Why do we pray...

Not long ago someone at church asked me to pray for him: there are profound medical issues in his life and some complications in his personal life. I said I would pray. A few weeks earlier, a new friend was diagnosed with a cancer that is very complex and hard to treat; we have been praying for her and her family, too. And I have been thinking a great deal about prayer in my own life as I try to find my way through the woods with a loved one who is hurting and in trouble and alienated from my love.

So, why do we pray? Clearly, we pray for God's intervention - God's presence - God's healing. And sometimes we experience all of this and more, yes? In my first church, a man facing an operation to remove cancer from 2/3s of his face woke up right before surgery to discover that most of the cancer was gone. Cured. Totally absent! And I have been with countless souls who have come to a totally new life through sobriety and working the 12 Steps. As we like to say, clearly God has been present for life became manageable when we turned over control to our higher power.

But what about the times when there is no healing? When loved ones remain wounded and in the dark? When cancer doesn't go away? When the scars of abuse never heal over? When wars rage and fear reigns? Is God absent? Is it all a farce? An illusion? What does it mean that after Mother Teresa sensed her call to minister to the poorest of the poor in India she never again felt God's reassuring and comforting presence?

Well, if you read one of my favorite blogs, The Dude Abides (listed on the side) the God Girl aka Cathleen Falsani has a posting re: prayer in which she concluded with a note from C. S. Lewis who said, I don't pray for obvious results. "I pray because I can't help myself — the need flows out of me. It doesn't change God; it changes me." And so it is with me, too. Like St. Paul so clearly says in Romans 7, more often than not the good I want to do, I cannot do; while the evil I hate I find myself encouraging." I pray because I can't help myself - I need to be changed and God is the only one who can do it. This prayer from the Community of Iona (Scotland) really speaks to me:

You are the unseen guest at every table;

You are the unknown goal to which all strive;

You are the unnamed source of inspiration;

You are the untamed grace on which we thrive:

You are our Savior... and we are your people.

Welling up in the song of children,

Willing laughter in a friendly room,

Crossing paths coincidentally,

Smiling in the face of doom:

You are our Savior... and we are your people.

Taking time to weave tomorrow,

Taking care to mend today,

Taking thought where we are thoughtless,

Noting what we meant to pray:

You are our Savior... and we are your people.

For this, our gratitude. For you, our yes.

AMEN.

In remembrance of her.. and him... and all the rest

Because we are considering the importance of remembering today - in honor of Memorial Day, to be sure, but beyond it, too - I'm going to invite you to take some time to go deeper into each of the readings from the Community of Iona. They ask us to remember both some of the people we tend to forget in our tradition, and, some of the truths about ourselves we pretend don't exist. Let the music take you deeper into remembering these truths, too, because remembering is part of what it means to be spiritually faithful.

In this week's Christian Century magazine, Senior Editor James Wall notes that President Jimmy Carter's recent peace-making trip to the Middle East was so powerful not only because he insisted on speaking with all the players involved - Hammas as well Israel - but also because he remembers history and calls others to remember it as well. "Most Americans have forgotten," Wall observes, "if they ever knew, that 30 years ago, in a peace agreement with Egypt, Israel agreed to full autonomy for the occupied territories, and also agreed not to permit Jewish settlements there. These promises have been forgotten by Israel which continues to build and expand settlements in the West Bank. But Carter has not forgotten, and his memory may be a factor in the hostility towards him - a man who remembers prods the conscience of those who want to forget." (CC, May 20, 2008, p. 44)

Elsewhere in that same edition, German theologian, Jurgen Moltmann, reminds us that the current Pope, Benedict XVI, seems to have forgotten the historic commitments of Vatican II in his understanding of hope and God's grace. Where once the Church spoke of its "deep solidarity with the entire human family," Moltmann writes, now Benedict is mostly interested only with church insiders: in fact, he "limits Christian hope to the faithful and separates them from those in the world who have no hope." (p. 31) What is missing in this loss of memory he asks?

What is missing is the gospel of the kingdom of God, the gospel that Jesus himself proclaimed. What is missing is the message of the lordship of the risen Christ over the living and the dead and the entire cosmos that we find in the apostle Paul. What is missing is the resurrection of the body and the life of the world to come as it appears in the creeds. What is missing is the salvation of a groaning creation and the hope of a new earth where justice dwells. In short, what is missing is the hope of the all-encompassing promise of God who is coming... By limiting hope to the blessedness of souls in eternal life, Benedict also leaves out the prophetic promises of the Old Testament so that Christian hope becomes hard to differentiate from a Gnostic religion of salvation.

There is a great deal at stake when it comes to remembering and forgetting... so today we choose to remember. After the meditative readings - and the music - we'll talk about what all of this caused you to remember and why that matters.

FIRST READING: Disciples of Christ

Let us remember and celebrate twelve of Jesus’ disciples – people who were touched by him – and who shared his ministry of hope and compassion. Remember Mary, the girl from the country town, the poet and singer, who became pregnant with God, by God and for God’s sake. Remember Elizabeth, Mary’s older cousin, who shared Mary’s excitement, who born John the Baptist herself, who was friend and mentor of our Lord.

Remember Anna, the old widow and faithful believer who saw and eight-day old baby and recognized that the Messiah had come.

Remember Martha, the cook and housekeeper, the plain speaker, who gave Jesus her anger so that he could give her his love.

Remember Joanna, who with Susanna and many other women, provided the hospitality and resources for Christ’s ministry and were essential to the living gospel.

Remember Peter’s mother-in-law, who was so grateful to be healed that her first act after recovery was to serve Jesus a feast.

Remember the Samaritan woman whose conversation with Jesus was full of double entendres, but whose life was so changed by him that she became the first real evangelist.

Remember the Canaanite woman, who called Jesus on his racism and gave him a hard time, taking his exclusive language to task until he saw and admired the wisdom of her tough insights.

Remember the hemorrhaging woman who contaminated countless men in her struggle to touch Jesus who saw her faith as the root of her cure.

