An Alternative Lent

I have never been a great fan of Lent.  I suppose it’s that I don’t have a very penitential sort of personality.  Actually, it’s not that I’m not penitent.  It’s just that I’m a terrible backslider.
 

The thing that has always bothered me a little bit about Lent is that the unspoken premise seems to be that God likes people to be unhappy.  That isn’t right, of course, but especially as a child, it sure seemed that way to me.  So, once a year, just to keep God satisfied, I had to give something up that I liked.  It was often chocolate.  Later on, I moved on to more sophisticated pleasures to go without during Lent.  It wasn’t the end of the world, but I did miss these things.  And it seemed sort of a pro forma exercise that didn’t really have much of a point.
 

Now this seemed odd to me since God had made those pleasurable things I was giving up in the first place.  And on top of that, what I was taught was that God wanted us to be happy and created material things for our enjoyment.  Why was it, I wondered, that for 40 days, once a year, we were all supposed to act as if that were not true, give up the good things God had made, and be unhappy?  It was better, too, if you could feel guilty.  I didn’t get it.
 

And then I came to understand Lent differently.  I came to understand it as being about health.  It wasn’t supposed to make me unhappy.  It was supposed to help me be healthy.  It is an alternative Lent.
 

And at that point I started thinking about Lent in a different way.  Instead of giving something up, particularly something I liked, I started taking something on that was healthy.  Giving up something was actually OK, as long as it was giving up something because it was unhealthy and not just because it was pleasurable.  So, Lent became about giving up what was not healthy or taking on what was.  Lent stopped being about misery and started being about healthy.
 

What I have taken on has been different in various years.  Some years it has been getting some rest.  Some years it has been overdue trips to the doctor.  This year it will be spending more time with my wife, who has finally completed the move to New York.
 

I’m taking the opportunity of Lent to begin our New York adventure.  We will be more intentional about time together.  We’re going to pick areas of the city to explore each weekend.  We are going to talk.  And walk.  And, Lent notwithstanding, have fun.  That seems to me to be much more what God has in mind with this annual opportunity of Lent.
 

Lent is now an annual opportunity to get me to do something good for myself.  Lent has stopped being about God punishing me for being human, which never did make much sense to me, and instead become a way of God helping me be healthier.  I like that a lot better.  I even look forward to it.
 

We are, in the words of the Prayer Book, invited to a “holy Lent.”  May it be a holy and healthy one this year.  That sounds a lot more like God to me.  And, perhaps, you may have the opportunity to discover what it is that really does make you happy.  And human.
 

Peace,
+Stacy

Archbishop and Missionary

There is an inherent tension in the life of the Church, and it is very much one in which we live today.  It is the tension of stability and change, of being settled and being a traveler, of safety and adventure.  It is this, the tension between safety and adventure, with which I am most concerned.  Ministry can, if one is not careful, be more about being stable and settled than about change, traveling, and adventure.  Mission is the counterbalance.  Being a missionary is inherently about change, traveling, and adventure.

I refer you to a medieval saint of the Church, Anskar, Archbishop of Hamburg and Missionary to Denmark and Sweden.  This tension between safety and adventure played out in Anskar’s life in an interesting way.  In the course of his ministry, in 845, the Danes sacked Hamburg, rendering Anskar’s nascent archdiocese unviable, thus leaving Anskar without a base and, more importantly, without revenue for his work.  Here is where it gets interesting.

In order to solve this problem, the king decided to combine the more prosperous district around Bremen with the now ransacked diocese of Hamburg.  It was a sensible solution except it did not make the Bishop of Cologne, whose diocese had included the wealthy town of Bremen up to that point, happy.  It was no small controversy in Anskar’s day, and it finally required the intervention of the Pope himself to resolve.  My guess is that the Bishop of Cologne got a cash settlement from someone.

Now, here’s my point.  Archbishop and missionary.  The reason they do not go together without tension is that one can be very much about vested interests and the other is always about upsetting vested interests.  Fundamentally, the missionary effort is about upsetting vested interests.  It is about upsetting vested interests in a distant place by the proclamation of the Gospel.  Even more importantly, it is about upsetting those vested interests within ourselves by living it.

The fact that vested interests resist the missionary imperative of the Gospel was not new in Anskar’s day, and it is not new in our own.  It has always been so.  But that being the case, we must not let it be the last word.  We must, like Anskar, be willing to, indeed insistent upon, upsetting the vested interests in the service of the Gospel.  Here is the difficulty.  The Gospel and the Church are not synonyms.  The Church is full of vested interests that prefer safety.  That’s the archbishop part of Anskar.  Not so the Gospel, which prefers adventure.  That’s the missionary part.  And it’s why salvation is in the Gospel, even more than it is in the Church.

