Preparing for Advent

 We are about to begin the season of the church year which seems to be overwhelmed by secularism i.e. the Secular Christmas.  That would be the season of Advent which is a time to prepare for the coming of the Christ Child.  Christmas seems to be in full swing now with Christmas carols playing in the stores and Santa Claus parades in every corner of the land. 

I am proposing something which is probably way out in left field (to use a secular metaphor).  I am proposing that we spend a bit of time preparing for Advent.  In case you are wondering, Advent begins this coming Sunday.  We will be lighting the first candle in the Advent Wreath.  I also hope we will be singing some Advent carols – yes there are actually Advent carols such as O Come O Come Emanuel; or, Lo How a Rose E’er Blooming.   

So, what does it mean to prepare for the season of preparation?  The first thing is to understand, as best we can, what Christmas is actually about.   For me this is best summed up by the carol, Love Came Down at Christmas by Christina Rossetti.  Here are the lyrics:

1. Love came down at Christmas,
   Love all lovely, Love divine;
   Love was born at Christmas,
   Star and angels gave the sign.
2. Worship we the Godhead,
   Love incarnate, Love divine;
   Worship we our Jesus:
   But wherewith for sacred sign?
3. Love shall be our token,
   Love be yours and love be mine,
   Love to God and all men,
   Love for plea and gift and sign.

Here is the link for a beautiful reedition of the carol, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1UodfFV3A3M

You may be protesting that I am doing just what I object to – jumping over Advent directly to Christmas with this carol.  However, what I am trying to show is that the essence of Christmas is love.  To get ready to prepare for Christmas we must prepare to welcome love within us.  We cannot be ready to receive the love that is born in a stable in Bethlehem unless we begin to truly love ourselves.  That is easier said than done. 

How do we, then, begin to do that?  I received a missive from Kathleen Wiley, a wise person who spoke about the qualities of love proposed by Erich Fromm in The Art of Loving. According to Wiley, Fromm states these are giving, care, responsibility, respect, and knowledge.  When I read this, I had not planned to connect this to Advent but that seems to be where the spirit has taken me this morning. 

What I would like to do is to explore each of these themes during Advent to see what they mean when applied to loving ourselves.  At this point, I am not sure what this idea will reveal as I have not tried to do this before.  So, I am very interested to see what this will reveal as I journey through Advent.  So, with this, I am preparing for the Advent season.  I hope you will join me.

Blessings  

 

 

 

Of Holidays and Holy Days

Happy Victoria Day to those of you who celebrate today as a Holiday.  Holiday originally meant holy day but it has lost much of that meaning for many people.  There is not too much that is holy about the 2-4 weekend in today’s society except for those who worship beer at the cottage. Of course many of our holidays originally had a religious connotation being connected to Christmas and Boxing Day, Good Friday and Easter Sunday and even Easter Monday.  But even those have taken on a secular connotation in modern culture.  I recently bemoaned that fact that the Easter Egg hunt in this part of my world is held on Good Friday morning.  I had a letter to the local paper publish those remarks to which I received some positive response.  There is also the new custom of wishing people happy holiday instead of Merry Christmas.  People obviously are oblivious to the fact they are wishing people a happy holy day.  However, the secularization of our Holy Days cannot be denied.

Perhaps this is why my thoughts this morning have turned to prayer even though Victoria Day is one of those holidays which does not have religious connotations.  I have been in a couple of discussions recently about why we pray.  I am reminded of the reflection I used for a Diocesan Council meeting some years ago which follows:

Dean Alan Jones of Grace Cathedral, San Francisco has noted that there are only two prayers: ‘Help’ and ‘Thank-you’.  Everything else is just a footnote or variation and expansion on the basic theme—whether it is praise, adoration, confession, supplication or thanksgiving.

I believe that the essence of those two prayers ‘Help’ and ‘Thank you’ can in turn be summed up by ‘O God’ depending on how you speak that phrase.  ‘O God!!!’ which could be followed by ‘what was I thinking’ or ‘what were they thinking’ or ‘what were you thinking God’.  Or ‘O God!!!’ which could be followed by ‘isn’t this wonderful’ or ‘aren’t you wonderful’.    These true prayers probably should always followed by exclamation marks. 

