual church is a lot better than no church at all on the highest Hoy Day of the year.

We were on both Zoom and Facebook live and had well over 100 viewers. It went great. That's from 3 little churches that average, between them, less than 70 a Sunday. We'll do it again next week (called 'low Sunday' in the Episcopal Church because so many folks are apparently exhausted by Easter and take a week off) then decide whether to be totally virtual or go back to streaming from one of the churches.

We also zoomed with our family: Josh and Mimi, our children, Cathy and Tim, our children's spouses, and our granddaughters--Eleanor, Tegan, Emma and Morgan.

Josh, who is a partner in one of the largest law firms in Baltimore, gave himself a mohawk hair cut and grew a beard. He wondered why his bead was gray. My beard turned gray many years before my hair. I colored it for several years then though, 'what the hell?' and let it grow in. People would look at me and say, "are you feeling alright?" having no idea why I looked different.

It wasn't like being with them for dinner--but it was fun and lively and full of laughter.

I swore off being political for Holy Week, but that's over!

A President's rating go up in a crisis. Bush 2 was over 70% after 9/ll as was Obama during his virus outbreak. The current president who will not be named here, is still short of 50%, though it is his highest approval ratings ever.

This administration has so mangled the response to this virus that we are in much worse of a mess than we could have been. Lack of supplies, lack of tests, delays in isolating us, not making 'staying at home' a national order rather than leaving it up the the governors--all in all a disaster.

Now he wants to reopen for business on May 1. Give us all a break! I'm waiting until our Governor, Ned Lamont, tells us it's ok.

Reports today said that the president suggested 'doing nothing' and letting us build up a 'herd immunity' until the people that really 'know stuff'' told him millions would die and talked him back from that plan.

Thank God that they were there to save us.

The president never would.

Go, Biden!

He is Risen indeed, Alleluia!

Happy wield Easter.

Wierdness continues

Tomorrow is Easter.

I don't know when I didn't go to a church on Easter. I'm sure there was a year or two, but I can't, for the life of me remember when.

We're doing a zoom/face book Easter service because one of the members of the Cluster churches, Ted, knows how to do it.

Very odd. But better than nothing. I'll get to see faces I haven't seen for a month and get to tell them how much I miss them and love them.

We'll have organ music and a solo and I'll bless bread and wine for anyone who has it before their screens or phones. Who knows if it will be 'consecrated'? But it will be a virtual sharing of bread and wine.

We have a zoom call set up with our children and their spouses and children for 3 tomorrow.

Mimi texted Bern that she's didn't remember an Easter when she wasn't here. I'm sure there have been a few, but like me and church, Mimi can't remember.

Easter is about Resurrection, which we all need in these Covid-19 days.

We need to know we can be full of life though cut off from the world in a way we've never known before. We need to know we can be safe and be 'alive' at the same time.

The on screen service tomorrow will begin with the affirmation, "Alleluia, Christ is Risen" and the response, "The Lord is risen indeed, Alleluia."

Say that when you wake up on Easter.

Say it and know Life conquers Death and courage conquers fear, and safety conquers danger.

We are risen too, tomorrow.

Truly. Truly.

Holy Saturday

Read Matthew's gospel   27.57-66

Holy Saturday is the most solemn day of the year.'

It is as if the church is dead and in the tomb with Jesus.

Holy Eucharist cannot be celebrated and the bread and wine consecrated on Maundy Thursday must be totally consumed.. Not even reserved sacrament can be shared this day.

The liturgy for the day is contained on page 283 of the Book of Common Prayer. One page only.
And instead of the Prayers of the People we say the Anthem "In the midst of life", which is part of the Burial Office.

No blessing is given by the priest on this day.

Liturgically it is a day of solemnity and silence.

It is a day to 'be still and know.' that tomorrow will be a very different day....

Another gift of the virus

I got an email and then a call from M and V M--people I haven't seen for over 30 years.

They live in New Orleans and M survived Covid 19 and is fine. V is fine too, so far as they know in that epi-center of disease, not infected.

They are still staunch Episcopalians, as they were when I was their parish priest so many years ago.

M is on the vestry of his church and at least 7 members have died from the virus.

Mimi was older than their daughter but played with her a lot.

They had a son after they left CT and he lives in New Orleans with a child and wife. There daughter lives in Richmond with her husband, son and daughter.

What a hoot to hear from them!

Another gift of the virus, to hear from people from long ago....

Good Friday

Read John's Gospel 18.1-19.42

Whew! That was a lot to read. And painful to read as well.

Why do we call it GOOD FRIDAY when so much bad happens?

Christ dies, painfully, in agony on the cross. For the only time in John's gospel Jesus shows some humanity when he says, "I thirst". Then his side is pierced and he is laid into a tomb.

