Kids, Youth and Faith

The Temple Must Fall

2009-11-15T16:51:00.002-05:00

Pentecost 24, Yr. B, November 15, 2009
+So where will you be on Dec 23, 2012? If you believe all the hype associated with the just released movie “2012,” you’ll be witnessing the destruction of the earth—The Earth’s crust collapsing through earthquakes and tidal waves flooding the continents. The apocalypse. The end ,which has been anticipated by humanity for millennia, will be here. Of course the movie is a fictional, fantastical dramatization of the end times. But, regardless of how it’s depicted, the apocalypse brings an end to all things familiar ushering in something altogether new. .Apocalyptic predictions tend to cause panic in some, indifference in others. Dec 2012 is just another in a long line of drop dead dates given for end times. Remember Y2K? Water bottles, canned goods? Kerosene lanterns? People seem drawn to Armageddon. All sorts of books movies and tv are full of such imagery. Even the Bible.

Both Hebrew and New Testament scripture have apocalyptic portions…. Isaiah Jeremiah, Micah, Ezra, Revelation and, as we’ve heard today, the Book of Daniel, the Epistle to the Hebrews and the 13th chapter of Mark’s Gospel (commonly called the “little apocalypse”) all allude to a dark time when a final battle between the evil of this world and the paradise of the heavenly world will occur. Taken in their cultural context, these writings make sense. The Jewish world at that time—mainly the two centuries before and after Christ’s birth—was under siege, with various invaders marauding about. It was a time ripe for writing about the pervasive power of evil. However, to only hear these writings as a response to a particular historical moment in time is, in the opinion of most scholars, a mistake. Descriptions of the end times, pop up in the literature of all cultures throughout all eras, suggesting we should consider what it says not only about people then, but people now.
In today’s Gospel reading, Jesus, wasn’t just speaking to Peter, James, John and Andrew, he was speaking to us as well.
According to Jesuit professor and author John Kavanaugh , apocalyptic imagery works for every generation because, indeed, each generation experiences its own end of times.

Whenever what we hold as dear—whenever what we experience as fundamental to our way of life is threatened, it feels awful, it is scary and it can seem as if it is the end of the world. And in a way, well it is the end of the world. In every generation and for every people, life as trusted and known is threatened and in some cases destroyed. In our own 20th century history this has happened time and again—the Great Depression, the Holocaust, World War 2, the civil rights fight, the AIDS epidemic have all taken the world to the brink. In these and many other instances, all that those affected held dear, trusted, was torn away, turned upside down.

9/11/2001 was an apocalypse of sorts, as was the financial collapse of last year. To the folks in Ft Hood, Texas last week was an apocalypse.
Today there are people all over the world, in this country throughout this state, within this city and here at this Cathedral whose lives are turned upside down, who are experiencing there own private and personal apocalypse.

Indeed, when all that we consider fundamental—foundational-- to our lives collapses, it can feel like Armageddon, it can feel like the end.
Because when all that we hold dear collapses, it’s an end.

But, and I think this is the point, with each end comes a beginning. Now it’s not always apparent just where and how that beginning will manifest, that’s what makes it so scary, but scripture seems clear---to get to the new we must get rid of the old. The trouble is the old, no matter how flawed, is comfortable—familiar-- and we don’t want to let go of it.
Jesus, throughout his ministry, kept saying, all that you know, all that you think is important, isn’t. You must lose the old way so you are free to embrace the new.
But this transformation, this transfiguration is not easy…it gets messy and is almost always terrifying.

So, what are we to take from all of this? Should we just give up on all that we hold familiar, figuring it will all end in apocalyptic terror anyway? What should we do with all this talk of the end of time? How do we remain open to change, to a new way?
By loosening our grip.
It isn’t about giving up all that we know and all that we hold dear. It’s about keeping it all in perspective. This text is not so much a warning about our own deaths or about the end of the world as it is a commentary on fully living in this world, with an eye to the next . It is easy to get caught up in the deadlines and demands of this life, of rushing from this meeting to the next, of working toward one goal after another. To do that is to give into this world, a world that is destined for destruction, a world which will turn on itself, be it nation upon nation, or the destruction of this planet through our own abuse and neglect. Regardless of how it comes about all the earthly temporal things we work for will, one day, cease. But when all is said and done, and the last smoldering coal of earth’s demise is extinguished-- we will revel in the next world, in the company of the angels, filled and sustained by Love, that unending, never dying, always growing Love of God as known to us through Jesus Christ.

So when we read these apocalyptic stories of death and destruction should we despair in what may be the inevitable or should we celebrate the gift of love given to us through Christ?

When Jesus sits atop the Mount of Olives-- detailing the destruction of the temple—the one in Jerusalem and those each of us erect in our lives—he isn’t lamenting the inevitable of this life, he is proclaiming the Good News of eternal life. He is saying, don’t be afraid to let go, don’t hold onto the past, go boldly into the future, whatever it may bring, loving ourselves, loving our neighbors and loving the source of all Love, God.
So where will we be on Dec 23, 2012? Hopefully wherever we are we’ll be surrounded by, infused with and evoking that Love which is available to us in the birth life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. +

“Faith Trumps Fear, Love Trumps Doubt” Proper 23 Yr B

2009-10-11T17:03:00.002-04:00

+Jesus, looking at him, loved him.
This is one of the most beautiful lines in all of scripture. Jesus looks deep into the soul of the rich man and through his unwavering abiding love, tells him the very thing the man fears: his wealth is standing in his way. His wealth is a barrier to the everlasting life he so earnestly desires.
The rich man hears this and then walks away, shocked and grieving.

I think many of us probably assume that’s the end of the story. A rich man asks for the key to everlasting life but not getting the answer he wants, walks away scheming on how to find a loophole, determined to hold onto his riches. But we’re not told the rest of this story, the gospel just reads that he walks away “shocked and grieving.”

He’s grieving. To grieve is to be fully aware of what just happened, but needing time to process it, to let it sink in. So the rich man may just need some time to adjust. He’s also shocked. Perhaps because a poor itinerant preacher had the audacity to tell a man of his wealth and stature to give it all up ----but I don’t think that’s it. I think he’s shocked that Jesus’ deep gaze saw through to the truth: that even though he claimed to be a faithful man, following the laws of Moses since childhood, he was faithless when it came to his wealth. Instead of taking his wealth and sharing it with others, caring for the least among him, he was hoarding it for himself, not trusting that by doing justice, by caring for the sick the hungry and the oppressed, he would be awarded with riches beyond all measure.
Jesus isn’t saying: wealth is bad. That having nice things is evil. The problem isn’t having wealth, the problem is hoarding it to the detriment of others.

Jesus knew what the rich man didn’t: that his wealth was a gift from God. A gift, which, like all of God’s gifts are not ours to hoard or to hide, but to share. The rich man wasn’t holding onto his wealth because he was evil. The rich man was holding onto his wealth because he was afraid. Although a self proclaimed devout man, adhering to the letter of the laws of faith, the man, like so many of us, is missing the spirit of the law. The spirit of the law, the spirit of our faith demands that we not just proclaim our faith, but that we live it: not letting our fear and our doubt hold us back.
Wealth doesn’t keep us from everlasting life. Fear does.
As far as I can tell, from Abraham and Sarah, [Isaac and Rebekah, Jacob Rachel and Leah] to Moses, Miriam and Aaron, through Elizabeth and Zechariah, Mary and Joseph to the Jesus of the manger, the cross and the empty tomb, we have been taught that doubt and fear render us lost and alone while faith and hope offer us a joy and peace beyond our wildest dreams.

But even with all these examples of faith trumping doubt, of hope over fear, we still doubt and we still fear.

We have a choice. We can doubt and fear or we can hope and dream. But we can’t do both. With every doubt we whittle away at hope and with every fear we squelch a dream. If the rich man really had faith in the laws of Moses he was following why did he seek out Jesus? Would a man of wealth and stature track down an itinerant preacher from the backwater if he was full of hope? I think his own fear and his own doubt had whittled away at his faith….I think the rich man was, in spite of all the material goods and social stature he had attained, empty. And he looked to Jesus to fill him--to adjust a ritual, to explain some law—so he could go on his way, happy and content. But as is usual with Jesus, the man didn’t get what he was looking for, he got what he needed. Jesus didn’t tell him how to better profess his faith, Jesus told him to live it.

The Gospel demands more than professing a faith once a week at church. The Gospel challenges us to live it. Jesus wasn’t just talking to the Rich Man, Jesus was talking to us.

The challenge of living out our faith requires us to ask: what helps us spread the good news and what hinders us? What’s important to us, what’s our heart’s desire for St Paul’s Cathedral?

Is it our building our music and our liturgies? Or is it to feed the hungry, clothe the naked and free the oppressed?
Hopefully it is both.

You see, our building, our liturgies our music don’t keep us from living the Gospel message but neither are they the Gospel message.

We don’t have all this stuff [the building the choirs…] because it’s nice, we have all this because it feeds us, strengthening us to do the work God has given us to do. We don’t ask you to pledge so we can keep this building, these choirs and these liturgies going for the sake of entertainment or aesthetic pleasure, we ask you to give money so we, as a community of faith, enriched, emboldened and empowered through our worship in here can do the work of God out there. We ask for pledges so that we can make St. Paul’s Cathedral more than a stop on an architectural tour, more than a nice venue to hear a concert, we need your pledges so we can continue to be a beacon of light for the people of Buffalo, so we can continue to offer hospitality healing and hope to all those we encounter—those who walk through our doors and those we encounter when we walk out of them.