Remember the poor widowed woman, who, in giving the smallest coins to God, gave Jesus his model for generosity.

Remember the woman caught in adultery, who let Jesus show how the grace of God is greater than the moralizing of men. Remember her whose perfume filled a room with fragrance – a woman who did something beautiful for the Lord – and whose costliest gift to God was love.

SILENCE AND SONG

Won't you let me be your servant,

Let me be as Christ to you?

Pray that I may have the grace to

Let you be my servant, too.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vgWftNI-E3Y&feature=related

SECOND READING: I Will Not Always Be with You

He had never said that kind of thing before… You will not always have me. He had warned us about Jerusalem, about going up to the city, about how he would be hounded and rounded up… and other things which we did not want to hear. But this was Bethany! You will not always have me.

Who did he say it to? That was the problem. We could not all see, the room was crowded, and other people were talking. IT was not as if time stood still and everyone froze to watch the action. No, no, James and John were arguing – as ever – a woman with a demented daughter was screaming for attention, Martha was shouting for help in the kitchen and somebody who was allergic to olives was vomiting in the corner… No, you will not always have me.

Some of us thought he said it to Mary. There had been talk… well, there was always talk… She doted on him, hung on his every word. So maybe it was his way of telling her to back off, to put clear limits on their relationship, to say, “That’s enough, Magdalene, there are others you should attend to. I’ve got more to do than be feted by you…” You will not always have me.

But more of us thought he was talking to Judas. For Judas was a rat. He was the kind of guy who was so smug that it made you suspicious. You know the kind of person who is always saying the church isn’t doing enough for the poor but who would never put a penny into the begging bowl? That was Judas.

He was our treasurer. He always complained that we didn’t have enough money. He suggested one day that if Jesus cured somebody, we should ask for a donation. And he would have pilfered every penny if Matthew hadn’t kept an eye on him.

So we thought it was him that Jesus was talking to… telling him that there were plenty of opportunities to exercise his concern for the poor… if only he would take them. Or was he, in his own way, telling Judas that he knew what he was up to – and that both their days were numbered? You will not always have me.

Or was he speaking to us – to all of us – was he giving us a last chance to say or to show whether we loved him? And maybe that’s what made us jealous of Mary… she always showed that she cared and the rest of us presumed we didn’t need to tell him. I remember thinking: if my mother was dying, I’d give her all the time I could, I would take her a red rose and tell her that I loved her. I would read her the psalms she wanted to hear and sing the songs she had taught me as a child. And here – with Jesus making clear he was soon to leave us – what did we give him? What did we tell him? Why did we hold back? You will not always have me…

SILENCE AND SONG

Like a mother who has borne us, held us close in her delight,

Fed us freely from her body: God has called us into life.

Like a father who has taught us, grasped our hand and been our guide,

Lifted us and healed our sorrows: God has walked with us in life.

Though as children we have wandered, placed our trust in power and might,

Left behind our brothers, sisters: God still calls us into life.

CONVERSATION AND SONG: What Kind of World Do You Want?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K-kpR32B-Uk

Anticipating Memorial Day 2008

This year another 4,000+ US soldiers have died and will be remembered on Memorial Day - or not. Americans, you see, rarely bring honor and solemnity to this holiday any more: we drink beer, crank up the grill, mark the start of summer and visit family. All of which is good - maybe even blessed - but it has nothing to do with Memorial Day. Politicians, of course, will try to lay claim to this day but they usually come off as the pandering buffoons they are and we are the worse off for their words. I think the poet, Longfellow, rather got it right when we wrote:

Sleep, comrades, sleep and rest on this Field of the Grounded Arms, where foes no more molest, nor sentry's shot alarms!

Ye have slept on the ground before,

And started to your feet at the cannon's sudden roar,

Or the drum's redoubling beat.

But in this camp of Death no sound your slumber breaks;

Here is no fevered breath, no wound that bleeds and aches.

All is repose and peace, untrampled lies the sod;

The shouts of battle cease, it is the Truce of God!

Rest, comrades, rest and sleep!

The thoughts of men shall be as sentinels to keep

Your rest from danger free.

Your silent tents of green we deck with fragrant flowers;

Yours has the suffering been, The memory shall be ours.

But we no longer remember for we cherish social amnesia. The way I understand it, this national holiday began during the American Civil War when the grieving women of the South went to decorate the graves of their fallen dead. After the war, freed Black slaves honored the graves of Union soldiers until 1868 when General John Logan encouraged folk to decorate the graves of ALL soldiers - from the North and the South - as a sign of honor and remembrance. After WWI the holiday of Decoration Day had taken root and whole communities gathered in quiet dignity to bring flowers and flags, prayers and poems to local graveyards where their military dead had been laid to rest.

Today all that is lost. As Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young sang after the deaths at Kent State, we no longer know what it means to "find the cost of freedom." We have been forbidden to see the bodies returning home. We have been distracted from the agony of Iraqi deaths and injuries and have been lied to by leaders with no shame and even less understanding of the morass they have created. Sadly, most Americans are more upset by $4 a gallon gasoline than their 4,000 dead.

So it will be left to the mothers and fathers, sisters and brothers and lovers of the most recent military dead to count the cost - and remember. They will recall that their loved ones died in a war that most of us knew was not needed. They died serving God and country - mostly with dignity - and often with great courage. And they died understanding that they were part of an ugly disaster with no clear short-term objectives and absolutely no hope of long term success. They will remember because most of us are too busy, too ashamed or too distracted to consider the cost of freedom.

It makes me think of the guys (mostly men) from my last church in Tucson who had been former military officers in Vietnam (and a few of the infantry grunts, too.) They wept on Memorial Day. The spoke to me of losing loved ones and strangers in combat. They told me how much they hated war and would do anything in the power to keep it from happening again. And they made it clear that freedom and hope are never abstractions for them, but always realities filled with the real blood of people they knew and lost. And then there were the Desert Storm vets - and a few who had deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan - who told me similar stories and wept similar tears. These women and men have blessed me - and all of us - and I give thanks to God our paths once crossed for they have helped me reclaim Memorial Days as a time of sober remembrance.

