A Maundy Thursday Fool

 

Last Thursday was the Beginning of Easter – Maundy Thursday.  I had the joy of presiding at the Maundy Thursday worship service at St. James Anglican Church in Parkhill.  We are back in the Pandemic Shut Down – I am not sure what the colour is – you could say I am pandemic colour blind – I just know we are back to not having in-person worship and need to limit gatherings to our immediate family and above all keep wearing our masks and social distance when we need to go out for essentials – not the faux essentials but actual ones – o yes and wash those hand thoroughly and often.  We are gathering together on social media – Facebook in this case.  I have not been preaching very often recently so I thought I would share with you my sermon for the Maundy Thursday worship service.

Today we are celebrating Maundy Thursday in which our Saviour Jesus Christ put service ahead of being served by washing the feet of his disciples.  However, today is a double occasion – we are also marking a very important secular occasion – April Fools Day.  This is a very important day for many reasons but not the least because it is my birthday. 

As a result, I have a special place in my heart for fools.  There is a long tradition of fools having a special place in our world.  Sometimes this is a place of honour as in the fool in medieval times who was in the court of the king and whose job it was to remind the king that he should not get above himself – reminding the king that he is only human and is going to die – reminiscent of Ash Wednesday – you are dust and to dust you shall return.

However, fools have not had very good press historically or in our culture today.  Perhaps you are old enough to remember that forgettable TV show from the 1980’s – The A Team.  The unforgettable character Mr. T had the catch phrase “pity the fool” – not very complementary.  Then there is the saying there is no fool like an old fool – and as I am 72 years old today that is applicable to me on both counts.  Another note of interest is that being 72, I was born on April 1, 1949.  A Canadian Heritage moment associated with that date is that this was the day that Newfoundland was originally going to join Confederation and become the 10^th province.  However, the premier of the day – the redoubtable Joey Smallwood – no fool he - decided he didn’t want Newfoundland to become a perpetual April Fools joke so he moved the day to March 31^st.  Canada would certainly not be the same if NFLD and Labrador had not become part of our Confederation. 

Being an April Fool all my life - in a good way of course – I have been assured by St. Paul that this is a good thing.  He makes a bold statement in 1 Corinthians, "We are fools for Christ's sake.”  Indeed, my blog is named after this passage – it is called Another Fool for Christ.  So, if we believe Paul, I am in good company - we Christians are all fools – fools for Christ.

Now you might be asking what this has to do with Maundy Thursday - the reason we have gathered today -albeit by social media.  Jesus is modelling for us exactly what it means to be a fool in St. Paul’s sense.  In Jesus’s act of washing the disciples’ feet he was making a fool of himself.  This after all was doing something which in some circles would have been unthinkable.  Washing the feet of a guest was the job of a slave or servant.  Peter showed how outrageous this act was. 

He blurts out in his usual way of saying what he is feeling, “You will never wash my feet.”  Jesus’s response says it all, “Unless I wash you, you have no share with me.” 

That is the reality for us.  If we are to follow Jesus we will be viewed as fools in the eyes of the world.  St. Paul sums this reality for us:

We are fools for the sake of Christ, but you are wise in Christ. We are weak, but you are strong. You are held in honour, but we in disrepute. To the present hour we are hungry and thirsty, we are poorly clothed and beaten and homeless, and we grow weary from the work of our own hands. When reviled, we bless; when persecuted, we endure; when slandered, we speak kindly. We have become like the rubbish of the world, the dregs of all things, to this very day.

This is not an attractive picture, to be what no one in their right minds would choose to be and do.  But then again to be fools for Christ has rewards that are beyond the imagination of this world.  We are called to serve and not be served.  We are called to love and not hate; we are called to love one another and Jesus loves us.  I will close with yesterday’s word of the day from Br. James Koester of the Society of St. John the Evangelist an Anglican monastic community in the United States:  The word is Way

The way we are invited to walk is not an easy one. It involves towel, basin, and water. It requires us to bend, to stoop, and to kneel. It involves cross and nails, thorns and spear. It requires us to die.

It involves tomb, and grave clothes. It requires us to lay everything aside, even our own lives. But for those who follow, it is life, and peace, and joy.

As Jesus said to the lawyer who asks, "who is my neighbour."  In response, Jesus shares with him the parable of the Good Samaritan and asks him which person was a neighbour to the man who was robbed and beaten.  The lawyer answered “the Samaritan”, Jesus says to him and to you and to me – “go and do likewise”.  Let us do just that - let us go and do likewise.  Blessings on your journey of service.

Offering Our Suffering to God

It would be easy to question the efficacy of prayer in these times of the Corona virus pandemic.  Where is God?  How can God allow this to happen when so many innocent people are suffering and dying?  How can God let the world close down and allow so many people be the victims of the plague of famine?  How can God allow this? 

It would be easy for people to turn their backs and say there is no point in these futile prayers that seem to go into the depth of this darkness which has fallen on the world – which are swallowed up by the silence which seems to fill the vacuum that has been created by God’s seeming indifference?