Whether it is ‘Help’ or ‘Thank you’, to pray is to strive to place ourselves more closely in right relationship with God and with God’s creation.  We need our God-given imagination to apprehend what that right relationship is or can be.  The poet Mary Oliver tells us that the world gives us an invitation to right relationship through our imagination every day: 

Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,

The world offers itself to your imagination,

Calls you like the wild geese,

Harsh and exciting,

Over and over announcing your place

in the family of things.

In today’s meeting let us pray ‘Help’.

Gracious and loving God help us to open our imaginations to all that you are offering us.  Help us to imagine and see the path to our right place in the family of things—in God’s family—in our lives as God’s children, in our parishes and especially in our work today for the part of God’s kingdom that is the Diocese of Huron.   In silence let us open our hearts and minds and bodies and souls and imaginations to the help that God offers us.  Amen.

Afternoon Session

This morning I noted that there are two prayers ‘Help’ and ‘Thank you’.  We ended with the prayer ‘Help’ that God would enable us to open our imaginations to right relationship with God for ourselves, our parishes, and the Diocese.  Let us pause and reflect on where we have been this morning.  Let us reflect on where have we had difficulty in opening our imagination to see where that right relationship could be?   Let us reflect on where we have opened our imagination to what the right relationship with God is. Let us reflect on where we have seen but not followed the path of right relationship.   Let us reflect on where have we have moved to be more in right relationship with God and God’s creation.

Let us pray.  Gracious God we thank you for all that you have given us this morning. ‘Thank you’ for all that you will continue to give us this afternoon and when we return to our homes and parishes to continue to seek the right relationship that God intends for us as God’s Children and God’s Church.  Amen. 

Being Truly Humble

I have been pondering what it means to be truly humble as part of my preparation for Christmas this Advent.  I like to think of myself as a fairly humble person but being humble is something I have not been all that successful at it I am being honest with myself.  One of my favourite quotes about humbleness is from Helen Luke, “to be humble is to see things clearly.”   When we see ourselves clearly we will be humbled by what we see—our warts and imperfections; our shadow; our desire to be perfect despite our imperfections.  As we approach Christmas and the incarnation of God among us we are given a wonderful example of humility. 

The birth of Jesus—in lowly estate, in a stable, among animals—does not happen by chance; nothing in the birth narrative does. In the terms of Carl Jung, Jesus, as the archetype of the divine child, is the incarnation of the Self—the God image. Edward Edinger explores the significance of this happening among animals in their abode:

Birth among animals signifies that the coming of the Self is an instinctual process, a part of living nature rooted in the biology of our being. As Jung told a patient, an experience of the transpersonal Self, if it is not to cause inflation, “needs a great humility to counterbalance it. You need to go down to a level of the mice.”

As Edinger proposes, Jesus’s birth is a balance between the humble and the grand. The stable has two sets of visitors who come to worship the new king of the Jews at the call of the divine. There are the humble shepherds—who were the lowliest of the low in those times—and the wise men, or magi, from the east, who are also transformed into kings by the later mythologizing. 

It is very easy for us to not see ourselves clearly.  In fact it seems natural for that to occur and it take a great deal of effort to begin to see ourselves as we truly are which is how God sees us.  God chose to humble himself and become one of us—not as prince born is a palace but he chose to be born in the lowliest of estates.  I hope that each of us will be able to see the Christ child and see ourselves more clearly this Christmas.  

Sermon January 5, 2013 The Epiphany of our Lord

Are you familiar with the Christmas song - It's the most wonderful time of the year?  That song came to mind when I was thinking about what I would say this morning.  Just to remind you, here are the words of the first verse:

It's the most wonderful time of the year.
With the kids jingle belling,
And everyone telling you,
"Be of good cheer,"
It's the most wonderful time of the year.