The poet, Rudi Raab, once wrote:

We are the children of the holocaust.

We are both germans and jews

We are the children of the victims

We are the children of the oppressors

We started out on opposite sides

But the memory of the holocaust will join us forever

We shall never let the victims be forgotten

For if we do, we will forget that the perpetrator

Can be in all of us.

Take a listen to David Gilmore (of Pink Floyd fame) and David Crosby and Graham Nash singing their old prayer, "Find the Cost of Freedom." It will help you remember and makes it all real... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U-Y0SMitMpk

Come on up for the risin'

I weep a lot - like Arnold in the movie Twins or some old guy at church who had a stroke - I have stopped trying to keep the tears back. I used to fight them and really struggle to keep them back, but now I just let them flow. A beautiful flower, a laugh with a small child, an episode of West Wing, a kiss from a loved one, a poem, a song, a movie... it doesn't matter: the flood gates open and I am filled to overflowing with emotion. Frederick Buechner once wrote: That's what sin really is - you know - not being full of joy. Tell the people that their sin is forgiven because whether we know it or not, that's what we want more than anything else... In fact, preacher, that's your job: what on earth do you think you were ordained for?

I wept tonight watching Barack Obama - no apologies and no regrets - I wept: who could have imagined that in the United States of America a BLACK man could be so close to winning the nomination for the Presidency?!? Not me. I still recall watching Dr. King as a small child during the March on Washington. I still remember April 4th 1968 sitting in my church hall (practicing for our 200th church anniversary) when a member of my youth group - and I was the youth group president - said to me: I hope you are happy now... cuz now your nigger has been shot! I still live with the memory of Robert Kennedy's assassination a few months later... and the reaction of Nixon's silent majority and all the rest. I still recall like it was yesterday being with Cesar Chavez in the early 70s and fighting the good fight (Obama's victory cry, YES WE CAN, is the English version of the Farm Workers chant on the picket line: SI SE PUEDE!) So I weep... tears of joy, tears of rage (thank you, brother Dylan), tears of hope and tears of prayer like Jesus weeping for his friend Lazarus.

I give thanks to God tonight for tears - they are truly a way of praying sighs too deep for human words - and one of the songs that always makes me cry is Springsteen's "The Rising." I love it in every version of this song and have sung it with a full rock band and in a simple gospel acoustic setting... but this one is particularly haunting. Not bold, not in your face, just tender and sad, hopeful and heroic in the the best sense of the word, all at the same time. Check it out:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_jJyZuMH51I

And that's how I feel at this moment in life: it is a sad, joyful, hopeful and heroic moment that could help us all move towards common ground, or, greater fear and polarization. I say, "Come on up for the rising'!"

IMAGES FROM: 1) Chris L. Peterson; 2)http://www.stealthunit.net/message.aspx?intBoardID=3&intMessageID=367059 3) www.afreeman.org/.../03/bruce_springsteen.jpg

An ordinary life with extraordinary awareness and commitment

One of my favorite writers, Joan Chittister, has noted on more than one ocaision that at the heart of her spirituality is a commitment to live an ordinary life with extraordinary awareness and commitment. "As the Zen masters teach," she writes in her The Rule of Benedict: Insights for the Ages: One day a new disciple came up to the master Joshu. "I have just entered the brotherhood," the disciple said, "and I am anxious to learn the first principle of Zen. Will you please teach it to me?" So Joshu said, "Have you eaten your supper?" to which the novice answered, "Yes, I have eaten." So Joshu said, "Then go and wash your bowl." (Makes me think of Leonard Cohen going to the Zendo in LA only to be told to wash his dishes; it scared the crap out of him and he ran away and didn't go back for a few years. And when he did, the Roshi told him to quit the crap and become his cook - which he did for a few years - and then came down the mountain with a bunch of great new songs. Listen to his song, "The Future"http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_drEFOaPaK8&feature=related)

And so another day in ministry comes and goes filled with simple blessings. It started with a 45 minute morning drive through the countryside to sit with a father wrestling with the Byzantine realities of family court as he tries to maintain joint custody of his young daughter. Some times all you can do is show up, yes? And maybe listen and try to share the grief, fear, hope and uncertainty of the moment. After a few hours of waiting and just being present, however, nothing happened except another hearing date was set so we drove away which meant that I got to have another 45 minute return trip through the countryside before preparing for a potluck feast with my film/faith discussion group.

It was so much fun - and the food was so incredible - that it was hard to believe that it wasn't planned: our only commitment was to bring a picture that showed a small sign of hope and some food we loved to share. We had pasta with pesto, strawberry shortcake, decadent chocolate delights, hummus, corn salsa, bratwurst, wine and tons of good bread and laughter.

What stories this group of former strangers shared: stories of faith, hope and love - stories of doubt and pain - stories of real life in war and peace. We began this group 4 months ago watching the movie, Chocolat, during Lent and nobody wanted to quit when Easter came. So we watched Babette's Feast and Shawshank Redemption and met to talk about how small choices can change the world. Now, after Memorial Day, we'll meet again in June to watch and discuss the Chronicles of Narnia. Even the group's pictures were powerful and nourishing: lovers holding hands, grandchildren, lilacs, blooming trees, the first picture of Mother Earth sent back by the astronauts, a street sign encouraging laughter. And just to totally surprise me, my dear wife got us a gonga deal for the holiday weekend in a place we've always wanted to visit - thank God for Priceline.com, yes? All very little things but all filled with blessings: sitting with an anxious man, breaking bread and laughing, sharing photographs and quiet time with a lover. Take nothing for granted, yes? To be sure, these small joys do not diminish the horror, shock and awe of cyclones and 78,000 dead or earthquakes in China. For these I grieve in bewilderment, and, at the same time pray Psalm 131: O Lord my heart is not proud: my eyes are not raised too high. I do not occupy myself with matters too great for me or with marvels that are beyond me. For I have stilled and made quiet my soul, like a weaned child nestling to its mother, so like a child my soul is quieted within me. Trust in the Lord from this time forth and forever.

