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2010 Sermons

Advent 1 November 28, 2010

Darkness and Light:

A Response to the Readings for Advent 1

 (This was one of our periodic intergenerational “Come With Joy” Sundays, which feature the use of drama and art, and participation by the congregation in the response to the Scripture readings.)

Romans 13:11-14

Matthew 24:36-44

Presider

Imagine the unimaginable. Perhaps it will be helpful if you close your eyes for a few moments. Be with the silence, the darkness. Now imagine the unimaginable. Imagine that in these next four weeks, these weeks of Advent, you do not put up a Christmas tree or decorations; you do not make lists or shop for Christmas presents; you do not give or go to Christmas parties; you do not listen to Christmas songs; you do not busy yourself with errands and organizing; especially, imagine that you do not feel you have to be “jolly” or “in the mood” or “get with the holiday spirit.” Imagine that for these four weeks, you only watch and wait, hope and pray. In other words, imagine that you keep the holy season of Advent as it’s meant to be kept, free from the pre-Christmas pressures of the world around us.

In the darkness as you sit there, you begin to hear things:

 (Roll of drums)

(Readers come forth one by one and stand before the Altar. After they read their headline, they cover their faces with a newspaper and remain standing as others join them.)

First News Headline

Irish Debt Crisis Forces Collapse of Government: New Fears of Political Instability for Allies in Europe

(Roll of drums)

Second News Headline

Iraq’s Troubles Drive Out Refugees Who Came Back: Iraqis who fled the height of the war and then returned are leaving in a second exodus, fueled by violence and unemployment that show how far Iraq remains from stability and security

(Roll of drums)

Third News Headline

North Koreans Unveil New Plant for Nuclear Use: South Korea Strengthens Military Defenses

(Roll of drums)

Fourth News Headline

Front-Line City Starts Tackling Rise in the Sea: Global Warming Means Tough Decisions Ahead for Norfolk, Virginia

(Roll of drums)

Fifth News Headline

South Korea at Forefront of Worldwide Dementia Epidemic: Estimated 100 Million Cases by 2050 

(Roll of drums)

Sixth News Headline

South Africa Fears Millions More AIDS Infections: Health Crisis Threatens to Overwhelm Country’s Future

(Roll of drums)

Seventh News Headline

Consumer Risks Feared as Health Law Spurs Mergers: Consolidation May Drive Up Costs, Impair Care

(Roll of drums)

Eighth News Headline

NATO Sees Long-Term Role After Afghan Combat: Tens of Thousands of Troops to Remain After 2014

(The readers return to their seats.)

Presider

And on and on it goes. You’d like to distract yourself. Go shopping. Get something to eat, maybe have a drink. Listen to “Jingle Bells” or “I saw Mommy kissing Santa Claus.” Watch something light on television. Maybe browse the Internet. Why not? What would be the hurt? But you discipline yourself. This is Advent. You watch and wait, hope and pray. And now through the darkness comes another sort of sound:

(Sound of chimes)

This time, as the readers come forward they each bring a candle which they light and hold before them.

First Prophecy

The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light.

(Sound of chimes)

Second Prophecy

For a child has been born for us, a son given to us; Authority rests upon his shoulders; and he is named Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

(Sound of chimes)

Third Prophecy

Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Look, the young woman is with child and shall bear a son, and shall name him Immanuel.

(Sound of chimes)

Fourth Prophecy

But you, O Bethlehem, who are one of the little clans of Judah, from you shall come forth for me one who is to rule in Israel, whose origin is from old, from ancient days.

(Sound of chimes)

Fifth Prophecy

A star shall come out of Jacob, and a scepter shall rise out of Israel.

(Sound of chimes)

Sixth Prophecy

A shoot shall come out from the stump of Jesse, and a branch shall grow out of his roots. The spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord. His delight shall be in the fear of the Lord.

(Sound of chimes)

Seventh Prophecy

The wolf shall live with the lamb, the leopard shall lie down with the kid, the calf and the lion and the fatling together, and a little child shall lead them. The cow and the bear shall graze, their young shall lie down together; and the lion shall eat straw like the ox. The nursing child shall play over the hole of the asp, and the weaned child shall put its hand on the adder’s den.

(Sound of chimes)

Eighth Prophecy

A voice cries out: “In the wilderness prepare the way of the Lord, make straight in the desert a highway for our God. Every valley shall be lifted up and every mountain and hill be made low; the uneven ground shall become level, and the rough places a plain. Then the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all people shall see it together, for the mouth of the Lord has spoken.”