It is not a carol – rather it is one of those secular Christmas songs which often permeate the ether in the weeks leading up to Christmas – ones like White Christmas and Sleigh Bells or Here Comes Santa Claus.  I wince a bit when I hear many of these because they represent the secularization of Christmas with its emphasis on materialism and the commercialization which seems to be so prevalent at this wonderful time of the year. 

The preparation for secular Christmas seems to start earlier and earlier each year and Advent is almost unheard of outside the acknowledgement is some churches.   However, the sentiment in that song resonates with me.  Christmas truly is – in many ways - the most wonderful time of the year.  Now despite popular belief it is not the most important time of the church year.  That is of course Easter with the passion, crucifixion and resurrection of our Lord and Saviour.  However, Christmas is a truly wonderful time of the year. 

Today we are celebrating Epiphany – that part of the Christmas story in which the magi – the astrologers from the East follow the star and find the Christ Child in the lowly manger in Bethlehem.  They bring their poignant gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh to the child whose coming was foretold by the star in the heavens.  They observed the sign in the heavens and were wise enough to follow it.  Have you ever wondered – or perhaps you know why today is the feast of Epiphany and not the feast of the wise men or Magi?  Epiphany is a Greek word meaning "to manifest," or “to make known.”  The birth of the Christ Child was made known to the magi and the world through the star hence we celebrate the epiphany.

However, in this sense the whole of Christmas and not just this day could be named epiphany.   It is the epiphany for the whole world.  Not only that, the whole Christmas story is about God revealing to himself to many different people in different ways. 

I find Christmas to be the most wonderful time of the year just for that reason.  God is made known to so many people not just in the birth of the Christ Child but also in different messages.  We have the star which gives a message to the whole world that the Christ Child is born.  We have the angel visiting the shepherds with the message of the divine birth.  But it starts much before that right at the beginning of the story.  An angel visits Mary and tells her the wonderful, terrifying news that despite being a virgin she is going to bear the son of God.  We have the angel visiting Joseph and telling him not to put Mary away for she is blessed with that role. 

However another thing that makes Christmas wonderful for me is all the times God makes manifest - reveals to people what is going to happen - in dreams.  Have you ever noticed how many times throughout the Christmas story that God speaks to people in dreams?  The angel actually appears to Joseph in a dream to tell him the news about Mary.  The wise men not only see the message in the heavens they also receive a message from God in a dream to warn them not to return to Herod to give him the news about the birth.  Again they show their wisdom by paying attention to the dream and returning home by another road. 

Joseph then receives a dream advising him of the danger to the child from Herod who wants to destroy any challenge from the new King of the Jews.  Finally he tells Joseph in a dream that Herod is dead and it is safe to return from Egypt. 

This is particularly wonderful for me because the Christmas story reminds us of the importance of paying attention to the different ways in which God speaks to us today.  God speaks through scripture which we hear when we come together in worship but also through ways which we often don’t recognize.  As we see from the Christmas story and from many other stories in the bible people used to recognize that God spoke to them in dreams.  Today dreams are what can be called God’s forgotten language.  Our culture has forgotten to pay attention to dreams and the messages that they have for us – messages that may reveal God’s intention for us.  We have forgotten the language of dreams.  God also speaks to us in other ways which we have forgotten how to listen to in our world today.  We have the still small voice within us which is drowned out by the noise all around us.  We have the constant activity which does not allow us to be still and know that God is God.  As it says in the psalms:

Be still, and know that I am God!
   I am exalted among the nations,
   I am exalted in the earth.’

At this time of year when we have been so busy with Christmas preparation and celebrations let us take time to be pause and be still.  Let us listen and hear the different ways that God is speaking to us just as he spoke to Mary and Joseph, the Shepherds and the Wise men.  Let us be still and know that God is with us. … Amen 

Home for Christmas

The idea and ideal of coming home for Christmas is one of our warmest images. After all, who wouldn’t want to be home with our loving families on Christmas morning (after going to church of course) gathered round the Christmas tree opening presents. Then later in the day everyone would gather round the dining room table for Christmas dinner of turkey and all the trimmings. Home for the holidays; it doesn’t get better than that. Or if it doesn’t quite live up to our hopes and expectations it certainly should.