 Peace,

+Stacy

                                                           

The Sick and Tired

Some of my happiest days were when Ginger and I were first married.  Part of the reason was her job as the head counselor at a group home for mentally challenged adults in Charlottesville, Virginia.  It was called Independence House.

Ginger is the only person I’ve ever actually seen do a miracle; several of them, in fact.  Over the years I’ve seen her as a teacher take children everyone else has given up on and give their lives back to them.  That is why my favorite picture of her, which is in my office, shows her with one of her students.  Her work never ceases to point toward God for me, which is what miracles are meant to do. 

Charles was one of those miracles.  When Ginger met Charles he was a resident of a state institution.  All of his test scores showed that he was beyond the parameters of Independence House, that he did not have would it would take to succeed, that institutionalization was in his best interests.  He had trouble communicating due to a stutter.  He limped.  He had a pretty low IQ.  Ginger, however, saw something beyond all those objective measurements.  It was something she sensed intuitively.  There was something about Charles.  She took a risk, and Charles came to live at Independence House.

There were many endearing things about Charles.  One was, stutter or not, he was a conversationalist.  Once in the car, he obviously had something on his mind and asked Ginger, “Ah-ah-ah-ah, Virginia, you been to college?”  Virginia, by the way, is not her name, but it was Charles always called her.  I have called her that, too, ever since. 

“Yes, Charles, I’ve been to college.”

Charles, who had lived his entire life up to that time in a state institution for people who were then labeled “severely retarded,” had the answer to his question.  “Ah-ah-ah-ah, I guess that’s why you’re so high functioning.”

Charles had a ferocious work ethic.  Shakey’s Pizza Parlor hired him to bus tables and wash dishes.  He called it “Shakey’s Peaches.”  I don’t know why.  I think it was connected to his sense of humor.  And I think his sense of humor liked to keep you guessing whether he said what he did because he was disabled or because he was being funny.

And Charles could pray up a storm.  His prayers were a lot like sermons.  One night we were at Independence House for dinner, as we often were.  It was Charles’ turn to say the blessing.  We bowed our heads.

Charles began.  “Ah-ah-ah-ah, Oh Lord, we pray for the sick and tired.”  He went on.  And on and on and on.  Before he finished he had recited in one way or another most of salvation history.  He ended on a note of heartfelt thanks.  It was a grace before a meal, after all.  “And Lord, we just want to thank you for Moses . . . who cut down the cherry tree.  Amen.”  That would be “Amen” with a long A, not the timid way Episcopalians like to say it.  When Charles said Amen, he meant what it means—so be it! 

Now, at the time, I confess that I thought Charles had merely interjected an expression he had heard along the way somewhere, perhaps from one of the staff at the institution, “sick and tired,” into a rambling prayer that pulled together a lot of different sources for inspiration.  I have come to believe, though, that imploring God to help the sick and tired had a lot to do with the quality Ginger saw in Charles that most people missed.

Charles was sick and tired.  He was sick and tired of living in an institution.  He was sick and tired of being dependent.  He was sick and tired of being treated as an inferior.  And he was sick and tired of being viewed as somehow less than fully human.  And being sick and tired, I’m convinced, is what gave him what it took, something admittedly mysterious, something miraculous, to change his life.  He did it in spite of having been dealt a pretty poor hand.  He did it in spite of what everyone expected.  Somehow, mysteriously, indeed miraculously, Charles took his expectations for himself from somewhere else.  Again, miraculously, he found just the ally he needed in Ginger, I mean ah-ah-ah-ah, Virginia.  

Somehow, I think, the sick and tired are particularly open to God precisely because they are sick and tired.  Everyone once in awhile, you run into someone who takes being sick and tired and turns it into incentive.  That’s why, Oh, Lord, we pray for the sick and tired.

Peace,
+Stacy

Being Who We Are

The weeks in which we are now living are sandwiched in the calendar between the end of Christmastide and the beginning of Lent, between Epiphany and Ash Wednesday.  They are not a season properly speaking; they are between seasons.  They are what the Church calls ordinary time.  Just regular time.  Nothing special.