We’ve been given all of this as a sacred trust, not an evil indulgence. Our job isn’t to fear losing it, but to rejoice in what it is-a loving testament of thanks to God, designed to strengthen us to go out, living the good news of Christ in the world.

As we enter into this stewardship season at St. Paul’s Cathedral we aren’t asking you to pledge out of fear, we’re asking you to pledge--commit your time, your talent and your treasure --out of hope. Hope that together we, as a community of faith, will be faithful live-rs of the Word for generations to come. AMEN.

The Courage of Letting Others be First

2009-09-21T15:46:00.000-04:00

Proper 20, Year B. Sermon preached at St. Paul's Cathedral, Buffalo New York, 20 September 2009

I must be getting old. As I drive around the city I find myself rolling up my windows so I don’t hear the rude and disrespectful language being tossed about on the street. Young people, middle aged people, older people…there doesn’t seem to be an age limit.

Sometimes I wonder what’s happening in the world. Politicians, entertainers, sports figures and regular people seem to have reached new lows when it comes to respecting the dignity of every human being. Never before have we seen such disrespect on public view, whether it be on the stage at music awards, the tennis courts of the US Open or the floor of a joint session of congress. These past few weeks have caused me to question the decorum of our culture.

But then, just when I wondered where civility had gone, where respect lost its way and where dignity became something to avoid instead of embrace, I am buoyed by flashes of grace.

After the debacle, which was Serena Williams’ tirade at the US Open, there was still a final match to be played. After Kim Clijsters won, we saw her 18 month old daughter Jada, delighting in seeing herself displayed on the gigantic video board at the tennis center. She really couldn’t get enough of it….it wasn’t some self serving look at me, it was simple joy at being able to see her mommy and herself up on the screen. There was something so innocent and sweet about the scene. Through the genuine joy displayed by this child the distasteful tirade of the previous day melted away and I was transported to a simpler place, transported to a fundamental truth of faith: that our life is a miraculous gift from God intended for our joy. God wants us to embrace life as innocently and joyously as a child.

In Jesus’ time a child was not necessarily embraced as an exemplar of innocence. Children really had no status, and when he tells his disciples to receive the kingdom as a little child, he is being tremendously counter cultural. To assume the position of a child was to lower oneself to a status no one would voluntarily ascribe to. Children fell in the same category as all the other near-do-wells he hung out with: women, tax collectors, Gentiles. But the point Jesus is trying to make is not that we should give up our dignity willy nilly, but that we should, out of our dignity, offer dignity to everyone else. Not just those who we feel have earned it,, but everyone. People we love, people we don’t love, people who are like us, and people who aren’t. Everyone. No Exceptions.

Sgt 1st Class Jared Monti understood this, he lived it and died it. Sgt Monti was posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Honor this past week, for valor displayed on a battlefield in Afghanistan. Sgt. Monti not once, not twice but three times ran directly into enemy fire attempting to rescue one of his men. Many soldiers would have sent an underling to do the job, but when another soldier said he would go attempt the rescue, Monti stopped him saying, “no he is my guy and I will get him.” He didn’t get him, but he died trying, and as he lay mortally wounded this Sgt. First Class from Massachusetts first recited the Lord’s Prayer and then said :
“I’ve made peace with God. Tell my family I love them.” Then he died. His final earthly act was to offer praise and thanksgiving to God and his family. Monti’s actions were selfless and brave.

Jared Monti lived Jesus’ message as heard in today’s Gospel: "Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all." For Jared, the last must be first and the first will be last. Jared Monti was selfless.

Today we recognize Sgt Monti as a hero and we grieve for his family…the image of his heroics help counteract the boorish behavior we’ve witnessed elsewhere. The reality is that the actions of Serena Williams, congress-people, church leaders get far more press than the actions of Sgt. Monti and the thousands of other people who follow the lessons of our faith every day. Why?

Because our culture seems to embrace another gospel, the gospel of me first. Of fleeting glory, of striving to be number one no matter whom we may step on to get there. A culture of denigrating the next guy for our own gain.

This human tendency to focus on earthly things is noted in today’s reading from the Letter of James: “For where there is envy and selfish ambition, there will also be disorder and wickedness of every kind….conflicts and disputes come from our cravings, cravings which are at war within us.”

Envy and self ambition breed disorder…..when we covet that which is not from above….when we covet earthly glory , we become disordered, angry and bitter, and these negative feelings block us, they cloud our judgment leaving us ranting on tennis courts, in the halls of congress on the street corner, in our churches and living rooms. When we become focused on the glory of the world instead of the glory of God, our thinking becomes distorted, our minds jumbled. It is the task of each of us to clear our minds to stop railing at one another, to stop jockeying for position and stop trying to out do the other guy. It’s time for us to reject the projected behavior of our culture and embrace the behavior of the innocent, the brave, the dignified of our world.

Now we needn’t beat ourselves up for being more of this life than the next…even the disciples were caught up in the status and prestige of this world, more concerned with who was the greatest among them instead of listening to the greatest of all. Jesus was saying to them and to us : do as I do, be servant to all, for in that servant-hood you’ll find the key to everlasting life.

The unbridled joy of a child, the unwavering loyalty of a friend and comrade, the grieving hearts of mourning parents remind us that to be first in the kingdom of God we must respect each other, cherish each other and delight in each other. Perhaps our final hymn today, “Tell Out My Soul,” a hymn of the Virgin Mary, no doubt the most selfless person of all, puts it best: “put proud hearts and stubborn wills to flight so the hungry can be fed and the humble lifted high.”

Amen.

Reading the Bible Again for the First Time

2009-09-17T14:13:00.000-04:00

Our Bible study for the fall is using the book mentioned above, by Marcus Borg, as our guide. Last night was the first meeting and our discussion was, as usual, wide ranging, animated and great fun.
We will skip next week as it is Chicken BBQ day and a couple of us can't make it through that and the study....;-) so our next meeting will be WED. SEPT. 30 7PM- 8:30 PM at MY HOUSE. (note change in location). See you then!

The Pharisees Weren't Such Bad Guys

2009-08-30T13:49:00.001-04:00

The Pharisees weren’t such bad guys. It’s easy to ridicule them, to laugh at them. After all, they are often the targets of Jesus’ harshest retorts and we, having 20/20 hindsight can snicker and say, “How could they have been so blind?”

But you know we often wear the same blinders as the Pharisees. They were appalled that Jesus ate with sinners, unclean people, and tax collectors! Don’t we all have that friend—that person your other friends just don’t ‘get” that person who maybe doesn’t quite fit in? Others may never understand her, but you do, you see something they don’t and so you continue to hang out with the outsider. You see them differently than others. You see beyond what may appear on the surface. For whatever reason you’ve taken a closer look-- you’ve opened your heart to theirs and they’ve open their heart to you. Out of that trust comes friendship. A friendship you wouldn’t have if you hadn’t taken the time to listen, to look and to fully see.

But to those who haven’t taken the time, your friendship with this person remains incomprehensible and hard to take. It seems wrong.

To the Pharisees, Jesus’ actions—his choice of friends, his teachings and his apparent disregard for the rituals of the Jewish faith—were incomprehensible, hard to take and wrong. Jesus was taking everything they loved, everything the held dear, everything they knew and messing with it. When all that you hold dear, all that is familiar and comfortable is threatened, its really easy to become hopping mad.

We in the Anglican tradition, in the Episcopal church are all too familiar with such feelings. The ordination of women, the “new” prayer book, the consecration of Bishop Gene Robinson. People walked out the doors of this Cathedral because of such changes. Every denomination has these upheavals, every religion, every organization. Changes move us out of our comfort zones, and in this fast paced always changing world, comfort zones are important…comfort zones can be, dare I say, sacred.

Sacred cows. We all have them. Families, societies, religions, and parish churches in downtown Buffalo have them. The Pharisees had them too. A sacred cow is simply something which a group has determined to be untouchable, tamper proof, free from editing. Sacred cows generally develop over time and when asked to explain the origin of the sacred cow, we often just shrug and say “well we’ve always done it this way.” Because what matters isn’t how or why it started, what matters is that the action, whatever it is, has been sanctified through tradition.

Our liturgies are full of such traditions. Regardless of the original purpose, our liturgical actions, so familiar to us, have taken on the aura of sanctity.

A great deal of what we do here on a Sunday morning was at one point functional. Processions became a way to move large groups of people from one place to another in an orderly fashion, Sanctus bells helped mark actions happening just out of the congregation’s view, candles provided light before electricity, etc. Over time, though, these actions moved from functionality to sanctity.
But you see, many of these things are enhancements .Our worship is enhanced by candles, music, beautiful vestments and this glorious building. Enhanced. Not validated. Not necessary. Enhanced.

We set aside this place this time and these ceremonies—these instruments of our faith-- to be nourished in our faith, strengthened to do the work God has given us to do.

We get into trouble when our special clothing and music, our candles and bells, our incense and chanting becomes the end instead of the means. We get into trouble when we confuse our rituals with our faith.

And that is exactly what Jesus was saying to the Pharisees in today’s Gospel. Washing of hands is a way to respect God, to consume the gifts of God with reverence and humility. But washing of hands is not what makes something holy. What makes something holy is our full and complete faith in God and the trust that all we need is available through God. To be truly holy we must open ourselves up to that trust, we must release the stranglehold we have on our hearts and allow the Love of God to take up sole residence deep within us. If, after doing that, we engage in rituals to keep us focused, to place us in a holy state of mind, fine….but we must begin with our faith written on our hearts, for if we don’t begin there then our chanting, our kneeling, our processing, our vestments, our vessels and our glorious surroundings become, to use the words of our patron, St Paul, “a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal,” not signifying much of anything.