(The readers extinguish their candles and return to their seats.)

Presider

We live in a world where imagining Advent is difficult. The darkness part, the news headlines and the crises and struggles in our own lives, is easy enough. What’s hard is imagining that the prophetic voices have any power against the darkness. We’re used to trying to combat the darkness all through our own efforts. Things are going badly in Iraq or Afghanistan, for instance, and we throw more troops or more money at the problem. Banks collapse in Ireland or on Wall Street and we bail them out. And of course we do live in a different world from biblical times. We have more power over darkness than people did 2000 years ago – or at least we think we do.

We think we do, but there’s a limit to our power. So often the law of unintended consequences operates so that what we try to do only makes the darkness worse.  We take out a mortgage to buy a beautiful new home and we lose our job or the interest rate jumps; now the house is a problem, not a solution. We overthrow a dictator and end up plunging a nation into chaos and provoking terrorist reprisals on our own shores. The Advent prophets would have pointed out that we act without consulting God. We act with insufficient imagination about what could be possible in God’s coming Kingdom.

The Advent prophecies invite us to entertain a deeper level of faith and hope. The prophets who voiced them so long ago knew something that we forget: that the Lord is always there, working in history and in our own lives, even in the darkest moments. That we often cannot set things right by ourselves, but God is always there, offering a flame of hope, new light, an alternative  way forward, comfort and courage in the struggle. This God is not Santa Claus. He does not always give us what we want.  His word is not always a jolly “ho, ho, ho.” He was born in poverty and neglect in a stable. He died an apparent failure on a Cross. But that was not the end, for God is a greater God than we can imagine. The old dies, but the new is born. The chaos that we read as darkness may be the birth pangs of the Babe who is Messiah.

Advent is about watching, waiting, hoping, praying for the coming of this God, our Lord Jesus the Christ.

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2010 Sermons

Christ the King November 21, 2010

Jeremiah 23:1-6

Colossians 1:11-20

Luke 23:33-43

One of the most valuable spiritual gifts, it seems to me, is a sense of irony. Irony is defined as “a state of affairs or events that is the reverse of what was to be expected”; it’s when someone says one thing but then does something that contradicts their words. You won’t find irony among the classic lists of virtues. It’s kind of an outlier, a bastard virtue, if you will. Having a sense of irony protects us from taking others – or ourselves – too seriously. It punctures our tendency to create idols. It brings us back to earth, where we belong. And yet, even as it does so, it can raise up for us new and more genuine hope.

Our celebration of Christ the King on this last Sunday of the Church Year is a perfect example of irony.

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Pentecost 25 November 14, 2010

Malachi 4:1-2a                                                                   

2 Thessalonians 3:6-13                                                    

Luke 21:5-19

In the news this week: gold hit an all-time high of fourteen hundred and something dollars an ounce. Actually, adjusted for inflation, it wasn’t an all-time high, but the fact remains that lots of people are apparently buying gold. People do that as a hedge against uncertainty, out of fear about what the future may bring: inflation, deflation, the fall of the dollar, the rise of China . . . whatever. Lots of uncertainty around us in the world today.

There’s biblical precedent for this flight to gold. In the Book of Exodus we learn that when Moses went up on Mount Sinai to talk with God and get the Ten Commandments, the people of Israel became anxious because he was gone so long. He’d led them out into the wilderness on this faith journey to some sort of promised land, but what if it didn’t work out? What if Moses abandoned them? What if this whole God of promise thing was an illusion? So they took all their jewelry and melted it down and made a golden calf to worship. A god they could get their hands around. A god who wouldn’t go away or ask them to journey on faith. Gold: the god of certainty. The Bible has another word for it: idolatry.

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All Saints’ Sunday November 7, 2010

Daniel 7:1-3, 15-18                                                            

Ephesians 1:11-23                                                             

Luke 6:20-31

For the last three weeks or so, I’ve been dragging around with a cold. Nothing serious enough to ground me, but enough to make me feel tired and subpar. I was almost back to health last weekend, but then the runny nose and achy muscles and exhausted feeling returned with a vengeance. The reason: standing out in the cold and wind at the Weare polling place all day Tuesday on behalf of a couple of candidates I cared about.

Why does anyone do this? Well, maybe because the “other side” does it and you don’t want them to be the only ones out there – and, of course, they do it because you do it. There was some talk on “the line” as the day wore on and we got colder and colder that we make a pact and next year no one would stand out there! But we stand because we believe in what we stand for. We’re witnesses to something we believe in – passionately enough to risk our health. Moreover, as I discover anew every time I do this, it’s also fun to see and greet all the people in town you know. You end up feeling a sense of solidarity and community: despite differences of opinion, we’re all out there exercising our responsibility as citizens and when it’s all over and the votes counted, we come together as one country, one people.

