Sermons from Grace Cathedral

Holy God so often we feel cut off from you and one another. Help us find our way to healing and hope, so that we can become new again. Amen.

Strikingly beautiful, Maria had deep dark eyes and long black hair. Superficially she seemed jaded, a kind of rebel. But if you took the time to really know her, she had great intelligence, sensitivity and heart. During my junior year of high school we were close friends. She used to talk about what it felt like getting painfully lost in the shuffle after her parents split up, about her resentful mother being left with almost nothing.

In those days divorce was suddenly becoming far more widespread and our society was not prepared. We did not know how to cope with divorce in a humane and grace-filled way. Divorce deeply affects all of us. Perhaps you have gone through a divorce yourself, or maybe it was your parents, your children, a close friend or work colleague. In our society really poor people, the ones who are barely making it, are far more likely to get divorced than wealthy people.

Being truly part of the human family means understanding how hard it can be to sustain a relationship and how much pain we can suffer when it breaks down. Many of us also have an experience of new life and joy on the other side of this suffering.

What does Jesus offer as we try to understand this feature of the human condition? Many preachers shy away from this complex topic and I worry a little about putting words into Jesus’ mouth and a lot about saying something that inadvertently harms you. But I believe that Jesus offers practical and real good news. But like all communication his words need to be interpreted and this requires difficult work. It is worth it because this teaching will lead us to wholeness and new life.

The context matters. Jesus has been teaching his disciples about becoming “servants of all.” [1] In fact he says that the world completely misunderstands servanthood. In Imperial Rome but also today we tend to think of servants as lower, lesser, outsiders compelled to work for those who are greater than they are. We easily slip into thinking that the great ones are those who coerce and control others. But Jesus turns this idea on its head. He tells his friends that serving others, especially vulnerable people, is the key to a meaningful life. He says that the greatest one will be servant of all.

Some Pharisees come to Jesus. The name Pharisee in Aramaic means “the ones who are set apart.” [2] They care intensely about determining what and who is pure. They are right to fear Jesus because he undermines this whole project. For Jesus there is one human family and no one is impure or left out. The Pharisees ask Jesus, “Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife?” The narrator calls this question a trap. Whether Jesus says yes or no the Pharisees have a plan to condemn him.

Jesus understands that there is no right answer. He also knows what happened after King Herod and his former sister-in-law each divorced their spouses and married each other. John the Baptist criticized their marriage. And this led to his execution by Herod. Rather than trying to set a policy or law on divorce Jesus changes the question. Rather than asking if it is legal to divorce he asks us to consider what God wants for us.

During those times there were ethical disagreements concerning divorce. Some believed that the only justification for divorce was sexual infidelity. Others thought that a husband should be able to divorce his wife for pretty much any reason. According to the Book of Deuteronomy a man can write a certificate of divorce if his wife, “does not please him” or, “because he finds something objectionable about her” (Deut. 24:1-4).

This biblical passage puts all the power in the hands of the husband. It makes divorce the rule rather than an exception to be employed only after all other courses of action have failed. Most important this law endangers the most vulnerable people in society – women and children who could not own property and who depend for their well-being on the generosity of their husband and father. This actually describes the situation of my friend Maria.

Jesus hates just this kind of human suffering. You can almost hear him raise his voice as he says that the reason for a commandment permitting divorce is our “hardness of heart.” But note this. Jesus does not say Moses was wrong. Jesus does not say that the commandment permitting divorce should cease to be a law. Jesus is not forbidding divorce.

Instead he uses hyperbole to make a point. In our reading a few weeks ago Jesus said that, “if your eye causes you to sin, tear it out” (Mk. 9:47). Just as this is not a call for us to pluck out our eyes, Jesus describing remarriage as a kind of adultery does not mean that no one should ever get divorced. In every way Jesus says we are children of God and our actions have lasting effects on other children of God many of whom are far more vulnerable than we are.

Jesus is the same person who teaches us that the law was made for human beings not human beings for the law. Jesus’ point is not to shame people who have already suffered all the effects of a broken relationship. He is not trying to make people stay in a relationship that is abusive or in one that has clearly died. He is not trying to preserve relationships that continue to do damage to the people who are in them.

Instead Jesus is moving our attention from what the law permits to God’s dream for how our relationships could be. Describing this higher picture of marriage Jesus rejects the Pharisees’ approach which only sees the relationship from the perspective of the divorcing husband. In his words here Jesus treats women and men the same (he talks in equal terms about a man and a woman divorcing a spouse).

Jesus paints a picture of what love can become. He quotes the book of Genesis and talks about people leaving their families in order to be joined together. So often in my own life I think about the deep and miraculous truth that “the two shall become one flesh.” Adding to this Jesus says that, “what God has joined together, let no one separate.”

