peter learns that if you always do what you've always done...

When I was a young preacher back in Michigan and Ohio, I went through a phase of LOVING the liturgical songs of John Michael Talbot. He was once a Midwest rock’n’roller who gave up that dissolute life for the rigors of a Franciscan monastery. He still played the guitar, but now his music was all about welcoming others into a life of prayer and service. One of his song cycles was shaped by the “I AM” statements of Jesus: I am the light of the world, I am the bread of life, I am the resurrection and four others. I’ll say a word about these I AM confessions in a moment as they’re central to the insights of St. John’s gospel, but for now let me simply note that Talbot’s tunes became my prayers for a few years. They’re very easy to sing and helped me memorize portions of scripture. One of my favorites goes like this:

I am the bread of life – all who eat this bread shall never die.
I am God’s love revealed – I am broken that… you may be healed.

Simple, gentle melodies saturated in Scripture, yes? As both time and I ripened, my way of prayer-ing changed and I put John’s songs away. I now value the deeper wisdom of silence but from time to time still find myself singing some of his choruses: they ground me in the gentleness of grace, they open my heart when I’m feeling alienated, and they lure me towards the paradox of Christ’s love that takes me deeper within so that I might be more compassionate and real in public.

I am the bread of life – all who eat this bread shall never die.
I am God’s loved revealed – I am broken that… you may be healed.

That couplet synthesizes what I call sensual sacramental spirituality: seeing the obvious or pre-senting truth while trusting that just below the surface exists a deeper insight or blessing. Sr. Joan Chittister suggests that sensual sacramental spirituality can see the “eagle within the egg and knows that there is a spiritual child waiting to be born again within every adult.”

+ The classic definition of a sacrament is an outward and visible sign of an inward and spiritual grace: our tradition sees only two sacraments – baptism and eucharist – while our Catholic and Orthodox sisters and brothers name seven including baptism, eucharist, confirmation of baptism, confession, last rites, marriage, and holy orders. These older spiritual traditions consciously claim the symbolic patterns in Scripture and ordinary life and carefully construct words to help believers connect their experiences with the presence of the sacred. They even name three categories for the seven sacraments to reflect both the Blessed Three-in-One nature of God as Trinity as well as the sacred rest of the Sabbath that comes after God created the heavens and the earth in six days and rested upon the seventh.

+ As you may have already guessed, my evolving spirituality tends to trust the older tradition’s broad inclusivity of seven sacraments as superior to our paltry two – but I don’t think even that tradition goes far enough. No, sensual sacramental spirituality must be wildly more generous so that we can begin to cherish the rhythm of God’s grace in all of creation, poetry, art, politics, sexuality – even the act of breathing.

A sacramental spirituality, for example, hears the sacred in the songs that ring true in culture: Ten years ago, Lady Gaga’s monster hit, Born This Way, treated sexuality in a sacramental way when she sang:

My mama told me when I was young, "We are all born superstars"

She rolled my hair and put my lipstick on in the glass of her boudoir

"There's nothing wrong with loving who you are ‘

cause God made you perfect, babe

So hold your head up, girl, and you'll go far and listen to me when I say:

You’re on the right track, baby, you were born this way.

No matter gay, straight, or bi', lesbian, transgender life

I'm on the right track, baby, I was born to survive

No matter Black, white or beige, chola, or Orient' made

I'm on the right track, baby, I was born to be brave

I'm beautiful in my way 'cause God makes no mistakes

I'm on the right track, baby, I was born this way

Don't hide yourself in regret, just love yourself, and you're set

You’re on the right track, baby, you were born this way, yeah

I hear Ms. Gaga unpacking a core blessing from our creation stories in Genesis 1 where God pauses, looks at all that has been created and says: ooh this is good – very, very good – and takes a rest on the seventh day and called it a Sabbath. Gaga doesn’t overtly use Biblical language, but the mess-age is the same. I tested my working hypothesis of God’s still speaking nature again this week by randomly looking at the Top Ten songs only to find Taylor Swift channeling St. Paul in Romans 7 as she sings: “Anti-Hero.”

I have this thing where I get older but just never wiser 

midnights become my afternoons

When my depression works the graveyard shift

All the people I've ghosted stand there in the room

I should not be left to my own devices they come with prices and vices

I end up in crisis (tale as old as time) - 

I wake up screaming fromdreaming

One day I'll watch as you're leaving cuz you got tired of my scheming

It's me, hi, I'm the problem, it's me at teatime, everybody agrees

I'll stare directly at the sun but never in the mirror

It’s so exhausting always being for

 the anti-hero

Practitioners of a sensual sacramental spirituality celebrate the way Ms. Swift
reframes St. Paul in Romans 7:

Maybe this is your experience? I’m full of myself… but what I don’t understand about is why I decide to act one way, but then act another, doing things I absolutely despise. If I can’t be trusted to figure out what is best for myself and do it, it’s obvious that God’s love is necessary…. But even when I know that love is real in my head, I still can’t keep trusting it for the power of sin keeps sabotaging my best intentions. I realize that I don’t have what it takes: I can will it, but I can’t do it. I decide to do good and not to do bad, but then I do it anyway. And it happens so regularly that it’s predictable.