Finally, and to me most rewarding, it’s a time to talk with people you disagree with – discover what is motivating them, what their vision is, and at a deeper level who they are. Early in the day at the polls, the Republicans were at one end of the line by the door, the Democrats at the other. The Republicans were talking with one another about their beliefs: there were people who believed that roads and highways should be privatized, that churches should take care of all the welfare needs of society, that Obama was born in Nigeria and was bent on making America socialist.

The Democrats listening to this were rolling their eyes. But of course the Democrats were sharing their vision – an income tax, more aid to education and social services – and talking about how awful Andy Sanborn and John Stephen were, while the Republicans rolled their eyes. But late in the day, when the sun was going down and the cold getting more intense, when most of the line-standers had gone home, those of us who remained began to talk with each other, across party lines. What we discovered, of course, was that we shared many of the same concerns. Moreover, there was much we could agree on about how to approach problems, how to work together. And we learned that the “other side” were really decent human beings, with good hearts and minds, who cared just as intensely as we did about our country, our state and our community. So when the day was finally over, we went home – winners and losers – feeling somehow more deeply connected to one another.

I share all this because today we celebrate the feast of All Saints’, and this annual ritual of “working the polls” is very much a celebration of what it means when we say each week in the Creed that we believe in the communion of saints.

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Pentecost 23 October 31, 2010

Isaiah 1:10-20                                                                      

2 Thessalonians 1:1-12                                                      

Luke 19:1-10

 This is God’s Message: “If you’ll willingly obey, you’ll feast like kings. But if you’re willful and stubborn, you’ll die like dogs.” That’s right. God says so.

Isaiah 1:20 (The Message paraphrase)

I was tempted, thinking about this sermon, to start out by asking for you to define salvation. This congregation has become pretty good at talking together in response to the readings – as you demonstrated last week. I thought as a follow-up question, I’d ask how many of you believe you’re “saved” – and how many of you have doubts. But then I thought, no, that’s being a little too “frontal” with you. Salvation isn’t something most of us think much about.

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Dramatic Response to the Gospel October 24, 2010

Breaking Through: A Dramatic Response

to the Parable of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector

The following drama, written by Pat Karpen of Holy Cross, was presented in lieu of a sermon. It was followed by congregational discussion. 

Characters

Cummings – an older angel                            Marge Burke

Esmeralda – a younger angel                         Pat Karpen

Sarah – a young woman of about 17              Sonia Sculer

Colin – a young man of about 17                    Ben Harrington

The two guardian angels are poised on step ladders at either side of the stage area. We see Esmeralda (E) desperately trying to scratch her shoulder blades.

Cummings (C):  What’s the matter, Esmeralda?

E:  These wings trying to come out. The itching is making me crazy. It’s like cutting teeth.

C:  Patience, Esmeralda. Soon the itching will abate and you’ll have your first set of beautiful angel wings – a full-fledged guardian angel, ready for action.

E:  Thank God.

C:  Exactly, Esmeralda. Exactly.

E:  Sorry.

C:  We want you to go on a visit. 

E:  Me? My first guardian angel visit! God thinks I’m ready?!

C:  Yes. Now listen carefully. The young woman you’ve been assigned to needs some help. She can’t hear you because of all the noise in her life. That’s the biggest problem we have in being guar-dian angels. People these days are so full of themselves and their problems they never stop to listen to God. You’re not getting through. Take a look.

Sarah (S) is screaming into her cell phone. 

S:  Mother, be quiet and just listen. (Pause.) No, I will not come home. (Pause.) Will you just shut up and listen! I hate math! I hate school! I don’t care if I fail! I’m not interested and I don’t need it! (Pause.) Shut up!! I don’t need it in my life. I don’t want it in my life. I will not go to summer school! I will not have a tutor! It’s stupid! It’s boring! It sucks . . . good-bye! She disconnects and immediately redials.

Colin, it’s Sarah. You still wanna hook up? Meet me at the field.

E:  Oh, crap — oops, sorry! Cummings, I’m on it. I’ll do you proud.

As E twirls to earth, S and Colin move more center. E “freezes” Colin and speaks to S.

E:  Hey.

S:  Who are you?

E:  Your guardian angel. 

S:  Yeah, right. You don’t look like an angel.

E:  Yeah, well. Maybe I wasn’t always an angel. The transition takes a while. I’m workin’ on it. (She scratches her itchy feather patches.)