Jesus wasn’t against ritual, Jesus was against rituals that miss the point, rituals that usurp instead of enhance the Holy.

As I wrote this sermon Friday morning, the services for both Lt. Charles Mc Carthy and FF Jonathon Croom were being held around the corner at St. Joe’s. What I witnessed as each funeral cortège carried their bodies to the cathedral was a ritual which was steeped in the Holy, much pomp and circumstance, signifying something. A ritual which displayed the brother and sisterhood of firefighters the world over, a ritual which helped me remember that nothing is as holy as a person who will run into a burning building to save his brother or sister. Those firefighters who lined the streets in downtown Buffalo on Friday know what is sacred, they know what is Holy-- the rituals they employed to honor the lives of their comrades, helped us all to see the Holy. No doubt Jesus, heartbroken with the rest of us was also pleased, for these men and women clearly get what ritual is all about.

Jesus was telling the Pharisees then and is telling us now---don’t lose sight of the forest of faith for the trees of ritual. For it is the act of meeting the holy, it is the act of opening ourselves fully to the presence of God, which is sacred.

AMEN.

Are You Going to Eat That?

2009-08-10T08:02:00.001-04:00

Sermon for Pentecost X
Last Sunday I was having brunch with old friends. Our table bustled with the joyful noise of family: Cousins poking each other, sisters laughing, a mom and dad overseeing the whole display, brimming with glee. I was privileged to be part of this gathering, not being related in any technical way with the group. But there I was, invited into this family, through love. At the end of the meal, my friend Mark reaches over and, with a piece of toast, sops up my leftover egg. In some circles this may be considered crass or rude, but it wasn’t. No this was an act of love. An intimate act of familiarity between good friends. No worries about social mores, of what others may think---just one person being drawn to something the other has. This wasn’t a hostile acquisition. This man, whom I love like a brother, reached across in the familiarity of old friends and absorbed what I had left. It was one of the most intimate and loving acts I have ever witnessed. We laughed about it remarking, “he just couldn’t stand seeing that leftover yolk sitting there, he had to eat it.” Mark was drawn to what I had and, in our mutual love, he felt comfortable enough to take it. And I felt comfortable enough to give it.

While much grander than any egg yolk on a breakfast plate, God’s love also pulls, beckoning us to partake.

The German theologian, Karl Rahner describes this attraction, this pull, this being drawn toward as fundamental to our human nature. As Rahner sees it, the Holy Mystery which is God, indescribable, unidentifiable, difficult to grasp, is so attractive to us that if we just stop trying to explain, quantify and tame it allowing ourselves to be taken in to be drawn, we will find rest in the loving embrace of God.

The problem is, according to Rahner, while this draw toward the Holy Mystery is part of our human nature, within our DNA, so is our desire for definition, prescription and certainty. We may feel a tug toward God but before giving into that pull we want to dissect, inspect and diagnose it.

That’s what was happening in today’s Gospel , smack dab in the middle of what is known as John’s “Bread of Life Discourse.” Jesus is explaining that he isn’t just some itinerant preacher from the backwater of Galilee, son of Mary and Joseph….no he is God’s Son, God in the flesh sent to us by our creator who is so drawn to us, so wants to reach us that he came to walk among us, to bring us home.

It’s easy as we hear these gospel excerpts to get caught up in the earthly image the words depict: Jesus’ flesh is the Bread of Life, a bread we must partake of to enter into eternal life with God. Not an easy image—it never has been. The early church was often accused of cannibalism—I think it’s easy to understand why. To this day it’s a popular way for detractors to condemn Christianity in general and our own Anglican belief in the Real Presence at Eucharist in particular, but to get caught up in that minutiae is to miss the point.

As Biblical Scholar Ray Brown states: The Jesus of John used language of this world to refer to the realities of the world from which he came.” (pg378 Intro to New Testament).
Jesus is using language we are familiar with to try and explain God. To try and explain a mystery so incomprehensible, so impossible to describe that whenever humans have tried to put words to it, we’ve failed. Speak to anyone who has had a near death experience----they try to explain a bright light, a peacefulness beyond anything they’ve ever known…but in the end they admit--words fail them. The ancient Jews knew the inexplicableness of God so well so they would never attempt to speak the name of God... They knew then, as we know now, that comprehending God’s full nature is beyond us. God’s love is so immense and so all encompassing we cannot tame it, we cannot hold it and we cannot describe it.

And therein lies the tension so clearly described in today’s Gospel reading.
Jesus is talking about all things heavenly, but he is heard with ears firmly encased in all things earthly. Jesus states that he is the Bread of Life. Not the bread of Moses, not the bread of bakers, or the bread of grocery aisles, but the bread of God, the bread of eternal light, the bread of a love so great, so immense, so massive it defies description, breaking free of the constraints of language, it knows no bounds.

Yes, Jesus is the Bread of Life but to receive this bread, to eat of it always we must embrace God in the person of Jesus Christ, allowing ourselves to be caught up in God’s mutual draw: our draw toward God and God’s reaching out toward us. To be caught up in this love means we must empty ourselves of our inhibitions, our worries, our doubts and come to the altar of God to be fed--fed with a love which we don’t earn, a love we needn’t understand and a love we can’t define….a love which, when we let go, will wash over us, a love we can sop up with the toast of our souls, a love which. when we’re open to receiving it, is a never ending meal of sacrifice and thanksgiving nourishing us as nothing else can.

In a few moments we’ll break bread together, presenting ourselves at this altar full of failings, full of questions and full of fear. Leave those here and walk away filled with the Bread of Life. A Bread which, while incomprehensible to each and every one of us, nourishes us in ways we cannot imagine yet so desperately crave.

Amen+

Volunteer Opportunity for Youth

2009-08-07T14:25:00.001-04:00

Wing Fest 2009 seeks help for Kids Fun Zone-
Wing Fest is happy to partner this year with WNED on the Kids Fun Zone and a fantastic special event on Sunday of the festival weekend. In keeping with the long-established literacy theme of the Kids Fun Zone, we are looking for help before/during/after the big Electric Company "main event" at noon on Sunday, Sept. 6 (the national circuit tour is the 5th stop on a 20-city launch of the "reinvented" Electric Company); and for all day on Saturday with a Sesame Street theme and many kids' activities in the "zone" tent for Ready-to-Learn, Sesame St. and Electric Company. Contact me here with your availability and contact info (name/address/ph/email); or for questions and/or more info/donations...

We are seeking:
--Volunteers! Mature 16 years or older; or mature 12-15 with a parent/chaperone--please notify if less than 18 yrs of age and provide parent contact info
We are looking for about 10 volunteers per shift for the Kids Fun Zone area (four hours if possible, minimum 2 hours please) and up to 50 volunteers during the "main event" on Sunday on the park stage
There will be a volunteer orientation at WNED Studios (140 Lower Terrace) from 4:30-6:00 on Thursday, August 27.
If you'd like to volunteer, but can't make the orientation, sign up for a slot and we will send you an info "packet"

--WNY Literacy agency info and giveaways (fridge magnets, key chains, DVDs, stickers, etc.--you know: CHOCHKEYS!)

--Books for kids' book give away. We anticipate needing about 1500 books (new or gently used) with a preference (where possible) for (age 0-12) Sesame St./Think Bright themes like all Sesame St., Martha Speaks, Clifford the Big Red Dog, Super Why, Arthur, etc. Also, books through teen age.

Tasks and activity centers will include:

Set-up and tear down for zone and "main event"
Electric Company Tour event registration
Runners (main stage and kids zone for "main event")
Post "show" interactive audience activities and redirection from ballpark to kids fun zone

Craft table/activity assistance (Monster Mural, picture frame decoration, word games/coloring, jump rope/ball bounce with rhyming songs, prize wheel, crown decoration)

Face painting/tattoo application (adhesive!)

Book give away table monitors/supervision

Please send in your numbers/names/contact info and times for sign-ups weekly so we can track our needs and keep filling slots for full coverage! email me at lva.sherry@gmail.com or fax to the studio at 845-7036 to attn: Pat Ragin.

Can you let us know what you might have in the way of chochkeys, books and service lit asap--with quantities?

If you can think of others to who might be a source for volunteers, please fwd this message and let us know who to contact to follow up.

Finally, if you are serving families, can you help us to publicize the Kids Fun Zone? Let us know if you can post a flyer...we'll send to you via e-file. We are hoping for good weather and a great turn-out!

Hoping to see you at Wing Fest 2009!