It is not, though, that they don’t have a theme.  They begin and end directing our attention to identity, to who we are.  They open on the first Sunday after Epiphany with the story of the Baptism of Jesus, this year from the Gospel of Mark.  It is a story about who Jesus is, a story about identity.  “And just as he was coming up out of the water, he saw the heavens torn apart and the Spirit descending like a dove on him.  And a voice came from heaven, ‘You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.’”  (Mk. 1:10-11)

This in between time ends each year with the story of the Transfiguration.  It is, once again, about who Jesus is, a story about identity.  “Then a cloud overshadowed them, and from the cloud there came a voice, ‘This is my Son, the Beloved; listen to him!’”  (Mk. 9:7) 

The issue at the beginning is the same as the issue at the end.  It is about identity.  There is, though, an important difference.  In the beginning of the story, the divine declaration of identity is directed to Jesus himself.  “You are my Son, the Beloved.”  At the end of this time just before Lent, the divine declaration is to the disciples.  “This is my Son, the Beloved.”  Second person; third person.  It begins with Jesus understanding who he is.  It ends with us understanding who Jesus is.

It is an important point.  Mission necessarily begins internally.  It is a matter of knowing who we are, understanding who we are, incorporating who we are into the core of our beings.  That is not unlike the divine declaration to Jesus.  We bear the image of God in much the same way a child bears a genetic relationship to its parents.  And not only do we bear the image of God.  It is a reality that God declares good; indeed, very good.  “You are my Son, the Beloved.”

But that is not the end.  Our identity depends on what we do with that reality.  That is something we call mission.  Mission depends first on understanding who we are ourselves.  It does not end there, however.  If it did, it would be narcissistic.  God is not narcissistic.  Nor can God’s image be.  Mission is what delivers us from narcissism. 

The next step is to act in the world as Jesus.  It is the completion of who we are, the being of who we are, the actualization of who we are, the making real of our own belovedness.  And in being who we are, as Jesus did, the divine voice can be heard again.  “This is my Son, the Beloved.”  Only this time our identity has authority.  God adds, “Listen to him.”

Our mission is, simply put, God’s mission.  And God’s mission for us is, simply enough, to be who we are, God’s children, God’s beloved, God’s agents in the world for the salvation of the world.  It’s all about being who we are.  And acting on it, making what is theoretical, actual.  Mission is who we are. 

And, as this time of the year reminds us, that is just what we do in ordinary time—be who we are.  And who we are is God’s children.  Beloved.  Beloved in action. 

                                                           

Peace,

+Stacy 

Child of God, Follower of Jesus

I was present this weekend for the investiture of my friend Kee Sloan as Bishop of Alabama.  Kee was already Bishop Suffragan of Alabama so there was no need for an ordination and consecration.  His transition to being the chief pastor of the diocese was marked instead with his investiture as Bishop Diocesan and his seating in the cathedral.

He renewed his ordination vows.  He was officially recognized in his new role by the Presiding Bishop.  Henry Parsley, the now-retired bishop handed over the pastoral staff symbolizing his responsibility.  And amid great fanfare Kee was seated in the cathedra, the bishop’s official seat and most important symbol of office (more on why that is some other time).

But in my opinion the highlight of the service came close to the very beginning when Kee formally asked admission to the cathedral.  This is an obscure tradition, but it has to do with cathedrals enjoying a degree of medieval autonomy, which required, whether or not they were the official and literal seat of the bishop’s ministry, that the bishop formally ask to be admitted.  This is symbolized by the bishop standing outside the closed doors of the cathedral, knocking (traditionally done with the crozier), and requesting to be allowed in.

After the opening prayers, we waited inside the cathedral.  Knock, knock, knock came the sound.  “Who seeks to enter here?” the president of the Standing Committee asked.  Very dramatic.

“John McKee Sloan, Bishop-Elect of the Diocese of Alabama,” was the answer.  There was no reply.  The doors did not open.

Again, three knocks.  “Who seeks to enter here?”

“The Right Reverend John McKee Sloan, Bishop Suffragan of Alabama and Bishop Diocesan-Elect of Alabama,” was the response.  I’m not actually sure of how that ended as we were all laughing at the “The Right Reverend” part of the plaintive request for admission. Still, no reply, and the doors did not open.

Finally, once again, knock, knock, knock.  “Who seeks to enter here?”

“Kee Sloan, child of God and follower of Jesus.”  And the doors were flung open with the prayer, “May the Lord prosper your way.”

It was more than an appropriate answer on the eve of the Feast of the Baptism of our Lord.  “Child of God and follower of Jesus.”  It is the fundamental baptismal reality.  And at least the first part of it, the child of God part, is the fundamental human reality.

In those days Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan.  And just as he was coming up out of the water, he saw the heavens torn apart and the Spirit descending like a dove on him.  And a voice from heaven, “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.  Mk. 1:9-11.

The fundamental reality is this, “You are my Child, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.”

