epiphany 2020: gratitude for the liturgies that gives shape and form to my spirituality

There is a gentle snow falling with full, fat flakes on our part of the world right now. It fills me with a sense of stillness and gratitude. I adore days like these - especially when I don't have to go out and hustle about - worrying about whether another is driving too fast on roads that are too slick. But there are errands to attend, so out I will go. 

It is the Feast of the Epiphany in my Western Christian tradition - also Christmas Day for Eastern Orthodox believers. Once upon a time, I was in the former Soviet Union on this exact day, in the beautiful city that used to be called Leningrad (St. Petersburg.) It was snowing that day, too when we came upon a church whose choir was rehearsing for midnight mass. They welcomed our small band of visitors from the West into their presence like the Magi - with holy hospitality - sharing smiles, hugs, and songs as neither group could speak the other's language. And for a moment in time, nothing else mattered: the snow and candles sparkled, a capella voices mimicked the heavenly host, and something of the Christ Child was mysteriously revealed within and among us that night.

So often this is the way with the Christ Child shows up: unexpectedly in the oddest yet ordinary places. The collect for this feast hints at how we experience this mystery with language both simple and direct: "O God, by the leading of a star you manifested your only Son to the peoples of the earth: Lead us, who know you now by faith, to your presence, where we may see your glory face to face; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen." (BOCP, p. 214) 

Our prayer suggests there are clues, symbols, and signs in real life that beckon us to follow the star if we have eyes to see and hearts to trust. Such is the calling of those who, "live by faith rather than sight." We look for clues, we listen for songs, we take time to be still, we wander in the wilderness, we let ourselves be surprised one more time so we can taste and see the goodness of the Lord. And over the course of a lifetime, these small, mystical moments and clues add up so that we sense something of God's glory even as we await its fullness face to face.

St. Paul's confession that, "now we see as through a glass darkly; then we shall see face to face. Now I know only in part; then I will know fully even as I have been fully known" (I Corinthians 13: 12) holds multiple truths for us. From the time I was a small child till earlier today, I have known a multitude of epiphanies. Some have been life changing, causing me to return home by another path like the Magi (Matthew 2: 12). Others have been "aha" moments of delight when I suddenly glimpsed a piece of the bigger picture. While still others have shown up as brooding questions or agonizing mysteries totally beyond my comprehension that I have had to hold and ponder in my heart silently for years like the mother of Jesus (Luke 1: 19/51). Cumulatively they have become my answer to the question: Why do you continue to live by faith when so much of your religion is broken and even bad? My answer is because I have tasted the goodness of the Lord in small ways throughout my life - a song on the car radio that lifts me beyond my grief at just the right moment, a friend who sends me an email from out of nowhere and we start to repair a broken friendship, the waves of the ocean that draw me under then toss me back on the sand as a child as I start to sense the enormity of awe, my special needs dog looks up at me every morning with total trust, I help deliver each of my two daughters as God invites us into the sacred act of welcoming new life into the world, I collapse in tears of release during confession - and each of these small encounters nourish me more than I warrant or deserve. Like Bono used to say: grace trumps karma.

The grandfather of Western Comparative Religion, the late Huston Smith, used to say that the essence of his religious formation could be summed up as: "We are in good hands, in gratitude for this goodness it would be well if we bore one another's burdens." (For more on Smith go to: https://www.motherjones. com/politics/1997/11/world-religion-according-huston-smith/) In another conversation in the Buddhist periodical, Tricycle, Smith reminds us that every institution has a dark side. "Would you dispense with learning institutions because of the problems of the universities?" (https://tricycle.org/magazine
/spirituality-versus-religion/) Religion is organized spirituality. It gives shape, form, and content to our deepest values and most important truths. It abides long after our emotions have faded from memory. Smith adds:

Religion has preserved history’s greatest wisdom teachings. If the Buddha had not founded the sangha, the community of monks, the Four Noble Truths and the bodhisattva vow would have evaporated in a generation. If Jesus had not been followed by Saint Paul, who founded the Christian Church, the Sermon on the Mount would have been forgotten in a generation or two....Spirituality (alone) gives us a nice, warm feeling, but it doesn’t reach out to other people. When India had a horrendous earthquake three or four years ago, the San Francisco Chronicle listed ten organizations to which you could send contributions to help. Five of the ten were religious; “spirituality” wasn’t one of them. What’s not good for our culture is when spirituality elbows religion aside because it sees itself as superior and sees only the downside of organized religion. The upside is far greater. Robert Bellah, a retired professor from UC Berkeley and one of the most discerning sociologists I know, says that, without the support of churches, the civil-rights movement would never have succeeded. And without the opposition of mainline churches in the eighties, we would have had troops in Guatemala and El Salvador backing up the CIA and installing or defending corrupt dictators. (Water from A Deeper Well, The Sun Magazine interview with Huston Smith @ https://www.thesunmagazine.org/issues/322/water-from-a-deeper-well)

On this Epiphany it is clear to me that while my particular religious tradition is dying a natural death - and must do so without artificially prolonging its demise - the way of Jesus will continue. The preacher who was inspired by St. Paul to craft the New Testament book of Hebrews said: "Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, today, and forever." (Hebrews 13:8) Not that Jesus was static - or rigid - or ethically calcified. But, rather, that his small way of loving and sharing the core of God's grace remains throughout time - and beyond time. I still find great value in the liturgical organization of my wider Christian family. So today I rejoice that the liturgy helps me grasp what might otherwise remain obscure. Epiphany celebrates the mystery of how the Christ Child continues to be born in the most unlikely places. It asks me to be grateful that the blessings of God continue to be shared beyond tribe, race, creed, and culture. And it invites me to keep that sharing alive.