Today's Sermon

2009-07-12T19:28:00.002-04:00

We’ve all seen it, some of us have done it, some of us have had it done to us. A parent and child are in the grocery store and the child is talking back, whining or is engaged in a full blown foot stomping, ear piercing temper tantrum. The parent is displaying amazing restraint, exuding a deadly calm as they say, “You know I love you, but right now I don’t like you very much.” In most cases, the love of a parent for a child is unconditional….but the like? Oh that’s conditional…there are times we really don’t like the one’s we love.
Is God, as the ultimate parent, any different? Considering scripture in general and today’s readings specifically, I don’t think so. I know God loves us, but I’m not sure God likes us all the time.
For the most part God liked Amos—
He was a reluctant prophet—God communicated with him through visions and Amos, instead of ignoring the difficult message he received, spoke of it-- for although reluctant, he was obedient, so when given a task from God, Amos followed through. The visions were clear to Amos: God was none too happy with Israel. Established ramrod straight as if on a plumb line they had gone askew and God, well God was disappointed, angry and perhaps at wit’s end. Right then, God didn’t like His people too much.
So God sends this tree dresser, this gardener, a regular guy out to tell the truth: God loves you but God doesn’t like you so much right now. And as the reading tells us, “the land couldn’t bear all his words.”
The people didn’t like what they heard. The people liked being loved, but they didn’t like being held accountable. Sometimes it is really hard to accept love—because with love comes great responsibility, responsibility to nurture that love, to respect it and to heed its demands. So they shut Amos out, they despised him, they rejected him—for they didn’t want to hear what was being said. …they didn’t want to hear that with God’s love comes expectation.
In today’s Gospel we have another instance of not responding to God’s love, of not wanting to listen, resulting in God not liking us too much.
Herod is a sad sap. Remember this is not the Herod of the nativity story, the fearless and rigid ruler who, realizing that a threat to his power had been born, vowed to kill every male child under the age of two just to be certain his rival would never touch him. That Herod was ruthless and sure of himself. This Herod? Not so sure of himself. Herod feared John, he knew he was a holy man for what he heard from John, while perplexing, was somehow appealing. He was drawn to John’s message--but while Herod was King of the land—a man to be respected and feared--he certainly didn’t wear the pants in the family. So although he liked John the Baptist, he feared his wife more, so John was imprisoned—not killed as Herodias desired, but no longer free to roam the Jordan valley with his message of deliverance. John was saved from death and Herod’s wife was placated.…until that fateful night when Herod, so taken with his daughter’s beauty and talent and eager to show his guests what a gracious father he was, offered her anything her heart desired. Then and only then, when faced with the prospect of losing face in front of his guests does Herod follow through on Herodias’ deep held desire: to have John killed. His heart burning with John’s words Herod throws it all away just to look good at a party. By denying what he was feeling about John—by saying no to the gift of John’s prophecy and then by killing him, Herod has rejected God. Herod has taken God’s love and simply said, ‘no thank you.”
We all do that, we deny love in order to save face. Peter did it, Herod did and you and I do it. Every time we sleep in on a Sunday morning instead of coming to church, or stay in front of the tv instead of helping out at Friends of the Night people, every time we decide not to volunteer when asked, every time we don’t pledge, we are denying God’s love. We may achieve a short term gain—extra sleep, more money in our pocket or time in our schedule, but in the long run? In the long run we are poorer for it. God doesn’t like us much when we choose a short term gain over the long term peace and love God offers.
While we can never match the fullness of God’s love, isn’t incumbent upon us to spread the love we do have? Isn’t God’s love, as bestowed upon us a clarion call to love one another? We must, as recipients of great love offer great love back.
Herod couldn’t do that—even when face to face with a prophet, face to face with a messenger from God, his heart burning with a recognition that this man brought him something no amount of fame fortune power or prestige could give him couldn’t do that. He rejected the love of God and killed the messenger, all for a few moments of temporal glory.

Israel in the days Amos, wouldn’t accept God’s love. They doubted, they feared they lost their faith and in so doing, they made God mad. Not mad enough to remove his love, but mad enough to make them mighty uncomfortable . God still loved them, but they were too caught up in the here and now to remember that love and to spread it.
We’re no different.
With God’s love comes great expectations. We must let our hearts burn with recognition, we must set out to love and serve the Lord in all we do. We must gather here proclaiming God’s love and then leave here, refreshed by God’s grace, to show the world that love. For that is what God likes, a people who know they are loved and in turn love each other in His Name. And as the Cathedral Church of St. Paul in downtown Buffalo New York that is our task—to respond to God’s love by working, living and loving in His Name. Amen.

From General Convnetion

2009-07-10T10:12:00.002-04:00

The General Convention of the Episcopal Church is meeting in Anaheim CA for 2 weeks. Periodically I will cut and paste some testimony or news coming out of the Convention. Below is something I received through the Episcopal Peace Fellowship today the "Catherine" who is speaking is not me. If only I could be that eloquent:

Episcopal News Service today reports testimony is overwhelmingly in favor of moving beyond B033 with new legislation.

A YAP Speaks:

Resolution C028 (or: Weddings and Wakes)
On Thursday afternoon, I testified before the Liturgy Committee in favor of Resolution C028, which would direct the Standing Commission on Liturgy and Music to prepare additional, gender-neutral Book of Common Prayer rites for the celebration and blessing of marriage. My thoughts went roughly like this:
I am a proud Episcopalian, and I am also proud to announce my recent engagement to my partner of five years. We've set the date for 2011, and we want to be married in the Church we love - so, members of the committee, I'm counting on you.
I come from a sprawling Irish Catholic clan, for whom Vatican II is still a radical concept. My family has always treated my partner and me kindly, but with caution and restraint, and this is what I expected when I told them I was engaged. I did not expect my many cousins and aunts to greet the news with an outpouring of joy, but to my astonishment and delight, that is exactly what they did. Finally, I figured it out: They may not understand my sexuality, but they do understand weddings - and this, I think, is the critical lesson to our communion of believers.
I ask you today to submit yourselves to that same startling joy. Marriage is a good thing. It's a sacrament, a blessing, and a cause for celebration, and I believe opening its doors will draw our church together, not tear it apart.
Remember, I'm an old Irish Catholic - we party hardest at weddings and wakes. Please make this decision in time for my wedding, rather than my wake. Thank you.
Catherine

The Parable: Cracked Open

2009-06-15T17:41:00.001-04:00

Sermon Preached on Sunday June 14, 2009

Parables as Jerome Berryman, the creator of Godly Play our church school curriculum says, are difficult to engage and we need to be ready for them. You see parables, when we’re ready to hear and explore them usually tell us just what we need to hear.
Parables are, at their core, morality tales which are dynamic stories, designed for us to re-visit again and again, each time taking a little something else out of them, something different, something more. What we need to hear, not necessarily what we want to hear. Oftentimes they remain closed to us, inexplicable, meaning nothing more than what the story says on the surface---regardless of how hard we try we don’t get it, the insight they’re designed to engender just doesn’t happen. Jesus encountered that a lot as he exclaims, “you mean you still don’t get it?” It’s not uncommon to stay on the top layer of the parable and move on, none the richer for it.

This week I was staying on the surface of the Gospel, ready to preach a fairly typical sermon about how the kingdom of heaven, God’s grace if you will, is like the mustard tree—a large shrub spreading all over and when its gained a foothold? Impossible to move.
But just as Berryman says in Godly Play, sometimes parables crack open and surprise us.
The seeds described in today’s parable, the growing and the mustard are pretty persistent—we’re told the growing seed sprouts and grows without the planter doing anything ---he sleeps through the whole process, and the mustard seed, smallest of all the seeds sown grows into the largest shrub on earth. These seeds have odds stacked against them, yet they prevail, they prevail because they are fed by a faith in God which creates things far beyond our wildest imaginings.
The odds, at times, seem stacked against us. The economy is terrible and our cathedral resources are strapped—we are really hurting. But if something so small, can grow into something so great then what’s stopping us from taking the seeds of our declining Cathedral resources and planting them, nurturing them and watching them grow into something greater than we could ever imagine?

Times are tough, our pledge income is down, our endowment is down, our loose offering receipts are down. Just this week we said good bye to our Cathedral Secretary her job eliminated due to budget constraints. The need in this City is great—the hungry, the homeless, the illiterate, the drug addicted, the mentally ill---there is a steady stream of need knocking on our Cathedral doors. If we can’t balance our budget how will we ever meet the increasing need of the world?
BUT, our donations to the food pantry are up, the Liberian community will graduate 60% more of their high school seniors this year than last, due in large part to the tutoring program we host ,my email request for some help with a Burmese refugee family has rendered very positive response—in the midst of deprivation and decline we have these bright spots.
Some small actions on the part of several of you does make a big difference. And right there---that’s the parable of the mustard seed … even though our financial situation feels weak what we’re able to piece together continually grows into something bigger and stronger than we, individually can imagine. That’s the lesson: each of us here has something we can give and we should for even if it seems meager, joined with others through faith it will grow into something much stronger.
Each of us sitting here today is gaining something by being here. Likewise, each of us here today is responsible for this place—the building, the worship and most importantly each of us sitting here today is responsible for the Word of God, as given to us through the love of Holy and Undivided Trinity. This love, and our work in its name, is what we are all about. Whether it’s giving a world class music education free of charge to children, whether it’s preserving a national historic landmark –a building which draws people in through its sheer beauty, whether it’s offering our space to refugees desperately trying to make a new life in the United States, whether it’s protecting people from the changes and chances of this life through the work of our Hunger Outreach committee---food for the hungry, clothes for the naked, housing for the homeless--or showing a four year old through Godly Play what the great stories of the Bible mean in our daily lives, our ministries at this Cathedral spread the Good News of Christ .
This place and you its people provide, like the mustard tree, a place of healing hope and hospitality to the world. I know it is scary right now and I know it is easy to cut your pledge ---or to not pledge at all—thinking that someone else will pay the bill---but that’s not how it works.
One big seed doesn’t grow into a beautiful house of worship, a variety of ministries to serve the world, a wonderful music program and glorious liturgies. No this place, and all that we do in its name, is sown through the individual seeds of each of us. A dollar here, a dollar there, teaching when asked, hosting when asked, helping when asked---these are the seeds of our faith and when sown together they grow into something more magnificent than we could ever imagine, something more stupendous than we could ever do alone.
In the words of the grace ending Morning Prayer (BCP page 102) remember:
Glory to God whose power, working in us, can do infinitely more than we can ask or imagine.
Just like the Mustard Seed.
Amen.