Sheena is a punk rocker...

So I've been watching a documentary on the Ramones - who when they first came out I HATED but have since come to appreciate - and it gave me a whole weird sense of time and perspective. When the Ramone's burst on the scene I was living in San Francisco - in the Haight - as a very earnest young man with a very young family. I had just left the United Farm Workers Union (for ideological reasons - which is to say because Cesar was acting crazy) and was finishing my undergraduate work at San Francisco State University. My degree was in Political Philosophy and my thesis had to do with violence and nonviolence. Shortly after leaving the city of love I was in seminary in NYC pursuing a commitment to urban ministry, peace and justice and being a good, earnest young white boy.

But I had opted out of much of popular music in the 70s - too vapid for me - and was listening to James Taylor/Cat Stevens (finger picking and blues) and lots of roots music (especially Dave Von Ronk and Mississippi John Hurt - more finger picking.) In fact, I was trying to opt out of a lot of the 70s (which was short sighted in some ways, but still true.) My first baby was born in LA (at home with hippies) and then we were off to a little studio apartment on Haight Street and exploring the inner world. When the Ramones hit, my gay next door neighbor and I used to joke that we could not tell whether they were "white punks on dope" or "white dopes on punk!" The Sex Pistols played the Fillmore and it all sounded like noise. To be sure, Talking Heads grabbed me - as did "Darkness on the Edge of Town" - but the rest did not register.

Jump ahead 30 years and I am the Senior Minister of a significant church in Tucson, AZ and I am having dinner with a family interested in membership. They have two children and as mom is serving up a home cooked meal she tells me, "I came alive when I heard the Ramones!" It seems that she and her husband played in a Kiss cover band, they toured with Alice Cooper and worked as roadies with Kiss in Japan. What's more, the lead guitarist in my church band was a big Kiss fan. Now about three years before this dinner, I had been hanging with a local bar band, the Rowdies, and building a friendship with their guitarist, Chris, and one of their HOT songs was a Ramones medley: I Wanna Be Sedated/Beat on the Brat. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wMD7Ezp3gWc)

It brought me back in touch with the Ramones' energy and what they were REALLY trying to do back in the middle 70s. And just as I was trying to opt out of the plastic bullshit of the era, so were they: I was going inward and mellow and they were going crazy and loud. But it was the same protest against the horrible malaise of the era. (Think Bee Gees or "making love in my Chevy van!") So I have come to love the Ramones - and all their punk friends from Television to Richard Hell and the Voidoids - and while I don't often play their music... they touch my heart and soul.

In fact, I think they were one of the voices of the Living God in that era pleading with young people not to sell out their souls. They nailed the spirit of the age when they sang: "24, 24 hours ago, I want to be sedated, nothin' to do and no place to go, I want to be sedated!" In their own weird way they sound like the prophet Isaiah to me: "Your new moons and your appointed feasts my soul hates; they have become a burden to me and I am weary of bearing them... wash yourselves clean, remove the evil of your doings from before my eyes, cease to do evil, learn to do good, seek justice, rescue the oppressed, defend the orphan and plead for the widow." They were screaming against not only boredom but being co opted of meaning, hope and life with passion.

Me, too! And interestingly I find U2 and Springsteen taking up the hopeful side of this quest. Ani De Franco, Sarah McClaughlin and others, too. Not with the nihilism of the Ramones and so much of the punksters - who all burned out or sold out - but with a modest sense of speaking truth to power... and I'm still playing "I wanna be sedated!"

If you want to kiss the sky better learn how to kneel...

Tonight our acoustic music (mostly) band played during the Third Thursday street fair in Pittsfield. We added some new tunes - "Mysterious Ways" and "Beautiful Day" - shared some of our favorites - "Slip Slidin' Away" and "One of Us" - and had a ball singing "Let It Be," "Isn't It a Pity," "Changes Come" and "Anthem." My two vocalists, who also play drums and recorder (and a little keyboard, too) are excellent musicians - they sing like angels - and can harmonize with one another like they were sisters. And while we are still finding our groove, there is a sort of Cowboy Junkies feel to many of our arrangements - slow, plaintive, slightly edgy with a sensual beauty - that feels very cool.

(check it out: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BHRFZFmEq9o)

In our candle lit sanctuary we sang songs of faith through the experience of contemporary secular music. I am especially loving "Falling Slowly" by the Swell Season and our very funky and sensual take on U2's "Mysterious Ways." That line: "to touch is to heal, to hurt is to steal if you want to kiss the sky better learn how to kneel (on your knees boy!)" sounds like an affirmation of faith to my rock'n'roll ears. Better than many creeds and a whole lot easier to comprehend. And the other - "you have suffered enough and warred with yourself its time that you won: take this sinking boat and point it home we've still got time" - should be required listening for every preacher in every seminary. Life is hard enough without all our guilt and confusion making it worse! (end of sermon) The quiet sensual pathos of "Falling Slowly" continues to be a prayer of solidarity for me. And then to play with Paul Simon's, "Slip Slidin' Away" - with that line about God's ways being unavailable to the mortal man..." - is just too much fun. And so another day comes to an end and I rejoice in the music and the friends who make it all possible.

A sacred conversation begins...

Today throughout the United Church of Christ, our parent denomination, a sacred conversation about race relations is beginning: it is the start of what many hope will be a loving leaven within the soul of America to help us rise again into a that beloved community of conscience and compassion Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. once celebrated so eloquently. It is the start – not a onetime event – but the start of what we hope will be a long and loving look at what is real – good and bad – about race relations in 21st century America. And it is intended as an act of embodied prayer that could, with the Lord’s blessing, advance the cause of healing and hope in our still too fractured and unequal homeland.