Our tradition used to celebrate a still speaking God; that’s our 21st century paraphrase of what the Reverend John Robinson’s said to those boarding the Mayflower in 1620: I am very confident the Lord hath more truth and light yet to break forth out of His holy Word. A sacramental spirituality searches for how God’s grace is being enfleshed within and among us. The ancient Celtic and Orthodox traditions speak of this as deification.

Our becoming ever more comfortable in our own skin and humanity in the spirit of Jesus. They reject, as do I, the notion that we were born into sin. They advocate original blessing rather than original sin: this path never denies human brokenness but insists that as we learn from our mis-takes we can grow in humility and wisdom just as God intended. This spirituality simultaneously re-jects sentimentality AND cynicism – with a long albeit it obscure legacy starting with St. Irenaeus in the 2nd CE, Pelagius in the 3rd, John Scotus Eriugena in the 8th CE, both St. Francis and St. Bonaventure said it in the 12th and 13th centuries respectively, George MacLeod of Iona in the 20th, and Cynthia Bourgeault, Matthew Fox, and Richard Rohr today. All claim that our faith starts with a loving God who creates ALL life – ourselves included – imbuing the totality of creation with a grace deep within. We can tarnish and reject our original blessing, we can ignore it and trash it, too but we can not destroy it. How did Thomas Merton put it?

At the center of our being is a point of nothingness which is untouched by sin and illusion, a point of pure truth, a point or spark which belongs entirely to God, which is never at our disposal, from which God disposes of our lives, which is inaccessible to the fantasies of our own mind or the brutalities of our own will. This little point of nothingness and absolute poverty is the pure glory of God in us. It is God’s name written in us. It’s like a pure diamond, blazing with the invisible light of heaven. It’s in everybody, and if we could see it we would see billions of points of light coming together in the face and blaze of a sun that would make all the darkness and cruelty of life vanish. I have no program for this realizing this. I only know it is real and shows me that the gate of heaven is everywhere.

+ Are you still with me? I know that’s a bit over the top and arcane; maybe I should have simply said sensual sacramental spirituality seeks grace in ALL things and trusts that love trumps karma always.

+ It’s an alternative orthodoxy – a generous orthodoxy – that posits acts of love over abstract doctrine; orthopraxis – right living – over orthodoxy – right belief. It’s how St. John talks about Jesus in the fourth gospel – sacramentally – noting that there are no parables of God’s kingdom in this gospel; rather, Jesus tells us HE is what kingdom living looks like: I am the bread of life, I am the resurrection, I am the way, the truth and life. Same for the deeds of Jesus. Fr. Raymond Brown, master scholar of St. John, writes that the so-called “signs” that Jesus shares have an obvious meaning as well as a deeper truth:

A figure today who could physically give the blind sight and restore to life the recently dead would be hailed not only medically but spiritually. John's Jesus has a totally different outlook. He does supply earthly bread to a crowd that hungers; but that’s not the real marvel, for they will hunger again and so are not permanently better. The real marvel is that Jesus can give a bread from heaven that obviates spiritual hunger. Likewise Jesus gives a blind man sight, but such a gift simply makes the man no more disadvantaged than the rest of humanity that has sight but can-not see God. The real marvel is that Jesus as the light come into the world can lead the blind man to a believing sight that will enable him to see God wherever he looks. Jesus restores physical life to Lazarus, too but does that make Lazarus better off than he was before he died? The real marvel is not simply that Jesus can restore the dead to life but that he can give a life impervious to death. Lazarus comes forth from the tomb in his burial garments because he will need them again when he dies a second time. His being raised is a sign pointing to the resurrection of Jesus who will leave his burial garments behind in the tomb, never to be needed again.

Like I said at the outset: sensual sacramental spirituality sees creation as
saturated in grace whether we have eyes to see or not. One of the blessings of the life, death, resurrection, and ascension of Je-sus is that Jesus gives shape and form to what grace looks like. That’s why I’ve come to see Jesus himself as a sacrament – and this is crucial for today’s text about Peter’s betrayal becoming a portal away from shame and into a new and more consistent compassion. If you know Peter’s story, you see how incrementally he becomes more of his best self after encountering the love of God made flesh in the resurrected Christ.