And Then A Miracle Happens

2009-06-07T22:32:00.002-04:00

Sermon preached at St. Paul's Cathedral, Trinity Sunday, Yr B
+
One of my favorite comic strips is The Far Side. One of the best shows a man resembling Albert Einstein standing in front of a blackboard upon which is diagramed some complex equation divided into three steps. Under the heading Step One are scribbles numbers and equations; likewise, Step Three, at the other end of the board, has similar markings. But under step Two, right in the middle of board are just five words: “And Then a Miracle Happens.” I love it----the notion that something so intriguing, an idea so historic, a formula which explains so much…could be boiled down to a “and then a miracle happens,’ is funny…and refreshing.
I empathize with the Einstein figure—how hard it is to explain something which seems so logical to you, yet it is so difficult to convey. No doubt the real Einstein had times when he wished he could just use Step Two! At times what we know so clearly deep inside is almost impossible to put into words.
It’s the same with certain Christian doctrines...the incarnation, resurrection, ascension, the gift of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost and The Trinity. No doubt the Bishops in Nicaea at the fourth century council which gave us the doctrine of the Holy Trinity struggled mightily to find the words to describe our faith. Words we recite each week in our Creed, words which, to this day, cause a lot of consternation both within Christianity and beyond.
Let’s face it, it can be very difficult to explain our faith to another. Just because we have experienced it doesn’t mean we understand it. It can be so big and overwhelming that words fail us and we end up with “Step 2:” and then a miracle happens!
Jesus may have felt the same way speaking to Nicodemus…Nicodemus, you see, wasn’t thinking BIG enough, he was so constrained by his adherence to the law and to the ways things had “always been done” that he couldn’t open himself up to understand the full magnitude of what he was experiencing through the ministry of Jesus. Nicodemus, a Pharisee had been raised to follow the rules—rules designed to please Yahweh a distant, all powerful loving yet also wrathful God. But being pleased isn’t God’s ultimate goal--
God’s ultimate goal is to be in relationship with us. Through the ages of prophets, patriarchs and matriarchs God has been trying to reach us—to connect with us. God wants to experience us and God wants us to experience God.
This is the purpose of the Trinity: God in three persons, Father, Son and Holy Spirit gives God various routes to us and we, in turn gain various routes to God. A roadmap of sorts*.

The Trinity gives us, and God, a variety of ways to communicate, to connect, to relate.
Some of us connect to the parental “Father God” because we have caring nurturing parents or we long to have a caring nurturing parent---either way, for some of us the image of God as parent, as Father/Mother is comforting.
For others, the fleshy God, the incarnate word of Jesus is an easier image to connect with---a friend, a companion someone more accessible, more real, more tangible for us.
For others, there’s a sense that God is all in all—everywhere, in all things, of all things and deep within us experienced as intuition, inner voice etc. The Holy Spirit, while not physically present, is deep within us, expressing itself in our innermost thoughts, our soul searching and our heart’s desire.
Our heart’s desire, when we let ourselves feel it, is to receive God’s love, to accept God’s pursuit of us. The Holy Trinity comes for us in a number of ways because, beyond all human reason or reckoning, God wants to reach us!
When Jesus says in today’s Gospel “the wind blows where it chooses” I see an image of God in the person of the Holy Spirit, seeking us out reaching into the recesses of our hiding places to offer to us what God most wants to give: Love.
That’s the real miracle of our Christian faith: God so loves us, so wishes for us to accept that love, that God continues to come after us—as we heard in the Gospel: God so loved the world he gave his only Son (John 3:16)- his incarnate self to see and touch and taste that love, God gave us his eternal and all encompassing self, the Holy Spirit, to course through our very being at all times and in all places. This is a miracle indeed…and one we are called to proclaim…if only we could find the right words!
The three persons of the Trinity are traditionally described as Father Son and Holy Spirit but others prefer: Creator, Redeemer and Sanctifier or: Artist, Rescuer, Companion and many other permutations to numerous to mention here. It is a challenge to find the right words to describe the mesmerizing, fantastic and most amazing experience of God working in our lives. This struggle continues to this day—not because God is elusive, but because God is so big, so ever-present that language proves insufficient in describing it.
That is why this Cathedral, each Sunday, offers three distinct liturgies utilizing various styles to express our love of God and God’s love for us.
In the course of 4 hours we in-- three distinct ways---proclaim the Glory of God. We do this because as Jesus explained to Nicodemus: We speak of what we know and testify to what we have seen….and what we know and what we have seen of God is so huge and so varied we must use a variety of words and images to express it. And that’s ok, because it doesn’t matter so much how we say it. What matters is that we experience it; that we delve into a relationship with God dying to our limited human roadmap, allowing ourselves to be reborn into the life of “And then a Miracle Happens”---the Holy and Undivided Trinity, One God Creator Redeemer, Sustainer, Artist Rescuer Companion, Father Son and Holy Spirit.
Amen.

*CS Lewis Mere Christianity considers the doctrines of Christianity to be roadmaps to reality

The Descent of the Holy Spirit Gives us Life

2009-05-30T08:07:00.002-04:00

Tomorrow is Pentecost, when we remember the moment Christ, sitting at the right hand of God sends the Holy Spirit to fill us, lift us, inspire us, guide us, and at times carry us. We wear red and celebrate the birth of the church, the occasion of us being given the tool needed to carry on and to do God's will in all that we do. Tomorrow, we will welcome the newest member of the Church of God, Jaiden Cooper as he is baptized at the 11:15 Eucharist. At both 9 and 11:15 everyone will be offered a red balloon to carry in procession and hold throughout the day as we welcome the tongues of fire brought to inflame our hearts minds and souls. It is a GRAND day in the church and I hope as many of you as possible will join us. The Holy Spirit is our lifeblood, the Holy Spirit is the person of the Trinity who fills us, leads us and follows us. If we let the Holy Spirit have room and if we listen carefully for her direction, her nudging, we will know peace.
Tomorrow we will also recognize our Sunday School teachers and later in the day we'll bid the program a year a final adieu with the annual choir banquet (you don't want to miss the skit---Mother Liza and Mr Bruns in a Name that Hymn contest orchestrated by Ms Rockwood and Mother Cathy.

'Calgon Don't Take Me Away"

2009-05-24T22:07:00.002-04:00

Sermon preached at St. Paul's Cathedral, Buffalo NY 24 May 2009

+ “Calgon take me away” That is my sister Anne’s favorite saying when life gets too hectic and she’s feeling stressed. Remember that ad campaign from the 1980’s? A harried woman busy at work and at home, she would , at the end of the day finally achieve some sense of peace through the tranquility and solitude of a Calgon bath.
Calgon take me away was a promise of relief from the world, a respite, an escape.
We all have times when the world becomes too much for us and we just want to escape for a while. Bubble baths, vacations, zoning out in front of the computer or the TV, taking a long walk in the woods or along the waterfront, a bike ride through Delaware Park—these are all ways we escape the stress of the world. During the everyday world of our lives, at our jobs, in our classrooms, doing the mundane tasks of housework, yard work etc. don’t we yearn for, dream of and hope for the time of escape—a reprieve from the daily grind of the world? But can we ever find complete escape? We have a respite here and there, get re-charged, revitalized, but it always comes back to the same routine, and soon we find ourselves longing to be taken away again, be it via a Calgon bath or something else. We spend a lot of time trying to divide our lives—separate the necessary drudgery of day to day life from the joy of respite, of vacation, of the weekend.
Today’s reading from John is called Jesus’ High Priestly Prayer. In it Jesus is asking God to help us be in the world, but not of the world. To help us keep our focus on all God has given us, as opposed to focusing on all those earthly items we think we need---commodities vs. love, things vs grace. Jesus knew that we, in our humanity are drawn to things we can earn all the stuff we can acquire, instead of accepting all that is simply given to us.

He prays that God will help all of us see that it is US who make this world so tough. It is us who allow our existence to be divided between drudgery and joy. Yes this world does have temptations, responsibilities and duties which can drain us, distract us and lead us down an unfulfilling path, but the answer is not to leave the world, the answer is to be in the world to be fully in the world and to gather our strength, to refresh ourselves, through the love of God as shown to us in the person of Jesus. How do we do that? How do we stay in the world yet hold onto our faith? Especially when Jesus, our great high priest has just left this world, ascended to be at his Father’s right hand.

At this point in the church year we are in what anthropologists call a liminal state—we are betwixt and between. Right now we are between the glorious miracle of resurrection and the sustaining power of the Holy Spirit. The temporal example of death’s defeat at the hands of the resurrected one has given way to a less concrete guide---Jesus has left us with a promise, a promise that we’ll always have an advocate that if we’re patient and trusting the advocate will come in the form of the Holy Spirit—who is offered as guide, as respite, as hope as re-assurer.