Now, I’m not sure God is always pleased with everything we do.  In fact, I’m quite sure God is not.  But in our fundamental humanity, which is God’s creation, I have no doubt of God’s immense pleasure.  All we have to do is live into it.

That is what the follower of Jesus part is all about.  For Kee, for me, and for many of us, we find being a follower of Jesus, the fully human one, a way of living into our own humanity.  It’s not about trying to be more than we have the capacity to be.  It’s just about trying to be what we actually were created to be.  Real.  Alive.  Human.

Human, of course, comes from the Latin word humus, which means earth, dirt, ground.  It also happens to the same root meaning of humility.  Human.  Humility.  Earthy.  Sometimes we find children of God and followers of Jesus to be just that—earthy, humble, human. Sometimes they can even happen to be bishops, which is quite remarkable because there are so many things that work against it in that office.  I don’t think those things will get the better of Kee Sloan who is, in the true sense of the word, grounded, grounded as child of God and follower of Jesus.  It sets a good example.

Peace,

+Stacy

Dumbstruck

As some of you know, I’m an only child.  If Ginger were contributing to this reflection, this is where she would add, “And that explains everything.”  It’s worse than that really.  On one side of my family, I’m also an only grandchild.  You can imagine what that meant.  Not only did I have my parents undivided attention, I had two grandparents for whom my wish was their command, particularly at this time of the year.  More about that some other time perhaps.

But for now, the point is more about my son Andrew, who had me beat.  Until his brother Matthew arrived, Andrew was the only grand child on both sides of our family.  This, combined with the fact that both my parents and Ginger’s parents felt like they had waited inordinately long for grandchildren, created the perfect storm of indulgence on Andrew’s first Christmas with us.  (He was still in Korea on his very first Christmas.  Not to worry; it got made up for the next year.)

As has become our custom, Ginger got Andrew his Christmas pajamas.  Best to do the truly humiliating while they can’t resist.  The first year night wear was a red and white striped night shirt with a matching night cap.  Very cute.  Pictures exist, which I plan to use in case of an emergency.

The first Christmas morning arrived, and Andrew toddled out of his room in his nightshirt and cap to see what Santa had brought.  Santa, that year, had been assisted by his four grandparents.  In addition to setting out to completely spoil him, there was no small amount of competition for his affection going on.  Ginger and I, at least, stayed out of the Santa event that year.  We knew there was no need, and so we contented ourselves with the embarrassing pajamas.

As Andrew entered the living room where Santa’s bounty was laid out, he stopped dead in his tracks.  There were toys everywhere.  They were on the floor and under the tree and stacked on the sofa.  So much stuff for one very little guy.  We were somewhat overwhelmed.  He was completely overwhelmed.  He was stunned.  It was just too much.  He was quite literally dumbstruck, unable to utter a sound.

The Christmas story, indeed the entire Gospel, begins in a very similar way, although it is a part of the story we usually forget to tell.  Before the Nativity, before the Annunciation, there is the story of another miraculous birth bringing great joy.  It is the story of Zechariah and Elizabeth.  The first chapter of Luke tells us that “[b]oth of them were righteous before God, living blamelessly according to all the commandments and regulations of the Lord.  But they had no children, because Elizabeth was barren, and both were getting on in years” (vv. 6-7).

And then Gabriel, the same angel who would shortly announce a second miraculous birth, this time to Mary, appears to Zechariah with some most unexpected good news.  “Do not be afraid, Zechariah, for your prayers has been heard.  Your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you will name him John.  You will have joy and gladness, and many will rejoice at his birth, for he will be great in the sight of the Lord” (vv. 13-15).

The news is completely overwhelming to Zechariah.  He is not inclined to believe it for, as he says, both he and Elizabeth are getting up in years.  And Zechariah, too, is dumbstruck.  Gabriel assures him of the veracity of all that has been said, and adds, “But now, because you did not believe my words, which will be fulfilled in their time, you will become mute, unable to speak, until the day these things occur” (v. 20).

The child to be born, of course, was John the Baptist, announcing the coming of the Messiah.  And with that, the story is set in motion.  One miraculous birth after another.  Grace upon grace.  And so it goes on.  It is all just overwhelming.  It leaves us, or maybe it ought to leave us, dumbstruck. There really is just nothing to be said.  It is just too much.

Now, in future years as parents, we learned to give specific instructions to the grandparents as to who bought what.  No more of the competition. We divided things out quite equally. And there was an overall limit.  Never again more than was possible to take in.  No more toddlers paralyzed by how overwhelming it was.