Let that sink in for a bit. Imagine two beings so united in purpose and affection that they become like one single entity. Imagine God as the source of our deepest relationships and actively at work in helping them to thrive.

I understand that marriage is not for everyone. Anyone entering into marriage needs to know that even in the best circumstances it can be hard work. Marriage involves renewing the relationship over and over again. Marriage requires wisdom, communication, perseverance, patience, courage, forgiveness and an openness to what is new and what cannot be controlled. It demands not just a commitment to the other person but to the relationship itself. To be strong a marriage requires a community of support like the one gathered here this morning.

Jesus wants us to know that there is more to life than feeling justified by the law and superior to another person. Jesus wants us to strive for goodness, to find the way that we are called to serve. But there are relationships that have become so broken that no matter how hard we try, they cannot be saved. Jesus speaks about this not because we have broken some rule and deserve to be punished, but because it is God’s nature to be present to help us when we are suffering. [3]

I began by sharing my fear of speaking about divorce with you today. I guess I really did not want to be misunderstood on this point. Jesus does not condemn people for being divorced. Fifty years ago Diane, my mother-in-law and one of the women I most admire, went through a divorce with my father-in-law. Because of this the church she grew up in utterly rejected her. For decades she never felt comfortable in a church and I did not talk to her about it. Some of you might remember that magical midnight Christmas mass ten years ago when she joined us.

Delayed by her flight, Diane hesitantly made her way down the center aisle to her pew. In all those years as family we had never worshiped together. In the middle of my sermon, preaching from this pulpit I immediately recognized her. I almost started crying tears of joy because she had come home – loved by God and by you the people who welcomed her.

Our reading today ends as Jesus’ disciples try to keep children from bothering him. Mark writes that Jesus feels “indignant” about this. He says, “Let the children come to me; do not stop them; for it is to such as these that the kingdom of God belongs.” Mark writes, “And [Jesus] took them up in his arms, laid his hands on them, and blessed them.”

This week I keep thinking of my high school friend Maria and Jesus taking her into his arms and blessing her. I imagine Jesus holding Diane with that smile from Christmas on her face and blessing her. And in my mind’s eye I see all the people who have suffered the effects of difficult marriages and divorce and he is reaching out to embrace and bless us.

[1] Matt Boulton, “One Flesh: Salt’s Commentary for the Twentieth Week after Pentecost, SALT, 1 October 2024. https://www.saltproject.org/progressive-christian-blog/2018/10/3/one-flesh-salts-lectionary-commentary-for-twentieth-week-after-pentecost

[2] “The appellation “Pharisee” is probably derived from the Aramaic word perishayya which means “the separated one.” Very likely the addresses of Mark’s story would not know that. But from previous narrative they have already learned that the Pharisees maintain a pollution system that separates the world into two realms of the clean and the unclean.” Herman Waetjen, A Reordering of Power: A Socio-Political Reading of Mark’s Gospel (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1989) 165.

[3] Canon Edie Weller writes about this in a sermon. She says, “Jesus was a realist. He knew that there are times when we can’t reach or maintain the kind of relationship that God might dream for us. There are times and circumstances which lead to broken relationships, from which – as hard as we might work at it – we cannot recover. Jesus speaks about this not because the death of a marriage is more sinful or worse in some way than other experiences of human brokenness. Rather he speaks about this because he cares about us. God’s grief in the face of our irreconcilable differences stems not from our having broken the rules or failed a divine test, but from God’s response to our experience of such pain.

Edie B. Weller, “Sermon for Sunday October 7, 2018 Twentieth Sunday after Pentecost, Year B (Proper 22), St. Peter’s Episcopal Church, Seattle, Washington. https://saintmarks.org/staff/the-rev-edie-weller/

Genesis 28:10-17

Revelation 12:7-12

John 1:47-51

“For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world, and to forfeit his life?” (Mk. 7).

​Proverbs 1:20-33

​Psalm 19

​James 3:1-12

​Mark 8:27-38

What does it mean to lose our life in order to save it?

“Looking up to heaven [Jesus] and said… “Ephatha,” that is, “Be opened” (Mk. 7).

The Very Rev. Dr. Malcolm Clemens Young, Dean

Grace Cathedral, San Francisco, CA 2E58

16 Pentecost (Proper 18B) 11:00 a.m. Eucharist Sunday

8 September 2024, Congregation Sunday

Proverbs 22:1-2, 8-9, 22-23

Psalm 125

James 2:1-10, (11-13), 14-17

Mark 7:24-37

How can we open ourselves to God? When we go beyond the way others experience us, beyond who we think we are, we will encounter God. Today I am going to offer two pictures of this openness the first from Mark’s story of the Syrophoenician mother and the second from the ancient Book of Proverbs.