How easy it is, during these in between days to long for the world as it was before---when Jesus was still here, when his wounds were in front of us when the miracle was something to be seen—making it much easier to believe. When the challenge, temptations and struggles of this world could be ignored, could be refused could be run from because we could turn to the Risen One, we could turn to the person of the Resurrected Jesus and he would tell us what to do and where to go.
A time when we didn’t need to rely on each other or on ourselves. A time when Jesus would be there—right there—to guide and direct us until we are finally through with this world and on to the next.
But you see, that’s what Jesus is trying to explain in today’s Gospel-- Calgon doesn’t need to take us away, we need to plunge into the world armed with the love of God as given to us in the person of Jesus, not to endure the world, but to improve the world. Not to deny the world, but to embrace the world, not to wait for the last day when all will be ok, but to live fully into today where we celebrate the gift of life given to each of us at our birth and renewed in each one of us as we come to the altar as a community of faith, eager to be fed.
That’s the point of Jesus’ prayer as heard today---he prays that we will learn from him and be fortified through the love of God so that our presence in the world will help creation not hinder it. Jesus wants us to be instruments of God’s love. Right here on earth. Our job is not to endure this life but to enhance this life. Our job isn’t to bide our time until the last day. We needn’t look for respite or escape. We need to simply practice our faith. Our job is to go forth into the world rejoicing in the power of God’s immeasurable love for us. In this time between Ascension and Pentecost, in between our daily grind and our peaceful vacation respite we are to live into the world and to bring to all those we encounter the peace and love of God, which surpasses all understanding. We can offer the world an eternal respite, something which lasts longer than a bubble bath, provides rest never attainable on a two week cruise, we offer the world what is promised us each week as we are invited to communion: The Gifts of God.
For together we are the people of God. +

Youth Ministry

2009-05-16T09:52:00.002-04:00

After reading a blog entry at:
http://raphael.doxos.com/2009/05/16/genx-ministry/comment-page-1/#comment-11241

I wanted to talk about youth ministry. Am I wrong to think that ministry to teens should focus on those who are no longer teens mentoring current teens? I fear that too much "youth ministry" is an attempt by people who are no longer teenagers holding onto a past which is, due to the passage of time, over.
Life is dynamic. Our job as living beings, is to move toward what's next. God's creation is a motion packed work in progress. No do-agains, no looking back...it's a movement toward the next, using the wisdom gained from what happened before to take the next step, to do the next right thing as best we can.
When given the honor of leading young people shouldn't we keep THEIR interests, THEIR goals, THEIR desires in the forefront? Not ours now and not what we wanted when we were teens? To use the teens of today to hold onto our youth is, at worst, abusive and at best, selfish.

NEXT YOUTH GROUP MEETING

2009-05-08T10:35:00.002-04:00

May 17th after the Friends of Music Concert we will have a cook out and game night. OR instead of games we may need to practice our softball skills as St Martin in the Fields has a trophy which the Cathedral would dearly love to re-claim. Show up May 17th at 4:30 for more details......

Life and Death...interrupted

2009-04-26T18:54:00.000-04:00

Today's Sermon
Easter 3 Yr. B April 26, 2009

Alyssa was four years old when baby brother David arrived on the scene. One day, after David had been in the family for several months, Alyssa asked, “will David be here for Christmas?” “ Yes,” replied her mother. “Will he be here every Christmas?” Alyssa responded. “Why yes, he will be here for every Christmas from now on,” replied mom.
As her eyes opened to this new reality Alyssa responded with an emphatic, “RATS, ” and then marched up to her room, indignant.

New life is disruptive. Not only for older siblings but for anyone encountering something new in their midst.

Whether it ‘s actually a new life---a birth, an adoption a new co-worker or new neighbor the dynamic of a family, organization, or relationship is changed when someone new enters the mix. Our eyes are opened to a new reality, which is unfamiliar and cumbersome. As we get used to it, we may stumble, we may stammer we may even, in exasperation, exclaim: RATS and turn away.

Death disrupts as well. How many times did I, after my own father’s death, think, oh I need to call Dad and tell him about this or that or the other thing…only to be brought up short with the realization that I couldn’t call him. Ever. Family gatherings are not the same when grandparents, parents, siblings or children aren’t there----it changes the whole experience when someone is missing. It too is cumbersome and we may stumble and fall as we adjust [to this new reality].

The apostles, on this long long day of resurrection, experience both the disorienting events of death and then shockingly, new life. All in the same day. It began with mournful yet dutiful Mary Magdalene trudging to the tomb, to finish anointing the body of her beloved teacher. It continued with some disciples lamenting the loss of Jesus and all the events that lead up to the crucifixion as they journeyed toward Emmaus. And then, as we heard last week in John’s Gospel and today in Luke’s the eleven are huddled in the locked upper room, fearful, dismayed and disoriented by the events of the previous few days. The living are trying to regain their bearings following the death of a loved one…trying to figure out what to do next, how to carry on with someone missing.

But, in each instance, the grieving is interrupted, disrupted, and blown apart by the simple actions of the Risen Jesus—to Mary he simply says her name, to Thomas and the others he shows that he is flesh and bones, not a ghost, not a mirage.Through simple gestures of speech, touch and eating Jesus discloses the amazing truth: death has been replaced by life.

And suddenly, everything, once again, is changed. It isn’t as it was with Jesus dead, but it isn’t what it was when Jesus was alive either. It is hard to figure out. Just what is going on? Alleluia Christ is Risen. But what does that mean?

Now what? What do we do?
In a few hours this band of followers have gone from the disruption and disorientation of death to the disruption and disorientation of new life. They are, as we are told in two of our readings this morning, witnesses to these things.

Ask any police officer and they’ll tell you, put three witnesses in a room and you will get three different stories. Not because anyone is lying or being deliberately deceptive but because, when in a scary situation, when shocked by what we see, our perceptions get altered, our memories get confused, we aren’t sure of what it was we just saw. Or, we ARE sure of what we just saw, but we just can’t believe it.
I know that when I see something amazing---something tragic and horrible or miraculous and life giving, I have a tendency to stop dead in my tracks. It’s as if the automatic actions of living—breathing, talking, blinking, and walking--stop. Suddenly there is nothing we can do except gape, mouth open, eyes wide. It is as if we must open all our senses to comprehend what has just happened. The world as we have come to expect it, is changed, perhaps for just a moment, perhaps forever….but it is changed. ..and we need some time to adjust. Was what we just saw really what we just saw?

It takes some time for our eyes to be opened to this new reality.

Our readings early in this Easter season show us a whole group of people trying to come to grips with the disruptive events of life, death and then life again. A series of events unfolding at lightening speed leaving the disciples confused, frightened and seemingly in the dark about the new reality of Easter. But then, the risen Jesus opens their eyes and their hearts burn with a recognition which, while familiar, is also incomprehensible.

Jesus opened their eyes so they could finally begin to see, to comprehend to understand. It was a process of fits and starts as they tried to regain their footing in this new reality. Now it’s easy to scoff at the disciples—how could they NOT see? But truth be told, how often do we not see?

In the collect for today we ask that the eyes of our faith may be opened to behold the redeeming work of God in the world. Have our eyes been opened? If so, what do these opened eyes see?

Don’t we see the Risen Christ in the eyes of our co-workers, in the chatter of carpool kids in the backseat of the car, in the laugh shared at coffee hour, in the wave another driver gives us at the stop sign. You see, when our eyes are opened through our faith we find the Risen One everywhere, in the brokenness of another’s hurt, a hurt we try to soothe by listening, by being present. When our eyes are opened through our faith the risen Christ is found when we bring a bag of rice for the food pantry, when we linger with the elderly neighbor who is lonely. Our eyes are opened to see the Risen Christ when we support our youth and children. Our eyes are opened to the Risen Christ, our hands touch his wounds when we remember that the welfare of the world we live in, the caretaking of creation as bestowed to us by God , is dependent on us living dying and rising to life again every single day. It may be disruptive, it may be uncomfortable, it may be messy, but such is a life with a savior who has redeemed us to be an Easter people.

Amen.

Waiting, watching and remembering.

2009-04-09T21:47:00.001-04:00

Maundy Thursday sermon, April 9, 2009

***The Gospel used at the Cathedral is Luke 22:14-30 as the foot washing is not practiced at St. Paul’s. ***

+Some 16 years ago as my father lay dying my extended family and I gathered round his hospital bed telling stories of the past-- funny stories about George, our dad, grandfather, husband and friend. We laughed and laughed at the memories until finally my mother noticed that his labored breathing had stopped. Dad was gone.

His final journey had been arduous and for the last three weeks of his life he was in the hospital, slowly descending into the grips of death. It was during those weeks and most especially those final days and hours that we had the opportunity to bear witness to Dad’s journey. During those final days we waited and watched with him. Many times there were no words, it was simply our presence that gave him the strength he needed to die. The memory of that waiting and watching with Dad will always be with me and sharing those memories as a family strengthens us, those memories make us who we are. Remembering that time is important because remembering the past helps us navigate the present. Walking with Dad and remembering that walk, is a big part of who I am today. Remembering forms us into who we are now.

Jesus took these two points—the walking with now and the remembering later and made them the focal point of that Thursday evening supper during the first Holy Week. “wait with me. Be with me as I move toward the inevitable. And then, when it is over, remember it all, remember me.” Jesus needed his friends to wait with him, to watch with him, to walk this final walk toward death with him. The week had such a promising start--the triumphal entry into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday, but then over the next few days the triumph changed to despair as one by one the supporters fell away, denying him, deserting him, turning on him.
Tonight we meet Jesus halfway through this week, when all the questioning, the fear, the denial and the betrayal has been put in motion. ..the disciples are arguing, debating and gossiping…no one seems t o be paying attention. It’s a Seder, the ancient Jewish meal remembering Jewish people’s liberation from slavery, a story each of the disciples knew, a story integral to their Jewish identity. It’s possible this telling of the Passover story had become rote for them, they were just going through the ritual motions. But Jesus needed them to pay attention because on this night, as he had done so many times in the past, Jesus would take something utterly familiar, something very comfortable and turn it upside down and inside out.