S:  So, angel…what do you want? I’m busy.

E:  Takes a big breath. I want to save you from the clutter of ego, self loathing, fear and a graceless existence. I want to lead you to the embrace of mercy and wisdom. Oh, man! That sounded like a heaping load of . . .

From on high.

C:  ESMERALDA!!!!!!!

E:  Sorry. Sorry. Here’s what I mean. I don’t think your problem is math or mother. I think your problem is you.

S:  How did you know about math? Who are you? Really?

E:  Leap of faith time, Sarah. I really am your guardian angel. I’ve been trying to get through to you. A lot of us have been ,but you just couldn’t hear because of all the clutter. So we decided maybe a visit was in order. So . . . It’s over, Sarah. You can’t con me. You can’t con any of us. Level with me. Level with yourself.

S:  Oh, give me a break. Pause. E does not speak. Just looks at her. What? Pause. What!?  Pause. What?!  What do you want? Did my freaking mother hire you are something?! Pause as E just looks at her.  What!? What do you want me to say? That you’re freaking right! That I’m freaking terrified! Do you think I like being stupid! There she said it. Do you think I don’t know that I’m stupid! Pause as she softens just a tad. Do you know what it’s like to sit in that classroom and watch everyone except me get it. Even the really dumb freaking ones. Do you know what it’s like to start out by thinking that you’re normal. That you’ll open the book just like everyone else. That your pencil will fly across the pages as you come up with the answers. That the teacher will smile at you and your work. That she’ll have quiet talks with you about your talent and your future. That you’ll know the answers. That you won’t have to hide. Disappear. Talk trash. Start fights. Act bored. Act up just to hide the freaking fact that you’re useless. Stupid . . . just stupid.  Nothing. A  . . . nothing. Do you know what it’s like to go from hope to knowing that you don’t stand a freaking chance. There. Is that what you wanted to hear? Feel good, angel?

E:  Pause. I don’t like to see people in pain. No. But . . . if the pain comes not from cruelty but from looking at things that are hard to look at . . . things that have to change before we can move on . . . then maybe some temporary pain now . . . to stop what will end up being a huge and permanent pain  . . . might be worth it.

S:  What?

E:  If you keep changing who you are; if you harden your heart if it was meant to be gentle; if you make yourself brittle if you were meant to be soft; if you fill yourself with anger and let it grow and consume you; surely you will lose yourself. Do your best. Your talents will emerge. Don’t measure yourself against others. Don’t masquerade out of fear. Forgive yourself your failures and shortcomings – after all, God forgives you. Present your true spirit, regardless of how fragile and vulnerable it might be to the world.  Love yourself and others because of the eternal love given to you.

S:  Are you serious?

E:  Damn if I’m not.  C starts to scream at her from above but stays himself.

S:  You really are. Pause. How about if I promise to really think about it? How about if I promise to listen more for your voice? I mean it. I’ll . . . I’ll just try.

E:  I’ll take that. She freezes Sarah and goes to Colin and unfreezes him. She is a bit angry with Colin.

E:  Hey you.

Colin:  Yeah. Who are you?

E:  Her best friend. Listen to me. Were you gonna hit on her because you wanted to, because you thought you could, or because you thought you should? Do you fell good knowing that you’re taking advantage of a fragile spirit? Does it make you feel like a man, like a tough guy to work a con like that?

Colin:  What are you talking about? We’ve been friends forever. We tell each other everything. I wouldn’t do that to her. I wouldn’t do that to anyone. Who are you anyway? Who do you think you are accusing me of all that trash?

E:  Pause. She starts to babble a bit. Oh, sorry, sorry. I got carried away. I’m kinda new at this. Actually this if my first visit. I wasn’t even supposed to make contact with you. I just got carried away.

Cummings, who has been watching from above as E digs herself a hole, speaks to her gently with a smile.

Cummings:  Ask him about the books, Esmeralda.

E:  What are those books you have?

Colin:  Oh. Some used math books I found in a store. I’ve been trying to think of ways to help Sarah.  She’s not stupid, you know. She’s just beaten herself up so badly she kinda doesn’t know which way is up.  What did you mean when you said this was your first visit? 

E:  Nothing. Nothing. I’m uh . . . from the South. You really are a good person, you know.

Colin:  Nothing special. I just . . . you know . . . I want to help.

E:  Yeah, I know. Be prepared for itchy shoulders.

Colin:  What?

E:  Nothing. Nothing. Listen. Really nice meeting you. Take care. Keep on the path. She freezes Colin and twirls back to Cummings.