Song of Solomon 2:8-13

James 1:17-27

Mark 7:1-8, 14-15, 21-23

“Once there were three baby owls: Sarah and Percy and Bill. They lived in a hole in the trunk of a tree with their Owl Mother…” [1] These are the first lines in the children’s picture book Owl Babies. One night the three children wake up and find that their mother has gone.

The older two siblings have theories about where their mother went and wavering confidence that she will return. The youngest one Bill just repeats “I want my mommy.” It is a simple story about growing up, about the difficult task of learning to become separate from our parents. Sweet Alexandra loved owls, animals, babies and the experience of childhood itself. This was her favorite story and the basis for her nickname “Owlexandra” or just plain “Owl.”

It is hard to move gracefully from being a child to adulthood. It is hard to leave behind our childhood especially when we are very well adapted to it. It is hard to care for children in this time of transition. It is hard to be a child, or the friend of a child, who is becoming an adult.

Stories help to guide us as we make our way. Alexandra loved stories like Frozen, Wicked, and Hamilton. Her mother is American and her father is from England so they read quite a variety of stories including those of the British author Enid Blyton (1897-1968). In Five on a Treasure Island the first book in the Famous Five series, Julian, Dick and Anne are on their way to spend their first summer away from their parents, at the seashore home of their uncle and aunt, and their cousin Georgina and her dog Timmy.

“The car suddenly topped a hill – and there was the shining blue sea, calm and smooth in the evening sun…” At the house they meet their aunt for the first time (and they “liked the look of her”). She says, “Welcome to Kirrin [Bay]… Hallo, all of you! It’s lovely to see you… There were kisses all round, and then the children went into the house. They liked it. It felt old and rather mysterious somehow, and the furniture was old and very beautiful.” [2]

These books are filled with secret passageways, hidden treasure, stolen goods, old maps, smugglers, spies and suspicious strangers. But ultimately bravery, perseverance, kindness and loyalty are always rewarded. In the end everything is perfectly resolved and clear. You know where everyone stands. There is no gray area or ambiguity.

You might say that real life is not like this and you would be right. Each of us is a mixture of good and bad. But we need each other to remind us to feed what is good in us every day so that we grow in kindness.

I love the way Alexandra’s parents talk about her as a “gift from God” and uniquely filled with Christmas magic. In London her older sibling asked Father Christmas (or Santa Claus) for a little sister and ten months later she arrived. Alexandra was an angel in our Christmas pageant right here where I am standing. At the age of three she fell in love with the realistic looking babies in the FAO Schwartz store window. She loved children and animals. The Marin Primary motto is “treasuring childhood” and Alexandra did. She participated in theater, sports like cross country. She made art including a painting based on the work of Keith Haring.

One of the greatest treasures in this Cathedral is a triptych that Keith Haring (1958-1990) finished only weeks before his death from AIDS. It shows a mother holding her baby surrounded by joyful angels.

Alexandra knew that the most important question for a child is not what do you want to be when you grow up. It is who do you want to be; or better how do you want to be. Alexandra was empathetic, a thoughtful caregiver who valued kindness above everything else.

This way of being matches the values of this Cathedral where it is not about who is in or out, who is good or evil, who is saved or damned. The style of faith here is not about condemning other people or other religions. It is not overly preoccupied with the sin which is so evident in the world, the cruelty and unkindness that lead to tragedies like a young person’s death.

Instead we believe that God loves everyone without exception. We hold a faith that arises chiefly out of gratitude, out of an experience of nature’s beauty and the simple pleasure of being kind and helping the people who travel along with us. Jesus says, “Blessed are the pure in heart… Blessed are the peacemakers” and we try to be people who build bridges and look for the best in others. We sing “All things bright and beautiful, all creatures great and small, all things wise and wonderful, the Lord God made them all.” And in the midst of terrible tragedy we remember what a gift our life is.

At the end of the service my friend Luis will sing a poem by the sixteenth century Anglican priest George Herbert. It ends with these words. They are a kind of invitation to God. “Come, my Joy, my Love, my Heart: Such a Joy, as none can move: Such a Love, as none can part: Such a Heart, as joys in love.” Love and joy – these are the qualities exemplified by God. They are the possibilities that we realize in our own life.

Jesus does not say much about what happens after we die, about what the poet Mary Oliver calls “that cottage of darkness.” But he does say over and over that God is like a loving parent, an Owl Mother if you will, who always returns, who cares for us as every day of our life as we face the struggles of maturing.

And I imagine heaven as like the opening of an Enid Blyton book, the beginning of summer when suddenly we come across “the shining blue sea, calm and smooth in the evening sun,” and we are welcomed with “kisses all round” into an old house and a new adventure. And we will see again our lovely Owl as a kind of angel filled with kindness and the magic of Christmas.

