SSJE Sermons

Bede the Venerable is honored as the first Historian of the Church in Great Britain, having written The Ecclesiastical History of the English People, giving the history of Christianity in England from 597 to 731 A.D. He also wrote about the lives of some of the saints of his period.

Proverbs 8:14, 22-31/Psalm 8/Romans 5:1-5/John 16:12-15

Today we celebrate an idea—an idea that represents our best understanding of the mystery and paradox of God: the Holy Trinity.  There is one and only one God; and this God is a trinity of persons.

There’s a delightful poem about the Trinity called “The Creed of St. Athanasius”.  Whoever wrote it (it wasn’t St. Athanasius) probably didn’t mean to write delightful poetry, but I do find it both delightful and poetic. Here are a few lines from the Creed of St. Athanasius:

“… we worship one God in Trinity, and Trinity in Unity; Neither confounding the Persons; nor dividing the Essence. For there is one Person of the Father; another of the Son; and another of the Holy Spirit. But the Godhead of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, is all one; the Glory equal, the Majesty coeternal. Such as the Father is; such is the Son; and such is the Holy Spirit. The Father uncreated; the Son uncreated; and the Holy Spirit uncreated. The Father unlimited; the Son unlimited; and the Holy Spirit unlimited. The Father eternal; the Son eternal; and the Holy Spirit eternal. And yet they are not three eternals; but one eternal. As also there are not three uncreated; nor three infinites, but one uncreated; and one infinite. So likewise the Father is Almighty; the Son Almighty; and the Holy Spirit Almighty. And yet they are not three Almighties; but one Almighty. So the Father is God; the Son is God; and the Holy Spirit is God. And yet they are not three Gods; but one God. So likewise the Father is Lord; the Son Lord; and the Holy Spirit Lord. And yet not three Lords; but one Lord… And in this Trinity none is before, or after another; none is greater, or less than another. But the whole three Persons are coeternal, and coequal. So that in all things, as aforesaid; the Unity in Trinity, and the Trinity in Unity, is to be worshipped…”

There’s something about this that I find delightful—is there something a little Lewis Carroll-y about it, something a little “Alice in Wonderland” 1000 years early? I wonder if God may be smiling at this. But it’s the best we poor creatures can do to try to explain the mystery. We can only speak of God in poetic language and in awareness of the limitations of our words and concepts.  And yet our limited words and concepts have a way of leading us through and beyond to that which is ineffable, inexpressible in words—like music, in a way. And, as it happens, Jesus taught mainly in parables, that is, in metaphoric, poetic language.  Even his actions can be read as parables or metaphors pointing beyond themselves—the calming of the sea, for example—or the Cross. Besides being something Jesus did, the Cross may be the greatest of all parables.

We speak of God as best we can because we want to, for some reason.  But the fuller truth lies somewhere beyond whatever words we utter and beyond the grasp of our minds.

(The Athanasian Creed, by the way, is not in the poetry section of the Book of Common Prayer, but in a section called “Historical Documents of the Church” toward the back of the book.)

It’s so easy to get lost in all our words about God and tangled up in the abstractions of theology. It’s not bad to be lost and tangled in abstraction once in a while, but in doing that we may overlook the most important thing about the Christian understanding of God: God is not an abstraction; God is personal, and we believe God is revealed in very specific, concrete, fleshly, human terms.

The masculine gender issues aside (for today), one thing key to our understanding of God is that the language of the Holy Trinity is very human and very personal. “Father” and “son” are unapologetically personal, human terms.  God is not an impersonal “force”, like in the Star Wars movies. We do speak of the creative power of God, the animating energies of the Divine, but, paradoxically, there is also about God an essentially personal quality: flesh, blood, laughter, tears.

This fundam[...]

The feast we are celebrating today is distinctive from other feasts in the Church’s calendar.  On this day we do not revere a particular saint or recall an event from the biblical narrative, as we do on so many other occasions.  Instead, this feast day points us to a specific date in the history of Anglicanism – June 9, 1549, the feast of Pentecost – when the Book of Common Prayer was introduced in the Church of England. It draws us back to the time of the English Reformation and the brief reign of Edward VI, son of Henry VIII, and to an event which set the direction and course of Anglicanism for centuries to come.