And before that Peter denies him three times. Pilate has him flogged and turns him over to be crucified. What is "good" about that?

I preached a sermon years ago on the feast of Christ the King, but it mentions Good Friday. I want to share that with you today.

CHRIST THE KING

          Here we are, on the Sunday before the first Sunday of Advent, poised on the edge of preparing ourselves to receive the Christ Child into our hearts, and what is the reading we get? Something from Luke about Good Friday….Something about the crucifixion.

          A little jarring and ‘out of time’, it seems to me.

          I’m reminded of how the Council of Churches—which became the Interfaith Ministry—used to have a Good Friday service here at St. John’s.

The service was “The Seven Last Words of Christ” combined with our Book of Common Prayer Good Friday Service. There were always 7 sermons—talk about a way to make Good Friday dismal and BAD!!!—and I was in charge of making sure the whole thing fit into the hours between noon and 3 p.m.

          Dealing with 7 preachers and a set-in-stone time frame was always an adventure! Preachers, by-in-large, don’t like to be given limits but I would limit them to no more than 7 minutes for their sermons, knowing full well most would go past 10 or 12. I’d built in enough silence to manage that. But the last one of those we had, the preacher on the 6^th word had gone on for almost 15 minutes about the crucifixion, when he said: “Now let us go back to Bethlehem….”

          “Oh no!” I said to myself, with expletives deleted, “we’re going in the wrong direction!”

          That’s rather how I feel today. We’re preparing to embark on the journey to Bethlehem and Luke has jerked us to Golgotha and the conversation between Jesus and two other dying men.

Since it is what we are given by the Lectionary, it is what we will attend to—Jesus talking with the two thieves.

          What is interesting about the exchange, in my mind, is this: the first thief parroted the slurs of the crowds and jeeringly called on Jesus to save himself—and to save the two other condemned men as well. Not only did that first thief by into the “conventional wisdom” of the leaders of his day, he was thinking of ‘himself’ above all. “Save yourself and US!”

          The second thief had another view of the situation. “We have been condemned justly, for we are getting what we deserve for our deeds,” he tells the other man. “But this man has done nothing wrong….”

          The second thief is not thinking of ‘himself’. In fact, he has a realistic understanding that, for him, ‘the punishment fits the crime’. Instead, that second thief, bleeding and dying, is thinking of the one beside him, who is innocent in his mind.

         

          That is a place well worthy to begin Advent—thinking of the one beside you, the ones around you, those even far away…instead of thinking of yourself.

          That could be recommended for all of us as a way to prepare our hearts for the visit of the Child of Bethlehem.

         

          But the conversation is not yet over. The second thief has one more thing to say to Jesus.

          “Jesus,” he says, life slipping away from him, “remember me when you come into your Kingdom….”

         

          That is certainly a second recommendation for all of us as a way to prepare our hearts for the visit of the Christ Child.

          REMEMBER ME….REMEMBER ME….REMEMBER ME….

          Memory is one of the most precious gifts God gives us. Memory is our anchor in the angry sea, our Rock in the storm, our Hope in the times of Trouble. Memory ties us to our identity—to WHO we are and WHOSE we are as we continue our journey.

          WHO we are and WHOSE we are is clear. We are the children of God, and as we move through the shadows and darkness of Lent we should pray God to “remember us”. And God will….

          “Truly I tell you,” Jesus tells the thief, “today you will be with me in Paradise..”

      

       There’s a third recommendation to us in today’s readings as we verge on the preparation of Advent. It comes from the Psalm of the day—Psalm 46, my favorite Psalm of all. After that Psalm tells us that we need not fear the changes and chances of life, the song reminds us of this: Listen—“BE STILL, THEN, AND KNOW THAT I AM GOD….”

          Next Sunday, Advent begins—one of the great and wondrous seasons of the Church’s year. And today we are given advice on how to prepare to prepare our hearts and lives to receive the gift of God at Christmas.

          It’s not hard. It’s not rocket science or heart surgery. It is, in fact, as simple as ABC.

          Think of others, not yourself.

      Pray to God to ‘remember’ you.

      Be still…find time to be still…and in that you will know God.

          That’s the advice I’ll seek to follow.

          I invite you to do the same.

 

Bernie is out

I was all in with Bernie Sanders. In fact, he may be more conservative than me.

But he is suspending his campaign, meaning Joe Biden will be the nominee.

Biden needs to name his female running mate and his whole cabinet (including progressives and Republicans--a unity cabinet) before the election.

Joe knows how to delegate and how to let the experts and the science people be in charge.

Go, Joe!

I'm with you all the way.