Jesus knew that remembering was a key component of community building and he knew that the community of the burgeoning primitive church was going to need strength, a strength built on the telling of stories, built on the remembering of what came before.
Every one of us has stories, stories which have been handed down to us by parents and grandparents. Whatever the specifics we tell and re-tell these tales because they contribute to our identity, they make us who we are.

Jesus, on this night so long ago didn’t want his friends to forget his story. Not because he was some kind of egomaniac but because he knew the value of telling a story. Just as the story telling at my father’s bedside forged our family and friends into a stronger bond, Jesus wanted his friends to wait with him, to watch with him and then when he was gone, to tell the story, to remember and to be strengthened by the story enough to keep it going. He wants the same for us--for the work Jesus started is not yet finished and we as inheritors of the faith must carry it on. We must ingest these stories of Jesus. And to carry on the work we must claim the stories as our own, not only by telling them but by living them.
That’s why we have the Eucharist every week, because not only do we need to say it and hear it, we need to be it. So we take, we eat and we remember.
In a few minutes after sharing in the Eucharist one last time, we’ll strip the altar, while lamenting the betrayal, loss and despair of the next three days. We’ll strip ourselves bare to feel the pain and loss of Jesus’ death. We do this not because we need to be punished, not because we need to hurt. We do this so we can remember. So we’ll remember not just with words, not just with thoughts, but with actions. For when we strip our sacred space of all that is familiar, when we enter into the darkness of this long night, waiting watching and weeping with Christ, we remember. And through our remembering we are strengthened. Each time we take and eat we are remembering the story and with each remembrance we gain strength. The strength needed to continue to do the work God has given us to do. Amen.

Crying Our Way to Easter

2009-03-30T15:37:00.001-04:00

Yesterday's sermon:
+
Cry. You have to cry.
Crying is a necessary part of life--- for crying—I mean a real good ol’ stomach wrenching sob-fest—is cleansing. It clears our hearts and minds and renews, as the psalmist tells us this morning, a “right spirit within us.”(Psalm 51)
Crying can be very difficult for some people—it represents a loss of control, a weakness that they do not—sometimes for very good reason---want to expose. But without crying, the anguish which fuels the tears is turned back inward where it can slowly eat away at us until we are languishing in darkness with seemingly no way out.
Crying breaks open the anguish, pushing the dark away so the light can shine through…it’s important to cry.

Sometimes we cry with joy, sometimes we cry with rage, sometimes we cry with fear, sometimes we cry with disappointment and sometimes we cry with heartbreak.
Everyone experiences tears and heartbreak, even God.

I am convinced God cries. And scripture tells us, Jesus wept.
God’s heartbreak has been chronicled throughout Lent--covenants made, covenants broken, God disappointed, God heartbroken by his creation.

The heartbreak of Jesus is also known--he wailed with sadness at the death of his friend Lazarus, he wailed with frustration at the money changers in the temple, and he wailed with fear and pain in the garden and on the cross.

Today’s Gospel gives us a hint of this heartbreak-- Jesus asks God if the suffering he is about to endure is really necessary. Isn’t there another way? Another way to change the heart of humanity, another way to bring in a completely different type of love?

No. God is clear, this is what needs to happen. The heartbreak of God at the death of Jesus is needed. The tears are needed, the agony has to happen. Not because we have a malicious, hurtful God, but because sometimes things need to break in order to grow .

This happens all the time. Something breaks and as a result we find ourselves stronger. Don’t you think this economic crisis will, in the end, bring us into a new way of doing business, into a new economic reality, which will be stronger, more resistant to the darkness of greed?

Think about learning something new. Skiing, golfing, the computer, a language. Aren’t the mistakes made while trying something new helpful? We learn from them. And when we learn from our mistakes something new emerges….a light bulb goes off and we are changed. Our mistakes make us different. Our mistakes make us better. Our mistakes strengthen us.

Mistakes, breaking, crying, hurting—all of this is part of our humanity, part of us. It is inevitable that we will break, cry and hurt…and it’s inevitable we will come out of it a little stronger.

You know why Jesus’ ministry was focused on the fringe of society the outcasts? Because—I think-- such people had a lot of heartbreak and their broken-ness made them ripe for growth.

Why is that? Why do we have to break a little to get stronger? Why is it that we have to cry to get clearer? Why is it that we have to hurt to grow?
Because each time we break, each time we cry, each time we hurt we open up more space for God .

And that’s all God needs---space. That’s why my favorite day of the Triduum—the three days of Maundy Thursday, Good Friday and Holy Saturday is Holy Saturday. The day of silence, the day of death, the day of quiet. All the betrayal and agony leads to this empty space, this abyss this loneliness this nothingness. A day when we have been stripped of everything and are able, finally to receive the full measure of God’s love. Because, as Mother Liza reminded us last week in her sermon, we need to receive God. And to receive God we need to be empty. As God told the prophet Jeremiah in today’s Old Testament lesson, this covenant, this final covenant between God and us is written on our hearts, it is inside of us, underneath all the crud we pile up. That’s why we fast, that’s why we quiet ourselves that’s why we discipline ourselves, we strip ourselves so that the love of God can grow from that spot deep within us where God placed his loving touch while we were still in our mother’s womb.

Jesus in his human-ness needed this broken-ness as well. Jesus had agony, Jesus had heartbreak, Jesus shed tears. Jesus in his human nature needed to break, he needed to agonize, he needed to cry---he needed to clear out space for the divine light to shine through. Jesus’ cried out in agony not because he didn’t want to do what he had to do, but because the only way he could do what he had to do was to break his human form so his divine self could shine through. To reach his full stature as The Christ, Jesus had to break.

Sometimes we must break in order to grow. Sometimes we must empty ourselves to be filled. And sometimes we must cry to be cleansed.

That’s our job as Lent winds down….to allow all our discipline of these forty days strip us bare breaking open our hearts and cleansing ourselves with tears. When we do that we allow a new and right spirit to take up residence deep with in us—a spirit of wonder, love and surprise found at the empty tomb on Easter morning.
Because no matter how much we cry, no matter how much we wail, no matter how much we try to avoid it, God loves us so much he gave us his Son to take the human journey with us and for once and for all open up a space wide enough for each of us to enter, stripped bare and ready to receive a new life in Christ. A life cleansed by tears and illuminated with divine strength.

Amen.

Talking to tweens and teens about sex

2009-03-28T20:08:00.004-04:00

From this week's Newsweek:
"What kids think about sex might surprise you, but what they're doing sexually—and when they're doing it—might surprise you even more. In a study this year of more than a 1,000 tweens (kids between the ages 11 and 14), commissioned by Liz Claiborne Inc. and loveisrespect.org, nearly half said they'd had a boy- or girlfriend, and one in four said that oral sex or going "all the way" is part of a tween romance. The parents' view? Only 7 percent of parents surveyed in this study think their own child has gone any further than "making out."

The whole subject of sex is so delicate that some parents put off talking to kids about it, believing their child is still too young, or because they're not sure what to say. They "finally sit down to have the Big Talk," says Dr. Mark Schuster, chief of general pediatrics at Children's Hospital Boston, "and it turns out their teen is already having sex." (The average age of first intercourse in the United States is 16, according to the Centers for Disease Control)
The good news is that there's plenty of evidence indicating that kids whose parents do discuss sex with them are more cautious than their peers—more likely to put off sex or use contraception. They also have fewer partners. Coaching for parents helps, as well. Parents who participated in a training program about how to have those difficult conversations, Schuster reports, were six times more likely than a control group to have discussed condoms with their children. So what did the parents learn? Here are nine "talking sex" tips:

1. Find the moment. Instead of saying "it's time to talk about you-know," let the topic arise naturally—say, during a love scene in a video, or while passing a couple on a park bench. It helps to think about opening lines in advance.

2. Don't be vague about your own feelings. You know you don't want your ninth grader getting pregnant, but is oral sex OK? How do you feel about your daughter going steady or dating several boys casually? Consider the messages you want your kids to hear.

3. Anticipate the roadblocks that a teen or tween might set up. If they tend to say "uh huh," try asking open-ended questions or suggesting a variety of possible ways someone might feel in a relevant situation.

4. Be a good listener. Avoid lecturing and don't interrupt once your child opens up. Restate in your own words what you hear and identify feelings.

5. Help your child consider the pros and cons of sexual choices.

6. Relate sex and physical intimacy to love, caring and respect for themselves and their partner.

7. Teach strategies to manage sexual pressure. It may not be obvious to your daughter that she can suggest going to the movies or a restaurant instead of lounging with her boyfriend on a sofa without adult supervision. Or she may not know she can set and stick to a clear rule (such as no touching below the waist). Discuss the fact that "no means no." A simple strategy like getting up and going to the bathroom can give a girl time to regroup.

8. Don't be afraid to get down to specifics. If your teenage daughter or son is spending every afternoon alone with a main squeeze, and you're simply hoping they're using condoms, go ahead and ask whether they are sexually active and using birth control. You can buy a box of condoms and talk about how to use them—practice on a cucumber. A good laugh won't hurt your relationship.

9. Make the conversation ongoing—not a talk that happens once or twice. For more tips on talking to kids about sex and other sensitive issues, visit Children Now, a nonprofit nonpartisan organization's guide to talking to kids of all ages about sexual subjects. Or The American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry's "Facts for Families." "

2009-03-20T12:49:00.001-04:00

This is from the online site: sojo.net
An interesting perspective on the Liberian issue from halfway across the country.