Why are this date and this particular event so important as to warrant a feast day of their own?  What cause do they give us today for celebration?  I might suggest three treasures this feast holds for us: First, it is a celebration of our faith.  Second, it is a celebration of our unity.  And third, it is a celebration of our mission in the world.

Anglican faith is, in many ways, distinctive from other expressions of Christian believing.  Anglican faith is primarily expressed through worship, unlike other Christian traditions which often look to ancient creeds or confessions as the source of their identity.  Some of you might know that I was raised in a predominantly DutchCalvinist denomination, the Christian Reformed Church.  Churches in the Reformed tradition, like the CRC, find inspiration and guidance in the Heidelberg Catechism, a document which dates from 1563.  The Heidelberg Catechism is conveniently divided into 52 sections, called “Lord’s Days,” which contain questions and answers about a range of theological ideas.  In my childhood, it was the preacher’s practice to elaborate on one of these “Lord’s Days” each Sunday morning, usually for about 30 minutes!  The Heidelberg Catechism, along with the Belgic Confession and the Canons of Dort, were the statements of faith on which the Dutch Calvinist tradition was built.  These historic documents articulated for us what we believed.

Anglicanism is different.  Although we affirm our faith in the words of the Apostles’ Creed and the Nicene Creed, our faith is expressed, first and foremost, in our worship.  There is a Latin phrase for this: lexorandi, lexcredendi, which, loosely translated, means “the law of praying [is] the law of believing.”  It refers to the conviction that prayer shapes belief, that liturgy forms theology.  Anglicans express their faith through their worship.  If someone were to ask you, “What do Anglicans believe?” the best answer might be to invite them to join in our worship.  Our common prayer and worshipshape and express the faith of Anglicans more than doctrinal statements and creeds.

Today’s celebration of the First Book of Common Prayer is a celebration of that principle.  It is an affirmation that, for us, the worship and praise of God, the glorification of God, must always be at the center.  Not our own selves, not our work, not our causes, not even our friends and colleagues…but GOD.  That is what it means to be “orthodox.”  The word orthodox comes from the Greek compound orthósand dóxa, the “rightful glory” – not so much the rightful belief, but the rightful glorification or worship, of God. Orthósplus dóxa – it’s all about God, our rightful worship and glorification of God.  It is from this that our theology arises.

The First Book of Common Prayer, then, along with its subsequent editions and variations, offeredus a way to order our worship of God and to express our faith.  We are a liturgical church, and we celebrate God with words and forms drawn from our rich history.  These words and forms were drawn together in 1549 by “a commission of learned bishops and priests,” but “the format, substance, and style of the Prayer Book were primarily the work of Thomas Cranmer, Archbishop of Canterbury (from) 1533-1556.”[i]  Cranmer and the commission drew on a number of existing resources, simplifying them and ordering them to make [...]

The gift of the Spirit at Pentecost then did not undo or reverse the story of Babel. Rather the gift of the Spirit at Pentecost healed the story of Babel, for the gift given was a gift of comprehension that healed the confusion, jealousy, division and even fear of Babel.

Jn 17:20-26

As we draw near the Feast of Pentecost it is a time for us to think deeply about the gifts of the Holy Spirit given at Pentecost and what they mean for us as members of the Church. 

Jesus in his discourse at the Last Supper promised that an Advocate would be given the disciples.  He did not say much then.  We know that in those words he was giving his disciples the promise of the Holy Spirit. Through their words it is given to us. 

Just after the discourse in John’s Gospel is finished comes the prayer of Jesus to God the Father, Jesus’ High Priestly Prayer (Jn 17).  The Gospel read today is part of this prayer. That prayer is primarily about the Glory shared by the Father and the Son. Considering what is written later about the Gift of the Holy Spirit given at Pentecost I have no doubt that the glory shared between the Father and the Son is also shared with the Holy Spirit in the fullness of the Trinity. If we can perceive it that glory is, in some way, shared with us through the Apostles’ ministry.