It is hard for me to believe, but it is true, that for the most part we white Americans have not seriously considered or wrestled with the legacy of racism in our beloved nation for over 40 years. Dr. King, you may remember, was gunned down on April 4, 1968 – and after a profound outpouring of anger and grief – serious progress in the realm of race ended. Think about that: 40 years… of wandering in the wilderness. 40 years of injustice and inequality festering just below the surface in ghettoes and middle class neighborhoods of color; 40 years of denial by the silent majority who suddenly rise up – with the help of talk radio and right wing cable news companies – to act terrified and morally outraged when a black preacher from Chicago speaks truth to power in the midst of a political campaign.

40 years – sounds almost biblical doesn’t it? Which may have something to do with the timing of this conversation: it is time we came in from the desert – it’s time we exchanged the old ways of moral obfuscation for some days of radical investigation into the realities of why we are still so divided, afraid and angry with one another. In 1963, Martin noted with penetrating clarity that:

When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir. This note was a promise that all men, yes, black men as well as white men, would be guaranteed the unalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. (Today we would be remiss if we didn’t also add women of every race, color and creed, too, amen?) And yet it is obvious today that America has defaulted on this promissory note insofar as her citizens of color are concerned. Instead of honoring this sacred obligation, America has given the Negro people a bad check; a check which has come back marked "insufficient funds." But we refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt. We refuse to believe that there are insufficient funds in the great vaults of opportunity of this nation. So we have come to cash this check- a check that will give us upon demand the riches of freedom and the security of justice.

And that reality has not been overcome. To be sure, segregated water fountains and lunch counters have been eliminated – amen – and true progress has been made in some areas of education and economic opportunity – amen and amen! What’s more, each younger generation since 1968 has deepened their commitment to social and racial equality in ways that are healing and hopeful.

And yet – and when it comes to race in America there is always and yet – and yet it would be an ugly and pathological delusion to “believe that we have made significant progress in addressing and reversing the alarming divisions” in our land. Our national church leaders put it like this in their Pastoral Letter on Racism in America (copies of which are available for you after worship):

We have witnessed a systematic assault on affirmative action policies at the state and national level. In the wake of our so-called “war on terror,” our Arab American and Muslim brothers and sisters contend daily with discrimination, racial profiling and misunderstanding about the true nature of Islam. As unemployment increases and jobs are outsourced overseas, frustration and rage are unleashed upon the most vulnerable within our borders – immigrants and those some call “illegal aliens.” After more than two years, thousands of dispossessed residents of New Orleans are still in Diaspora, awaiting our government’s promise to rebuild their homes and neighborhoods. The divide between rich and poor is greater than at any time since the Great Depression. Despite the rise of a Black middle class over the past 40 years, the average net worth of White families in 2008 remains 10 times greater than the average net worth of Black families. And racial segregation in our public schools has intensified and even been condoned by the United States Supreme Court.

And just to make matters worse, out of nowhere it seems there comes along a cocky, brilliant, charismatic, hard-hitting, soul-gripping, truth-telling, fact-stretching, fear-inducing African American preacher from Chicago by the name of Jeremiah Wright – edited and manipulated to evoke our worst fears and political nightmares I might add – and all hell breaks loose, beloved, because you can’t turn on your TV without seeing him rant and holler like a wild man.

Now I know Jeremiah – not well by any means and not intimately – but I have studied with him as the only white man in a group of ghetto pastors in Black Cleveland, in the midst of other young urban ministers trying to learn from a master of church building in Detroit and as a parishioner sitting at the feet of one of America’s most gifted preachers. And I can say without reservation that I respect and value the ministry and life-changing commitment to the poor and neglected that Dr. Wright has embodied for over 30 years at Trinity Church in Chicago. I have borrowed and made my own one of Jeremiah’s aphorisms: beloved, I know from experience that God can take a nobody and turn him into a somebody who can tell everybody that anybody can be made whole and pure through the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. And I have learned a lifetime of lessons from the music director of Dr. Wright’s church, the late Jeffrey Radford, who knew how to blend high European hymnody with down and dirty street music and sanctified Black gospel to created THE best blended and thoroughly integrated worship you could ever want to experience – black, white, Hispanic, Asian or Indian – and I mean EVER!

And yet – see what I mean – and yet sometimes the stridency and verve of Dr. Wright – and yes the arrogance as well as the very different social realities between a ghetto preacher and most middle class White Americans – can get in the way of our sacred conversation. It has become a distraction from our quest for the beloved community – and while it would be fruitful to explore and better understand the unique challenge of preaching hope and liberation in the Black Church – Jeremiah is not the issue: racism is.

So let’s take a moment to recall that while our churches may have been built on the back of racism in American – not exclusively, of course, and often simply because they were not sufficiently different from their culture – think of our Puritan forbearers and the Indians or even the Founding Fathers and their slave plantations – at the heart of God’s word is a different vision. Let me share three key texts with you that must take on renewed value if we are to reform our own lives and deepened our commitment to this sacred conversation.

Consider the creation stories of Genesis 1 and 2. Scholars Norman Gottwald and Laura Lagerquist-Gottwald note that: Genesis Two is a parabolic narrative about how earliest humans fell out of favor with God, while Genesis One is a liturgical declamation that places humans at the pinnacle of creation. And at least two insights are important for our living in light of our concerns about racism here: First: the biblical text – not some ideological editor – but the Bible tells us that in the beginning God created humankind. Not man but truly earthling – adam ha adamah – being made from the mud. And what does God do but create earth beings, male and female, formed in God’s own image.

Second: there is no racial division created in God’s image, is there? There is social and gender equality – adam ha adamah – but no black or white, Jew or Gentile, free or slave. This, you see, is where our old friend St. Paul gets his insight in Galatians 3 that in Christ Jesus, “…by faith you are all children of God…. There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus.”

Jesse Jackson put it like this: we may have all come to America in different kinds of ships, but we’re in the same boat now. And that’s the first insight from scripture: God’s vision is very different from our own. God did not create a Constitution that deemed people of African descent as merely three fifths human. God did not decree that we should build ghettoes and implement red-lining to keep people divided. And God did not call us ugly racial epithets that demean and degrade. Not at all, in the beginning God took the very basic salt of the earth and mud of the ground and formed it into adam ha adamah – male and female he created them in God’s image – and then blew the Holy Spirit into their nostrils so that they became nephesh chaya – earth beings filled with spirit and soul and God’s very life.