[1] “Once there were three baby owls: Sarah and Percy and Bill. They lived in a hole in the trunk of a tree with their Owl Mother. The hole had twigs and leaves and owl feathers in it. It was their house.” Martin Waddell, Illustrated by Patrick Benson, Owl Babies (Cambridge, MA: Candlewick Press, 1992).

[2] Enid Blyton, Five on a Treasure Island Illustrated by Ellen A. Soper (NY: Hatchette Children’s Books, 1997 originally published in 1942), 7-9.

“We have come to believe and know that you are the Holy One of God” (Jn. 6).

1 Kings 8:(1,6,10-11),22-30,41-43

Psalm 84

Ephesians 6:10-20

John 6:56-69

1 Kings 2:10-12, 3:3-14

Ephesians 5:15-20

John 6:51-58

In the crypt of the basilica in Assisi, there is a shirt made out of hair that once adorned the mortal body of St. Clare. Each time I visited that Umbrian mecca of a kind of sainthood that remains admirable and replicable today—the decision of St. Francis and St. Clare to choose worldly poverty in exchange for spiritual richness—I found myself dwelling on that hair shirt relic. Legend has it that Clare was beautiful and possessed some of the most luxurious golden locks of hair ever seen in the region. And yet because of how she experienced God’s presence in her contemporary St. Francis, who threw off the mantle of his family wealth and stood naked and reborn in front of the local bishop while pledging himself to rebuild God’s church, Clare decided to devote her life to the same Christ—and cut off those golden locks as a sign of her own rebirth in the living God. There were several children of wealthy Italians who lived in the 1200’s, many of whom most likely loved their families and cared for the local populace in admirable ways. But we gather here today in the city of St. Francis, commemorating the feast day of St. Clare, because these two children of 13th century wealthy Italians re-presented the heart of our Christian faith by following Jesus in a radical and life-giving way that transformed their city, their country, and the wider world around them. They let go of what the world believed was necessary for life and incarnated the power of the gospel in their own lives through utter reliance on God and love and service of neighbor. Every time I saw that hair shirt of Clare’s in Assisi, it made me conscious of two things. The first is just how scratchy and awful such a penitential practice must have been. I’m not sure wearing a hair shirt is a practice that would lead me to greater consciousness and trust in Jesus, but I do know that it would lead one to a state of constant discomfort. And the second is that even if a shirt made out of hair—with resonances and reminders of the hair that Clare let go—isn’t the way that may lead me to complete reliance on Jesus, my life’s call is about finding out what will, and about letting only the light and love of God clothe me and flow through me for the continued transformation of the world. We come into the world through God’s grace, “from [our] mother’s wombs, [and so] we shall go [forth] again, naked as [we] came” as the author of Ecclesiastes reminds us. And yet somewhere between the “forceps and the stone” each of us has the opportunity to choose how we will ultimately use the precious gift of our lives. Will we live into the imperial story—that sees worldly wealth as the final goal of human effort and toil, and trample whomever and whatever stands between us and its accumulation? Or will we see the accidental and earned gifts of our lives as tools to employ in the pursuit of the gospel—a gospel that constantly reminds us that our fundamental wealth, security, and influence are found in God and in restored relationships with one another? I stand before you in this magnificent worship space called Grace Cathedral because previous generations of the faithful chose the latter over the former. And yet, just like us gathered here today, the majority of our ancestors struggled mightily with the dual pull of the world and the gospel on their lives. There is something beautiful and enviable about the extreme choices Clare and Francis made—to renounce all worldly possessions and give themselves entirely to God. Perhaps that is the way that lies before some of us gathered here today. But regardless of whether we go all in on the gospel in the exact way they did, each of us are called to go all in on the gospel in our time and in our own way. Whatever method or practice leads us there, all of us must be gravitating toward the realization of a beloved and restored community—on the micro and macro levels. Regardless of our liturgical preferences and proclivities, all of us must be about authentic forms of worship that connect the interior life of our churches with the exterior needs and hopes of our neighborhoods. And no matter the contours of the time in which we live, the specific oppositions we may face individually or communally, nor the strength of the temptation to conflate imperial religion with the living gospel, all of us are called to embrace our unique membership in the larger Body of Christ and become channels of blessing and healing in this precious life we share. My deepest prayer today is that God will grant me the grace to live this calling out among you as your bishop, and that God will likewise grant us all the grace to empower and support one another as we pursue this joyful and difficult work together. As we discern God’s vision together in the months and years ahead, may the same Spirit that guided our forebears Francis and Clare be manifest among us, and may we grow in trust of the one God who clothes us in righteousness, anoints our head with oil, and equips us with the tools we need to see the vision realized on earth as it is in heaven. To the All in All, who brings us unburdened, bare, and free into this life and brings us home one day in the same way, be all honor, glory, power and dominion, now and forevermore. Amen.