More about the gifts of the Spirit is found in Paul’s letters (e.g. Gal. 5:22ffthe fruits of the Spirit) and in other letters of the Apostolic Age.

Other examples of the gifts of the Holy Spirit are found in the Creeds of the Church and in the writings of the Fathers of the Early Church, in the prayers of the Liturgy of Holy Baptism, and in the ancient hymn, Veni Creator Spiritus, used at ordinations and other ceremonies that mark changes in the lives of those who respond to the call to God’s service. 

Some of those gifts of the Spirit are seen in the prayer just after a Baptism;“sustenance in the Holy Spirit,  an inquiring and discerning heart, the courage to will and to persevere, a spirit to know and to love God, and the gift of joy and wonder in all God’s works.”  (BCP p.308)          

When we pray for renewal of the gifts of the Spirit within us, it is not that the gifts are to be made anew.  It is a prayer for our perception of the gifts of the Spirit to be renewed and refreshed within us.  Our perception of God’s gifts and God’s glory can be renewed again and again.

In his high priestly prayer Jesus prayed that the disciples might also know unity in the glory that God gave to him. 

As the Apostles of Jesus passed it on to us we also can find unity with God in the ministries God gives to each of us.            

In what ways can you pray that your perception of God’s gifts may be sharpened and renewed?

John 17:1-11a

Driving from Boston to any location on the North Shore of Massachusetts via Route One is a unique experience with which we Brothers, and many of you, will be quite familiar. Route One is the most direct way to get back and forth between our monastery here in Cambridge and Emery House in West Newbury. Most of us – especially those living at Emery House for any length of time – have driven this route dozens, if not hundreds of times. Though I do have a soft-spot for some of Route One’s distinctively kitschy landmarks – a fiberglass orange dinosaur, a replica of the leaning tower of Pisa, a steakhouse sign in the shape of a gigantic cactus – I confess that on many days I find the barrage of retail chains and languishing motels tedious and vaguely depressing. A New England tourism website describes the Route One experience with appropriately mixed emotion: “Years have passed and Route One is still one of America’s hideous, tacky gems –with its odd charm still shining at us in its neon, kitschy glory.”

That line begs the question: What does the word glory mean? What does it mean to you?  What does it mean to glorify something or someone? Is Route One, by any stretch of the imagination, glorious? We use the word glory in our shared lexicon of prayer, scripture and liturgy almost as often as the words Amen and Allelujah. So often, in fact, that in our least attentive or impatient moments, it has the potential to become just another fiberglass dinosaur on our daily commute to God. Fortunately, we hear of glory often enough and in such varied contexts that the ears of our hearts have constant opportunity to re-awaken and to rediscover this powerful, dynamic, utterly significant and mysterious word. The great prayer that Jesus offers to his Father in John’s Gospel is a culminating moment in his life and mission, a prayer that uses the words glory or glorify eight times. This prayer is a crucial moment of pause and clarification before the passion, crucifixion, and resurrection of Jesus, which in John form a single arc or processual movement simply referred to as his glorification. But this final glorification simply distills and amplifies a theme that is present even in the gospel’s prologue and surfaces again and again in each chapter, the sure conviction that “the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father’s only son, full of grace and truth.”[i]

Massive books have been written about the word “glory.” My words will barely scrape the surface. For this evening, I want to share just a few thoughts about the glorifying energy of corporate prayer. God’s glory is mediated to us in a physical and interpersonal way in the presence of Jesus especially as he prays for us to his Father. As we partake of the glory of the Son of the Father, God’s glorification in us takes root and blossoms wherever Christians are a praying presence, since the glory of God is always a glory shared.Our participation in a community of prayer makes the glory hidden in the work of Christ manifest to the world, so that all who are drawn to him through us may “see and believe.”

In Christian tradition, God’s glory might be understood as the visibly manifest, revealed, interpersonally mediated presence of God. It is something physical and available to our senses that opens us to God’s loving gift of Godself, the “godliness of God.” For us, Jesus Christ is the supreme mediator and embodiment of God’s glory, and the Holy Spirit communicates and grounds us in that glory even while leading us ever further into its Truth. In Christ, we participate in glory now and are being translated into greater glory as we follow the Way. Though not from the Johannine corpus, one of my favorite passages in all of scripture conveys the irresistible adventure of this transformation. In his second letter to theCorinthians, St. Paul writes:

Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is fre[...]