I am not sure – perhaps I am sure that I do not have a good answer to these questions that have arisen this morning.  Perhaps the only answer is faith – faith that we are called to pray, to call out in our distress – to lament in this time when lamentation seems to be the best and only appropriate response.

Sunday, I was at St. James Anglican Church in Parkhill again to ring the bell at 9:00 a.m.  I have been doing this each Sunday beginning on Easter Sunday and, God willing, will continue to do it until we can meet in worship together.  At these times I offer a prayer despite any reservations I might have about the efficacy of prayer.  The prayer I used this Sunday was in response to the devastation which has been wrought by the Corona Virus.  The call to God is,” Out of the depths.”   We are calling from the depths of our despair, from the depths of our lamenting, out of the depth of our anger and frustration.  The response to this call is, “We cry out to you. Protect them.”

Out of the depths we cry out to you in the face of the Corona virus

Adapted from Anne and Jeffery Rowthorn, current Resident Scholars at the Collegeville Institute, wrote the following litany for use in places of worship in the midst of the spreading coronavirus.

Creator God of the universe, God of a thousand names and faces, divine source of health and wholeness, whose compassion embraces the entire community of Earth: behold your fearful people all over the world as we confront the corona virus. Out of the depths we cry to you, O God. Holy God, hear our voices. Let your ear be attentive to our cries as we pray for all who may be affected by the virus:

For all health caregivers – nurses, physicians, aides, EMTs, paramedics, technicians and therapists; out of the depths, O God–We cry out to you. Protect them.

For hospital and nursing home medical staff, assistants, and housekeepers who have close contact with patients and for the patients themselves; out of the depths, O God–We cry out to you. Protect them.

For all who travel for their daily work over land and sea and through the air—flight attendants, pilots, ship captains and sailors, bus drivers, passengers and long-distance truck drivers; out of the depths, O God–We cry out to you. Protect them.

For all who handle money—bankers, supermarket, village market and convenience store cashiers; out of the depths, O God–We cry out to you. Protect them.

For all who provide services to anyone travelling; out of the depths, O God–We cry out to you. Protect them.

For all who are providing food to the hungry; out of the depths, O God–We cry out to you. Protect them.

For all who provide care and comfort to children and for all children; out of the depths, O God–We cry out to you. Protect them.

For teachers who are providing education for students in many new and different methods; out of the depths, O God–We cry out to you. Protect them.

For the homeless, the poor, the lonely, the vulnerable, migrants, and the isolated elderly who have no protectors; out of the depths, O God–We cry out to you. Protect them.

For clergy and people who are fasting from the eucharist and are leading worship when we cannot gather together in God’s house; out of the depths O God–We cry out to you. Protect them.

For all who have tested positive, all who are waiting for test results, and all who are quarantined; out of the depths—We cry out to you. Protect them.

For all who have already died of the corona virus, now free from pain and suffering. May the God of hope carry them all the way home, and comfort their families and friends; out of the depths—We cry out to you. Protect them.

Loving God, hasten the day when the virus will have run its course; quicken scientists to develop medications and vaccines; call out the best instincts of your people—love, neighborliness, compassion, and a sense of caring for every member of your beloved community on Earth. We pray out of the depths to you, O God of hope, whom we call Jesus, Allah, YHWH, Divine Mystery, Great Spirit. Amen.

Blessings on your journey in this time of Corona virus.  

I Will Make All Things New

I wrote last week about the three pillars of Anglicanism on which their faith rests; scripture, reason and tradition.  The tradition was front and centre last Sunday as St. James Anglican Church here in Parkhill celebrated its 150th anniversary. 

Our Bishop, Bp Linda Nicholls was present for the occasion and preached a sermon in which she spoke of the Anglican strength of tradition and the long tradition of St. James in this community and the lasting impact that St. James has had on those who have been part of this community in the past as well as the present.  However, there is the tension between the strength of tradition and the danger of pining for the golden era of the past.  In reflecting on this, the passage from the book of Revelation came to mind, “Behold, I am making all things new.”  (Rev. 21:5). 

There is much in Anglicanism which we can continue to draw on not least of which are the three pillars that I opened with.  We are able to use our God given intellect to consider how tradition can be a foundation on which we move forward.  We can use our intellect to understand scripture and use it to consider how God is speaking to us today just as God spoke to the people of God in those times. 

Most importantly, we need to discern how God is speaking to us in new ways today through the Holy Spirit.  God may be leading us Anglicans and all God’s people to places where we have not considered going before to meet the challenges of today.  We can use scripture and tradition to ground our understanding of where God is leading us.  As an example, when we consider who our neighbours are in the commandment love your neighbour, it includes not just those like us or those who we may want to love but also whose who do not resemble us.  It may be the immigrant from far away countries.  It may also be the Samaritans in your life who seem to be completely opposed to all you stand for.  That is indeed a mountain which can seem to be impossible to climb.

Jesus has come to make all things new the possibilities are endless and will be wonderful if we are open to meet them.

Blessings on your journey.