+ We meet Peter as a hard-working fisherman: what the text DOESN’T tell us, but what would have been widely know back in the day, is that under the bootheel of Roman occupation, most of those occupied in the fishing industry essentially worked for the Empire. They were not quaint, craftspeople sharing their wares in a rustic setting. They were more like today’s farm workers laboring in the sun for corporate agribusiness. Small wonder Peter and Andrew drop everything to follow Jesus when the invitation is offered, right? They were escaping the rigors of feeding the occupying army of the Roman Empire.

+ Once Peter gives up his fishing nets to spend with Jesus before the Cross, he’s learning how to balance his enthusiasm with responsible accountability. Jesus gives him the nickname Petras, the Rock, because Peter gets carried away like a bolder crashing out of control down a mountainside.

You may recall that early on Peter discerns the unique charisms of Jesus and confesses him to be the Christ – the Anointed One – but in the next breath begs Jesus NOT to live into his ministry which prompts the Master to bark: Get thee behind me, Satan. Later, Peter awakens in a boat crossing the sea of Galilee and sees Jesus walking towards him on the water; in a fit of enthusiasm, he jumps ov-erboard only to sink when his faith fades. Get the picture: he’s up and down and all over the place.

The arc of Peter’s story throughout the gospels shows a passionate devotee who is hard headed and in need of discernment – a reality that plays itself out in spades when, at the Last Supper, Peter first argues with Jesus about getting his feet washed then begs to be washed all over before prom-ising NEVER to leave Jesus only to deny him three times in betrayal hours later. Peter flees the scene in fear and shame – and at least in St. John’s iteration returns to his old ways as a fisherman again.

And right THERE is a key clue about why living sacramentally matters: Left to his own de-vices, Peter returns to his old ways. Now play that out with me, ok? I know people who fall off the wagon and return to their old addictions when overwhelmed by fear or shame. I know good souls who crash and burn when their expectations of what a lover should be goes up in smoke. I know precious people trapped in grief after losing a loved parent, spouse, sib-ling, or friend. So, this aspect of the story is not JUST about Peter’s collapse: it’s a paradigm for what often happens when we can no longer see the eagle within the egg. When life’s pain pushes us back into our old ways. How do my buddies in AA put it?

IF YOU ALWAYS DO WHAT YOU’VE ALWAYS DONE

YOU’LL ALWAYS GET WHAT YOU’VE ALWAYS GOT!

· Think of this within our body politic…

· Or in the life of our church…

Sacramental spirituality shows us that even our failures and wounds can serve a greater good IF we’re willing to be open to the love of God. That’s what the conclusion of today’s lesson is all about: after encouraging Peter to own his shame and his suffering – that’s what the three love questions are about – accountability for betrayal: three times Peter denies Jesus and three times Jesus pointedly asks: Peter, do you LOVE me? They say confession is good for the soul, but only if it helps us get off the dime of shame and into taking responsibility for our actions – which is precisely what happens next.

+ Jesus tells Peter: look, man, when you were young and impetuous, you lived for yourself and did what you wanted, when you wanted, however you wanted. But now that you are older – and more humble – it’s time you let someone else gird your loins and lead you into those places you do NOT want to go.

+ Sounds like therapy, yes? Could’ve been Carl Gustav Jung speaking: to become whole and deepen God’s love in your life you’re going to have to into those places, feelings, events, and activities that you do NOT want to explore.

Culturally, politically, socially, emotionally, and spiritually that’s where we are right now: trembling before those places we do NOT want to go into. Authentic racial and gender equality. REAL and consistent reproductive rights for all women not just those with enough money and clout. Partner-ing with Mother Nature to heal our precious earth. Finding a way through the blood and morass of political stagnation to come to terms with gun violence and our historic addiction to it. Need I go on? When we were younger, we did as we pleased and went where we wanted. But now, guided by love and accountability, we must let another lead us into those places we DON’T want to enter – but must.

It’s hard – it’s costly – and it will hurt. But the good news is that as Peter honored this call to let another lead him into a new way of being, he grew in courage and conviction. His story becomes much less brash after Easter: he shepherds his brothers and sisters with compassion rather than hu-bris. He reaches out beyond his prejudice and fear to welcome Gentiles into the fold. And at least apocryphally if not accurately, when Rome chose to put him to death by crucifixion, he insisted on being crucified upside down to symbolically show us he knew he wasn’t Christ’s equal but a servant of the Lord. If Peter can change, not perfectly but profoundly, so can we – and THAT is how the word becomes flesh in our generation. So, let those with ears to hear, hear.

check it out the small is holy video here: https://fb.watch/j_Dm4E4A-7/