I believe a comparable testimony is at work in the gospel reading from St. Matthew – that scripture we know as the Great Commission – speaks to us of making disciples of all the nations. Now pay careful attention to this because what we see in this text foreshadows one of the blessings of the Christian Church: the ever expanding circles of hospitality and welcome into the covenant of God’s grace.

It may be obvious to you but the first circle of Christians to follow Jesus were Jews; yes, he expanded the circle to include women and those who were often ritually unclean, but still the promise was initially shared only with Jews. After the resurrection, however, there is a dramatic change and the territory to be welcomed into the covenant begins to expand:

In Matthew, written about 80 CE, Paul has already been at work for 50 years bringing non-Jews into the fold. Peter has also been doing some of this after his vision gave him permission to reach out to beyond the dietary codes of his tradition. So scholars tell us that what began with Jews in Jerusalem and Judea now includes all of Palestine, Transjordan, Syrophonecia and most likely Egypt. And let’s not forget that those touched by Paul had pushed the circle to Italy, Turkey, Greece and more – and soon there would be Christians sharing the grace of God with the Celts and Slavs well beyond the boundaries of Israel. I will never forget my awe as Dianne and I stood in the great English cathedral of St. Paul’s which marks the place where worshippers have been gathering since about 400 CE.

What Matthew’s words are telling us, therefore, is that Christ calls us to break down barriers – to go out into all the nations – and build communities of faith, hope and love. There were ugly divisions in the Lord’s day between Jew and Gentile, Jew and Samaritan to say nothing of the ethnic conflict between Celts and Slavs and those that continue to wreak havoc throughout the Middle East. And amidst all of this – a real racial and ethnic cornucopia – Jesus continues to tell us that the mark of an authentic disciple is that we “love one another as he has loved us.”

Jesus’ love does not look like a Crusade: it does not resemble the tumult of an empire’s occupation forces, it has nothing to do with holy wars and jihad, it is the polar opposite of the Long March into Indian reservations and calls internment camps for Japanese American a blasphemy. Rather the love of Jesus has to do with ordinary people putting a towel around their neck and washing one another’s feet so that we cleanse away the crap away that keeps us distracted, defiled and deformed.

Remember: we were formed – created – in God’s sacred image. Male and female we were created – black and white we were created – beyond rich and poor we were created… and so a new sacred conversation has begun. It is my prayer and intention to keep it alive within and among us, too.

Yes, I know today is the start of our capital campaign and we’re going to commission our leadership and kick things off upstairs in just a few minutes so we won’t have a time to talk about my observations today – but we will starting in June. Every Sunday in June I’m going to hold a sacred conversation circle of faith, hope and love after fellowship hour so that might listen and talk and hear one another’s hopes and fears about being a part of God’s beloved community of racial reconciliation. I’ll give you some reading and reflection material, too, so that we might stretch our hearts and minds. And I even think there’s some work we need to do here in Pittsfield – especially with our historic Black sister congregation Second Congo just down the road. More will be revealed to us, sisters and brothers, as we move forward and hold one another’s in the Lord’s sacred hands. But this much I know: the time has come to reclaim that vision that is deep in the Bible but also in the fabric of our hearts.

It is a vision where the descendants of former slaves and slave owners are able to sit down together at a feast table along with Native peoples and immigrant peoples and their descendents to share our hopes and dreams about life, death and community. It is a vision built upon grace and courage and even speaking truth to power in love. And it is a vision deeply rooted in all that we hold as sacred. Remembering with gratitude those who have gone before us and relying upon God’s healing spirit, let us covenant again to treat the wound of our people with the care that it deserves. My friend, and president of the United Church of Christ, John Thomas says:

In the midst of peril, these sacred conversation offer promise: for those of us who are White, neither the sins of our ancestors nor our own past failures to confront racism need mire us in guilt. For those of us who have suffered the ravages of racism, neither our rightful indignation nor our temptation to despair need keep us from trusting once again. We are each blessed by the abundant grace of a forgiving God, a God who knows our pain and will be present in our healing. Our call is to trust that reconciliation is possible, but can only be achieved by beginning the process together. As Christians, we profess and proclaim the outrageous conviction that nothing – absolutely nothing – can separate us from the love of God in Jesus Christ. Set free by that unconditional love, and emboldened by the faith of our sisters and brothers, we can find the courage to raise our voices for justice and to make American and the church all that they ought to be.

(NOTE: for a little musical treat you might enjoy listening to U2 sing with a gospel choir at

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-OCxE22DOac. And for something equally wild but in a different way, check out the boys from Dublin with the Boss: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JVdZ0Rdm8zI&feature=related)

The power of small choices

Today was a potpourri of fascinating small choices that I pray added up to more compassion in this part of the planet: I visited with a man struggling to be a good dad to his small child as well as a man struggling with a body that is broken but a spirit that is strong. I also ran into an old friend in ministry who supports my quest for the Spirit in art and made contact with associates in town working on the arts revival. What's more, our little band is now committed for another night of spiritual music on Thursday at 6 pm in our candle lit sanctuary.

At the close of the day, my small class in film and spirituality made a decision to meet next week for a little feast (is any feast little?) and to bring in a picture of a small act that shows where they find hope in their life. It will become a non-verbal testimony to the movement of God's gracious Spirit within and among us. Then we closed the evening with a segment from "The Shawshank Redemption" where Morgan Freeman leaves prison only to be reunited with his old friend, Tim Robbins, in a scene that looks and feels a lot like the Prodigal Son to me.

As one woman, whose loved one is experiencing the uncertainty of health chaos, said: you have to connect the little blessings to find God in days like these. Sounds like my boy Springsteen singing, "Reason to Believe."http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H-Nbxzmjr1k

O God of unchangeable power, on this day of so many tragedies,

show us again that you are within and among us as Creator, Christ

and Holy Spirit. Keep us firm in this faith that we may praise your name by growing in the spirit and practice of compassion. In Christ's name we pray. Amen.