I sometimes wonder, though, if we missed the point.  God does not act in such a limiting way.  It just keeps coming.  The sun every morning.  The stars at night.  In truth, plenty for all of the creation to thrive, if only we would recognize it and stop living in fear of want.  Work to do and take satisfaction in.  People to love.  Dogs (OK, this is my personal prejudice about things to be grateful for, especially since Annie is at the office with me this morning).

And, above all of it, the most overwhelming statement of all.  God’s overwhelming love for creation, and particularly for humanity, in the Incarnation of God’s only Son, Christ our Savior.  It ought to leave us dumbstruck.

I wish you a dumbstruck Christmas this year.  Ginger, Andrew, Matthew, and the dogs, Annie and Abby, wish you such an overwhelming awareness of your belovedness that you are left completely speechless

Peace,

+Stacy

The Christmas Tree Angel

Star or angel?  That was the big question the first year Ginger and I were married as we prepared to celebrate our first Christmas.  With what should the Christmas tree be topped?  My family tradition was an angel; Ginger’s, a star.  The tradition did not run terribly deep on either side.

Growing up, my family’s tree had been topped with an angel.  It had not always been so, though.  The tradition was not inviolable.  After all, the Christmas tree in my earliest memories was aluminum with a color wheel.  Very modern.  Ginger, whose family always had a real tree, albeit the ugliest cedar tree that could be found, was appalled.  And the tradition at my grandparents’ houses differed.  One had a very fancy angel with a gold dress.  I think it lit up.  The other had a homemade star cut from cardboard and covered with aluminum foil.  Perhaps my mother, or aunt, or one of my uncles had made it in childhood.  I never really knew.  I suspect my grandmother was behind it.

Ginger’s family had a star.  It wasn’t a big deal to them, however.  No one can even remember now what it looked like.

That is a good thing.  Because I had my heart set on an angel.  Ginger was perfectly fine with that.  But no cheesy angels.  Nothing aluminum.  Unlighted was preferred.

So off we set that first December of our married lives in search of an angel.  There was not as big a selection in those days as I suspect there would be now.  We went to many stores in search of the perfect angel for the top of our first Christmas tree.  Nothing met the test.

Finally, we went to a little store we knew to have lots of interesting things, many of them imported, off the main street in Charlottesville, where we lived.  There we found a selection of beautiful angels.  I think they had been made in Germany.  That suited Ginger, who had been collecting ornaments from Germany since a trip there before we were married.  They had velvet dresses and hand-crafted faces.  Each had a candle in her hand.  Real wax.  They would do.

There was one problem, which was the price.  I was a student that year and money was definitely an issue.  We didn’t even look at the larger angels.  A smaller one would be fine.  The one we liked was $14.

Now, $14 doesn’t sound like a lot now, but to a student and his new wife in 1979 it was a fortune.  We debated a long time.  We knew we shouldn’t, but we bought it anyway.  Somehow, setting the Christmas traditions for a brand new family seemed like a very important thing to us.  I suppose it was an investment in Christmas.

That first Christmas together, we may not have been able to afford much to go under the tree, but we had a $14 angel with a red velvet dress and a real wax candle, and just as importantly without lights or anything aluminum, to go on top of it.  This year, that angel will be on top of its 33rd tree, which will go up this weekend by tradition.  (Don’t tell the Advent police.)

Christmas has always required an investment, quite often a very heavy one.  Mary and Joseph made a massive investment in the first Christmas.  Luke tells us that they left their home in Nazareth and traveled to Joseph’s ancestral home many miles away at a time when Mary was about to deliver her child.  It was an extravagant investment.

The angels announced the birth to the shepherds.  Though they were afraid, they left and went to see the child.  Extravagant investment.

The Magi set out from some distant place in the East in search of the child born to be king of the Jews.  They brought expensive gifts—gold, frankincense, and myrrh.  They would have made the $14 angels look, justifiably, like nothing.  Extravagant investment.

What I suspect is that making the investment itself made a great difference to the importance of that first Christmas to Mary and Joseph, to the shepherds, and to the Magi.  The $14 investment in the angel has obviously meant a great deal to Ginger and me.  The level of investment we make in something, including Christmas, always determines a great deal of what it will mean to us.  The more extravagant, the more it means.

Christmas now rolls around again.  What it will mean to us depends a great deal on the investment we decide to make.  It always has and it always will.  I think I’m of the opinion that an extravagant investment is well worth it.

As the days leading up to Christmas begin to pass us by, I’m hoping for extravagant investment of myself, something much more important than $14.  My wish for you is the same.

Peace,

+Stacy

(Alas, there is no picture of the actual $14 angel, so we'll have to make do with pictures of other tree-topper angels.)