My parish undertook a study series this fall entitled ‘The Prodigal God’ which was based on the Prodigal Son Parable in the Gospel of Luke. The theme of the study was the idea of returning home to God and the central image of the banquet.. In the parable the father who represents God, throws a banquet to celebrate the return of the prodigal son who left home after claiming his inheritance from the father and lived a dissolute life of wine, women and song. The father declares that, “we had to celebrate.” He had no choice. Unfortunately the elder son – the dutiful one remains outside the feast refusing to come in despite the father’s pleading. Unlike the younger prodigal son who has repented his life and returned home, the elder brother is in a self-imposed exile. In his deluded self-righteousness he cannot accept that invitation.

Unfortunately this is sometimes how our family relationships and Christmas gatherings turn out – less than we had hoped and longed for. We may hope that Christmas will bring peace and goodwill on this occasion if not on the whole earth. Families do not always live in peace and harmony as God intends. In addition many people live in circumstances that do not make this ideal Christmas possible. However, as Jesus shows us in the Parable, the feast is open to each of us. The family table at Christmas dinner is a wonderful image of the feast that God offers to each and every one of His children. God’s feast is offered to us through the love of God. That love came down to earth and was born on Christmas.

The poet Robert Frost said, “Home is the place where, when you have to go there, they have to take you in.” That may not necessarily be true but it should be. However, God’s banquet that is represented so well by the Christmas Dinner table is a place where you are always welcome. God’s love is there for each of us. The door is open and Jesus Christ is there to welcome you.

It is my hope that your Christmas may be a reflection and a fulfillment of the love which God offers to all of us through the symbol of that tiny baby in a manger in Bethlehem. May all of you have a blessed Christmas and a wonderful New Year.

A World Out of Joint

A week before Christmas I was visiting a parishioner.  In the process I slipped on some ice and fell and dislocated my shoulder.  There is no good time for that to happen by for a priest or pastor but Christmas time is one of the least convenient times to be inconvenienced in this manner.  I must give accolades to the medical system which receives less than stellar reviews at times as well as others involved.  The assistance of the tow truck driver (yes I also got stuck in the parishioner’s laneway), the ambulance personnel, the emergency staff at Strathroy Hospital and the Clinic at St. Joe’s in London all did a great job.   

Well I did manage to get through all the Christmas activities without it being an insurmountable task.  To say that I was experiencing the troubles of Job would be an outrageous exaggeration.  However, I found that many of the things which I did naturally and took for granted were no longer easy for me to do.  Of course it would have to by my right shoulder which made it all the more difficult being right handed.  Being the Christmas season assisted me in reflecting on my situation and how there was a relationship between having my arm out of joint and the season we were celebrating.  Actually this was pointed out to me by my wife and I was skeptical when she first mentioned it but on reflection realized the truth of what she was saying. 

You may be wondering what could be the relationship between a shoulder dislocation and Christmas.  Well I believe that Christmas was necessary because the world was out of joint.  God had created the world and all that was in it and declared it good.  However, it didn’t take too long until things were not going the way they were intended to go.  The world was out of joint.  The way the world was working was like dealing with a dislocated shoulder.  You can no longer do things the way you naturally would do them.  Things no longer worked that way so you had to find other ways to do them which are unnatural, more difficult and awkward. 

For the world, the Old Covenant was not working.  God gave the covenant with the law and people could not live up to it.  God’s intention was not being fulfilled by His people.  A new way was needed.  God decided that what was required was for God to become one of us – still fully divine but also fully human.  God was born as a small helpless baby in a stable in Bethlehem.  Well you know the rest of the story which we have just finished reliving for the 2010^th time.

We are now in the in-between time of the new covenant in which God’s Kingdom has not yet come to fruition.  We Christians are still in this world as a covenantal people.  The world still is not working as God intended just as my shoulder is still feeling the after effects of that dislocation.   Both those things will happen in God’s good time.  My shoulder will hopefully be back to normal before too long.  I have no doubt that it will take longer for the world to come fully to the state where it is working as God intended it.  However, I have faith that it will one day – in God’s time.