The blessings of this day

As each day comes to a close, I try to find the blessings that have been shared with me - and the more I look the more abundant they become. The first was waking up to see a person I love dearly - and who loves me - what a treasure. The second was sharing the weekend with our wonderful daughter, Jesse, who lives in NYC and teaches city kids about religion, math, science and how to try to get along with one another - with a little bit of literature and fun thrown in, too. She is a treasure and always has been. She was up this weekend for Mother's Day (her fiancee was in NJ with his momma) and we just gobbled up her goodness.

Then there was worship with a GREAT congregation: we took in new members today and for our little community it was a big blessing to welcome new and creative people into the church. One young man visited with me the first week I was in town and was clearly looking for something new and challenging. As we embraced after the prayer of welcome he said, "Blessed things are starting to happen. Thanks be to God." We are beginning to get over the "survival" legacy and new folk are a clear sign that some thing new is at work within and among us.

Then our little musical band - which a lst grader has dubbed the "dynamic trio" after his favorite Batman and Robin - sang some lovely tunes and our organist played a Pentecost selection that was stunning (Pentecost is one of my favorite church celebrations and a GREAT opportunity for us to go deeper in prayer and study and service!) And when we came home from worship, our daughter had a host of special anniversary and Mother's Day gifts for us which wound up with a catfish and Cajun potato breakfast after reading the NY Times on the back porch. I tell you: life is sometimes so sweet I can't help but weep - or sing! (How do the Quakers put it: how can I keep from singing?!) Then a nap and more sunshine and springtime flowers and conversation - even some planning to get to a nephew's wedding (the son of my sister who died about this time 15 years ago.) And last night we heard that a young man we used to sing with in Tucson - the voice of Bono for us in Arizona - was present as his wife gave birth to their first son (whom I dreamt about all night!)

And now that everyone at home has gone or gone to bed, I am watching a gritty British BBC mystery and writing my blessings. Like the song we sang today put it: To you, YHWH I lift up my song, O my God. I have even heard from a fellow minister blogger in Canada who sent good words - and some good humor, too - about my Pentecost thoughts.

God is good and I am grateful. It is truly a "Beautiful Day" and I give thanks to God for all the blessings.

"What you don't have you don't need it now

What you don't know you can feel it somehow

What you don't have you don't need it now

Don't need it now... it was a beautiful day." Yes, Lord, it was: thank you.

(take a look at my boys at Live 8... so wonderful:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3NmmLvfzMuE)

Learning to Speak and Listen in Their Native Tongue

Today is Pentecost – the birthday of the church, the historic celebration of the Jewish feast of first fruits in the ancient tradition and now the day reserved to commemorate the giving of the Law to Moses on Mt. Sinai fifty days after the Exodus – which makes Pentecost a truly important feast day. And feast days are intended to be passionate celebrations that help God’s people rejoice in a unique blessing the Lord has shared within and among us but many in our tradition don’t really grasp what’s at stake in this festival.

Is that fair to say: that a lot of us don’t really understand the value and meaning of Pentecost? I mean we know it comes around every year in the worship cycle like Christmas and Easter but aren’t really sure why it matters, right? So let’s talk about Pentecost – and why it matters – both because it is a sign of God’s grace to us, and, can help us clarify our mission as a congregation. You see one of the truths I have discerned about First Church as your new pastor is that we currently have what I call a “muddled sense of mission.”

For a long time you have maintained honorably – you have kept the building in place, the choir intact, many of the outward manifestations of ministry alive and well and the finances stable – in a word, you have worked to keep the ship afloat. Survival has been the goal and you have accomplished that with love, dedication and hard work. But survival and maintaining the status quo, beloved, is not mission: it neither grows the church nor trains disciples – it does not attract new believers into the faith community nor does it raise money for bold and healing ministries – because survival is fundamentally fear based while mission is rooted in faith, hope and love.

Listen to how Jesus put it in this morning’s text: On the final and climactic day of the Feast, he cried out, "If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink. Rivers of living water will brim and spill out of the depths of anyone who believes in me this way, just as the Scripture says."Jesus said this in regard to the Spirit whom those who trusted him would soon receive. (John 7: 37-38) Now did you hear that? Jesus is inviting those who love him to both receive the Holy Spirit and share it with others in need so that living water would pour out into a physically and spiritually thirsty world to bring it refreshment and renewal to hurting people.

And the promise of Pentecost properly understood is that God will give us everything we need to make this sacred mission possible if we go forward in faith, hope and love. That’s the testimony of the disciples as recorded in the Pentecost story in Acts, isn’t it?

When the Feast of Pentecost came, the (disciples) were all together in one place. Without warning there was a sound like a strong wind, gale force—no one could tell where it came from – and it filled the whole building. Then, like a wildfire, the Holy Spirit spread through their ranks and they started speaking in a number of different languages as the Spirit prompted them.

Now please pay careful attention to this: the Bible tells us that when the Holy Spirit filled the first disciples they started speaking in a number of different languages as the Spirit prompted them. Not that the Spirit em-powered them to speak in tongues – although there is nothing wrong with speaking in tongues – it’s just not what happened at Pentecost. Rather, when the early church was filled and energized by the Holy Spirit on Pentecost, they found themselves equipped for ministry and mission in the world.