Liberian Deportation Threat One More Reason for Immigration Reform
by Bailey Craft 03-18-2009

The clock is ticking for thousands of Liberian immigrants as the month of March draws to a close. I recently read a story in the Minneapolis Star Tribune concerning the temporary immigration status of more than 3,600 Liberians nationwide that is set to expire at the end of March. Unless an extension is granted by President Obama, these immigrants will face deportation. To postpone the deadline for at least another 18 months would provide Congress with time to consider a permanent solution – legislation providing a path to citizenship.
Liberians were granted temporary status after fleeing the civil war that erupted in their homeland. The conflict lasted well over a decade, and conditions in Liberia remain unstable. Liberia’s fragile infrastructure is not yet ready to absorb thousands of deportees, as it is plagued with housing, electrical and water shortages, as well as high unemployment and crime rates.
As a Minnesotan, this issue is extremely relevant. Minnesota has one of the largest Liberian populations in the nation, and over 1,000 Liberians in my state would be deported if nothing is done. Forcibly uprooting hardworking members of my community will have a devastating impact on these families who have made the United States their home. The sudden loss will negatively impact various sectors, as many are taxpaying home and business owners, students, health care professionals, and members of local congregations. Deportations will further deplete communities ransacked by the current economic crisis.
With Liberia’s current conditions in mind, many parents would face the agonizing choice of whether to leave their children behind in the United States or bring them to Liberia. Families will be ripped apart, and children left with friends or relatives who may not be in a position to provide care. It is unjust to force a parent to have to choose either physical safety or family unification.
Father James Wilson, a Liberian and priest at St. Philip and St. Thomas Episcopal Churches in Saint Paul, asserts, “Liberians go through this immigration nightmare, which I find very disturbing on the basis of biblical social justice ethics that call for welcoming strangers, treating them justly as you too were once strangers or aliens (Exodus 23:9).”
Liberians in our communities have ceased to become strangers; they have lived and worked alongside of us for nearly two decades.
It is imperative to respect the human dignity of these individuals and acknowledge and honor the numerous contributions they have made to our communities and our country.
Action to extend the March 31st deadline is needed now, but this situation underlines the need for long-term comprehensive immigration reform. It is unjust for a nation to allow people to settle and build their lives in the United States for nearly two decades yet withhold the opportunity to become citizens. An extension of the deadline by an administrative order would give Congress time to consider legislation which could provide a path to citizenship. Please join me in calling the White House and urging President Obama to extend the deadline of deportation for Liberians beyond March 31, 2009.
Bailey Craft is a volunteer program assistant at the Minnesota Literacy Council which provides literacy services to immigrants and refugees.

Sermons, Youth and Lent etc.

2009-03-02T10:14:00.002-05:00

Hi all,
Below is my sermon from yesterday, the text was The Noahic Covenant in Genesis.
At Youth Group we discussed Lent and what Lent means to each of us. I was pleased with the conversation about adding things to your life as a very viable option--Lent isn't necessarily about giving things up. But, that said, Nick's giving up his favorite video game is a very thoughtful discipline. Anyway, it was a great conversation, as always.

"God's My Bad"
Lent 1 Year B St. Paul's Cathedral, Buffalo New York
The Rev'd Cathy Dempesy

“My bad” is a modern day way of saying, “oops, I’m so sorry-- I take full responsibility for this. I screwed up and this is my fault.” This notion of “ my bad” is a good synopsis for today’s reading from Genesis. God says to humanity: “My Bad! I let my emotions get the best of me and obliterated my creation with the raging flood. I am sorry. My bad.”

Every relationship needs to have “my bad” room. Each party in a relationship must be able—and willing-- to say, “oh man that was lousy, I’m sorry” or “you know I blew it, I apologize.” Part of successful couple’s counseling is to teach partners how to have productive arguments. There will be disagreements that’s a given, what matters is how we express those disagreements and how we resolve them so we can move on. A lingering, unresolved disagreement is a quick and potent poison to any relationship. But having the skill --the tools to work through those disagreements is a soothing balm to relationships.

Often when couples come in for pre-marital counseling they cringe at the subject of disagreements—and they sure don’t want to discuss how these fights unfold. They’d rather deny that any discord exists at all. It is then that I remind them that the covenant of marriage is not about never being mad at each other. On the contrary it’s about sticking with each other even when mad. It’s about loving each other in sickness, in bad times, in poverty….it’s about not Bailing at the first sign of trouble (Now obviously there are any number of scenarios where the covenant of marriage must be dissolved—but what I am talking about are regular every day dissapointments, hurt, frustrtaion). Covenants, solemn contracts, oaths, bonds, are designed to keep us together—in relationship-- when we would rather just break apart.
Today God makes just such a promise, an oath to Noah and all the inhabitants of the ark: Never again will God destroy the earth through the raging waters of a flood. Among all the covenants God has made with humanity this one is unique, for this covenant, this promise, was wholly one-sided. As German theologian Gerard Von Rad said, this promise requires absolutely nothing of creation, it places all the limits, all the boundaries on God.
Boundaries on God? Why would our omnipotent, omniscient Creator need boundaries, need limits?
Because God is fully, completely, head over heels, in love with us.
And when one –even God—finds themselves so in love, great passions are stirred. And when great passions are stirred anyone can lose their mind. Even God!…

Have you ever lashed out at the one you love most in the world? We do so, not out of malice but out of confusion, frustration and hurt. When we start loving someone we start building up the possibility—the probability of hurt… God did the same with his creation, the more he loved us, the greater the hurt. Now had God been a distant, uninvolved, disconnected Creator, God never would have been so hurt and wouldn’t have lashed out of that hurt, that disappointment that sadness. But God isn’t distant, God is involved God is connected.
The flood was God’s gut reaction to our behavior. God became so derailed by his love for us, so stirred with passion for us, that he forgot the truth of our human nature—he forgot that we would, eventually, become recalcitrant, ungrateful and forgetful. And when that happened, when we turned our backs on God, out of God’s own frustration and sadness he tossed the whole lot of creation, save those on the ark, back into the chaos of water and darkness...the muck from which he created it all in the first place.

But God so loved us, he cleared the skies, dried the earth and told Noah he’d never again let his disappointment get the best of him, never lash out so violently. God could have just retreated to a disconnected place far from our reach, but instead God stayed with us. In his divine persistence, God stayed (and continues to stay) in relationship with us. In a relationship where God is always ready to receive us, a relationship where all we need to do is show up willing to let go of our temptations, our doubt, our fear, willing to empty ourselves and give God a chance to fill us up.
Clearly, this is hard for us.

And that’s what makes Lent so wonderful. A whole 40 days to focus on shedding all that blocks our way, freeing ourselves to accept a relationship with a God who is absolutely crazy in love with us. This journey of Lent allows us to ready ourselves for the greatest and most miraculous of all the Biblical covenants. This covenant of a new life in Christ a covenant in which God no longer communicates through messengers and emissaries, but comes to us himself, in the person of Jesus of Nazareth. God, through His Son, goes where we’ve all gone and will go, to the darkest reaches of our human nature---anger, confusion, doubt, fear and death. From the cleansing waters of our baptism to the terrors and temptations of our wilderness, to the fear of death, God has been there.

This Lenten journey has been taken before….by God, through Jesus, his beloved Son.

Everything that tempts us, everything that derails us has already been defeated by God. Evil threw all it had at Jesus in the wilderness yet Jesus resisted it because he let the peace of God, the understanding of God and the grace of God fill him. Through Jesus, God has defeated our doubts, our fears, our rejection. By filling Jesus with His love, God has given us a way to empty ourselves. In Jesus God has given us a way to toss out all the darkness and to come to Him stripped bare redy to be filled.

May we enter the wilderness of Lent with a willingness to be emptied of everything that holds us back…may our Lenten journey be a time for us to say to God, “my bad. I’m sorry for my neglect, I’m ready to let go, to empty myself of worry doubt and fear and let you, my beloved God, fill my heart, my mind and my soul --because only when empty can we receive the full measure of God’s gift to us, the promise shown in every rainbow, the oath made at every baptism, the vow God made, the covenant which requires nothing of us other than the acceptance that our Creator God is crazy head over heals in love with us.
Amen.

J2A

2009-02-26T18:35:00.003-05:00

Some of you have it scheduled for this Sunday evening. That is a mistake....our next evening meeting is March 22, sorry for the confusion.
BTW, I need to go to Chicago--my sister is having surgery--so I will not be here March 15th.

Ash Wednesday

2009-02-25T10:30:00.000-05:00

From today's posting by Jim Wallis at Sojourners:
Blessèd sister, holy mother, spirit of the fountain,
spirit of the garden,
Suffer us not to mock
ourselves with falsehood
Teach us to care
and not to care
Teach us to sit still
Even among these rocks,
Our peace in His will
And even among these rocks
Sister, mother
And spirit of the river,
spirit of the sea,
Suffer me not to be separated

And let my cry come unto Thee.

- T.S. Eliot,
from "Ash Wednesday, VI"

update for February 22

2009-02-18T16:42:00.001-05:00

Hi everyone,
We have acolyte trainings scheduled after the 9 AM and 11:15 AM Eucharists. Allie will be out of town, so no meeting in the youth room...enjoy the brunch on the Walker Room.

Great Gathering

2009-02-15T17:19:00.002-05:00

We had 11 people go to The Church of the Ascension to see the display of icons. Very interesting. Thanks to Fr. Armand Kreft and Ascension's seminarian, Pete Cornell, for their hospitality. And the lunch following at The Towne was great fun. Thanks to everyone!