Saint Francis famously called every little part of creation brother or sister. As with people or plant, tribe or terrain, a language or at least perspective of fraternity invites listening rather than restricting, honor rather than control, a sober humility pointing back to our common loving Creator.

The earth, in the words of the Franciscan eco-theologian Leonardo Boff,

“is crying out.” Crying out against its destruction by the creature meant to till the soil and make it fruitful.

Helen Keller once said I am only one, but still I am one. I cannot do everything, but still I can do something; and because I cannot do everything, I will not refuse to do something that I can do.

Transforming Unjust Structures: The Fourth Mark of Mission

For the past several weeks we have been considering the Mission of God in the world by looking at the Anglican Communion’s “Five Marks of Mission.” We have been asking ourselves, “What is it that God is doing, in our lives and in the world?  What is God’s mission and purpose?  What does God care about most passionately?”  This evening we examine the Fourth Mark of Mission, which is “to seek to transform unjust structures of society, to challenge violence of every kind, and to pursue peace and reconciliation.” 

Transformation is at the heart of the Gospel message.  God is transforming us individually, making each of us a “new creation” in Christ (II Cor. 5:17).  But God is also transforming us collectively, along with the whole Creation: “Behold, I make all things new,” says the One seated upon the Throne in the book of Revelation (Rev. 21:5).  God’s work of transformation, then,is personal and spiritual, and it is communal, social and political.[i]  God cares about us as individuals, but God also cares about our life together.

The Bible has plenty to say about God’s passion for justice and about God’s vision for our life together:

It speaks of the goodness and order of God’s Creation (“God saw everything that he had made, and indeed, it was very good”-Gen. 1:31), and of the rebellion and disobedience that plunged us into the bondage of sin.  It holds out to us God’s promise to restore the Creation and reconcile all things in Christ (Col. 1:20)

The pivotal story of the Exodus reveals God’s compassion for God’s people, and God’s desire to free them from oppression.   We read that the Egyptians were exploiting the Israelites’ labor, restricting their freedoms, and rendering them powerless; this is what dominant political and social systems do.  The liberation God wins for the people of ancient Israel is political and economic, as well as religious.

In the giving of the Law, God establishes communal norms that protect the poor from exploitation and limit the power of the rich.  God’s laws are designed to create a common good, and to allow it to flourish.

When the people stray from these laws, God sends the prophets to challenge their unjust social-political structures and to re-focus the attention of the people on God’s vision for them. The prophets cry out against the human suffering created by unjust systems imposed by the wealthy and powerful.

Similarly, the Good News preached by Jesus is not only personal and spiritual, but also communal, social and political.  Jesus comes announcing that “the kingdom of God has come near” and urging people to “repent and believe in the good news” (Mark 1:15).  The repentance he requires is not just a turning away from personal sin, but the transformation of social and political systems that elevate some at the expense of others.  “Kingdom” is a political term, and although Jesus could have spoken of the “family of God” or the “community of God,” he chose to speak of the “kingdom of God,” a kingdom that stood in stark contrast to the kingdoms of Herod and of Caesar, with which his hearers were very familiar.  He taught his followers to pray that God’s kingdom would come “on earth” as it already is in heaven – he meant right now, in this life, not just in the after-life.[ii]

In this kingdom, this transformed community, the powerful are brought down from their thrones and the lowly are lifted up; the hungry are filled with good things while the rich are sent away empty (Luke 2:52,53).  In this kingdom, the poor are blessed and those who weep learn to laugh (Luke 6:20,21).  Jesus tells us that it is for this reason that he was sent into the world: “to bring good news to the poor,” “to proclaim release to the captives,” “to let the oppressed go free,” “to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor” (Luke 4:18,19).

Jesus not only teaches about this new kingdom, he embodies it by befriending “tax collectors and sinners;” by associating with[...]