E:  Hey, Cummings.

Cummings:  Hello Esmeralda. What did you learn? How did you do? 

E:  I learned that there’s only so much we guardian angels can do. They’re responsible for so much themselves, human beings. It’s scary. All we can do is point and suggest and . . . I guess . . . pray. I did feel a shifting in Sarah, Cummings. I really did.

C:  You have a good voice, Esmeralda. By the way, how’s the itching?

E:  OMG!! Sorry, sorry. The itching has stopped! It’s gone.

C:  Yes, Esmeralda. You’ve got a fine set of baby wings. You did a good job down there. Thank you.  God is pleased.

 

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2010 Sermons

Pentecost 21 October 17, 2010

Genesis 32:22-31                                                                               

2 Timothy 3:14-4:5                                                             

Luke 18:1-8

 Jesus told them a parable about their need to pray always and not to lose heart. – Luke 18:1

So we’re talking about persistence this morning – persistence, commitment, a life grounded in hope and in ultimate trust in God. And while Jesus is talking specifically about prayer, in a real sense all life is prayer (or should be); so we’re talking about life, the character of life lived in discipleship with Jesus.

There are two brothers, sons of a Marine officer: The elder has followed in his father’s footsteps, a high school athlete, a family man, a major in the Marines leading combat missions in Afghanistan, about to return for another tour of duty. The younger is just getting out of prison, where he’s served time for a botched bank hold-up. He’s a drunk, a ne’er do well . . . all the rest. The father has no time for the younger son. “You know what your problem is?” he berates him. “You’re a quitter. The moment things get tough, you check out.”

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Pentecost 20 October 10, 2010

2 Kings 5:1-3, 7-15c

Luke 17:11-19

 

Friday afternoon we had a training session for our two new young acolytes, Alex Goulet and Anna Ishak, and Alex cracked one of the pillar candles at the altar. It was loose on its holder and he tipped it too far and it fell on the floor. Now what does that have to do with the readings for today? Everything.

You see, the readings are linked by the fact that each has to do with leprosy. Leprosy is mentioned again and again in the Bible, both the Old and New Testaments. It’s not to be confused with Hansen’s disease, which is the name for a medical condition, a bacterial infection now readily treated with antibiotics, that causes blotchy skin and disfigurement. In biblical times leprosy covered a wide range of ailments that had in common symtoms that made the skin discolored, scarred or imperfect. Biblical people thought that these imperfections were connected to moral imperfections. So people with “leprosy” were unfit to worship God and unfit for human society. They were outcasts.

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Pentecost 19/St Francis Day October 3, 2010

Genesis 2:4-10, 15-20a                                                     

Galatians 6:14-18                                                                

Matthew 11:25-30                                                             

 This homily was preached at the Eucharist following the blessing of animals for St. Francis Day. The lections are chosen with reference to that occasion.

So here is the title of a new book which caught my eye: Some We Love [these words superimposed on the silhouette of a cute Labrador puppy], Some We Hate [the silhouette of a rat], and (the punch line) Some We Eat [the silhouette of a pig]. The subtitle of the book, which I haven’t read but intend to, is Why It’s So Hard to Think Straight About Animals.*

Last Sunday we tried to bring some straight thinking to one of the concerns of St. Francis of Assisi, the poor and the outcast. Today we turn our attention to another of his concerns, animals and the environment. If we just blessed pets – the animals we love and on which we lavish billions of dollars in care each year – we would be sentimentalizing what St. Francis stands for. As people who try to bring moral judgment to our lives, we need to go more deeply.

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Pentecost 18 September 26, 2010

Amos 6:1a, 4-7                                                                    

1 Timothy 6:6-19                                                                

Luke 16:19-31

 

Once upon a time there was a young man, the son of a prosperous merchant. He had a love for good times, rich friends, music, partying, and fashionable clothing. One day he was selling cloth in the marketplace for his father when a beggar came by, asking for alms. Finishing his business deal, the young man ran after the beggar, emptying his pockets and giving the beggar all that he had. His friends mocked him for his charity; his father was enraged.

He sought glory on the battlefield, but without success, captured and imprisoned for a year. He suffered a serious illness. He began to spend time alone, wandering in the countryside, praying in abandoned churches. He took to nursing lepers who were shunned by others in society. One day in the marketplace, in a showdown with his father, he stripped off all his rich clothes, renounced his patrimony, and declared his dedication to the poor.

You will have guessed, perhaps, whom I’m talking about: St. Francis of Assisi.

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