Do you recall the two symbols of Pentecost: wind and fire? We know that wind – ruach in Hebrew and pneuma in Greek – is one of the ways the Bible traditionally describes how God’s Holy Spirit works in our lives. At the start of the scriptures there is God’s wind – or spirit or breath – hovering over the face of the earth before bringing order out of the chaos in acts of creativity, yes? (Genesis 1) What about when Jesus began his public ministry saying the spirit of the Lord has come upon me to bring good news to the poor, release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind? (Luke 4) And what about St. Paul who wrote that it is God’s spirit within us that gives us the power to love one another as Christ: love is patient, love is kind, love never gives up, it doesn’t strut, have a swelled head, doesn’t force itself on others, isn’t always “me first” and doesn’t revel when others grovel, right? (I Cor. 13)

Well, the first symbol of Pentecost is the wind – the Spirit – and we’re not talking about a gentle spring breeze: no, the Spirit of the Lord at Pentecost “is a mighty, rushing wind – a wind in a hurry – a hurricane force gale smashing through the whole house – filling not just the pulpit but also the pews.” (Clarence Jordan, Incarnational Evangelism, p. 22) There is an urgency to God’s spirit at Pentecost that pushes people into action – that is the first truth – and the second is found in the fire. Here the Bible talks about a sustained fire – almost an electrical charge with real juice – that energized people who were once afraid and living in the shadows to not only leave the security of their safety zones, but also find ways of communicating God’s love with people from vastly different backgrounds.

What we’re being told is that the Spirit gave ordinary people the juice and the joy to start acting and speaking and doing what Jesus had done before them – sharing the living water of faith, hope and love – and once they stepped out of fear into mission, some wild things started to happen: men began talking to women with respect – straight folk began communicating with gays and lesbians – the old found they had something to talk about in common with the young – and Catholics and Protestants started breaking bread together. Republicans, for God’s sake, started talking to Democrats about common ground – Americans began making friends with Iraqis and Iranians – and Palestinians were befriending Jews. The Bible says that:

When those who had gathered in Jerusalem heard the sound of the disciples, they came on the run. And when they did, they began to hear one another in their own mother tongues and were thunderstruck. They couldn't for the life of them figure out what was going on and kept saying, "Aren't these all Galileans? How come we're hearing them talk in our various languages? We’re Parthians, Medes, and Elamites; visitors from Mesopotamia, Judea, and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia… Egypt and the parts of Libya… we’re immigrants from Rome, both Jews and proselytes; even Cretans and Arabs! How in God’s name are these Christians speaking our languages, describing God's mighty works in ways that we can understand?"

Well, old Clarence Jordan explains the miracle of Pentecost it like this:

When the Church of God gets to talking (in the real power and presence of Jesus) it doesn’t talk in unknown tongues. It talks in the tongues of real people. It talks in their native dialects. It learns how to speak “hip hop” and “rock and roll” as well as Brahms, Beethoven and Bach. It knows how to talk all kinds of talk because the spirit of God becomes articulate and speaks the language of people… it doesn’t hide behind holy church words like thee and thou and what and what not. No, it talks business executive with those on Wall Street and housewife to homemakers for when the Church becomes articulate in Jesus language it communicates with people where they really live. (p. 22)

Pentecost is about being empowered by God to make Jesus visible for our generation. So how do we become articulate enough in the words of Christ that they become flesh and blood acts of healing mission within and among us? I suspect that there are at least two ingredients: one is that you can’t give what you don’t have; and two more often than God’s love will have to break our hearts. Remember: the first disciples began with broken hearts – their beloved rabbi and friend Jesus had been tortured, humiliated and crucified before God’s love raised him beyond death – so these folk were already tender and raw. They were aching for insights and answers – and when they met the Resurrected One and he told them to “wait together in Jerusalem for power from on high” they took him seriously.

In fact the Bible is clear that these disciples spent the 50 days between Easter and Pentecost in study, prayer and waiting before they were inspired and empowered by the Holy Spirit. Can anyone tell me what is significant about the number 50 in the life of God’s people? It’s the Jubilee number – 7 x 7 + 1 – the blessing of deep Sabbath. “Six days you shall work but on the seventh you shall rest as I the Lord your God rested at the start of creation,” right?

Every seventh day was a Sabbath rest, every seventh week was a Sabbath week, every seventh year the fields were to lay fallow in a Sabbath for the earth and every seventh cycle of Sabbath years culminated in one additional Sabbath called the Jubilee – a time of justice, renewal, restoration of rights and a new cycle of hope and peace. The Jubilee was to be the season of Sabbaths where debts were cancelled, prisons were opened and broken relationships made whole. You might recall that Jubilee is how Jesus described the start of his own ministry in Luke 4. So the disciples were a broken hearted people ready for spiritual training – they were ripe for Jubilee and open to the blessings of the Holy Spirit – which is another way of saying that they were learning from Jesus how to become Jesus for the world in another body. They were being prepared to share the image and power of Christ with creation through the birth of the church.

And when the Spirit of the Lord came as God promised – to fill them from the inside out and impregnate them with Spirit so that they, like Mary, could bring Christ to birth in a new way – man, they were ready. With love and broken hearts, training and power from on high, the early church was filled not with fear and a quest for survival, they were on fire to make Christ’s love flesh in the world.

But becoming tender people of the Spirit with broken hearts is not easy: it is counter-cultural work – tough going – which is why a lot of churches opt out of living as the Body of Christ. They may go through the motions and say all the right words, but as an old teacher of mine used to say: you can sit in a church all your life, hear sermons and hymns and organ preludes till the cows come home and that still won’t make you a disciple of Jesus any more than sitting in your garage all day and night will make you a car or howling at the moon will make you a coyote.

No, what you need is an encounter with that Jubilee spirit – that power from on high that heals you and inspires you; it fires you up and pushes you out the door – where your heart will be broken. Mother Teresa used to say that only when we allow our hearts to be broken is there room enough for God’s healing presence to be poured out among us. And I think she’s right – at least her words ring true for me.

Shortly out of seminary, my second ever funeral was for five young children all under the age of 10 who had perished in an electrical fire. It was horrible – the worst thing I had ever encountered – mind blowing. To make matters worse, it was probably at least partially the result of their parents’ ugly alcoholism for they were too wasted to help these children get out when the fire erupted.

I had visited with this very broken family a few times before the tragedy, trying to intervene on behalf of the children only to be rebuffed and shunted away by mom and dad. And when I encouraged them to try rehab, well you can probably guess that I was told in no uncertain terms to “mind my own freakin’ business and get out of their face.” Well, a few months later came the fire – and mom and dad stumbled out with one of their babies, but five other innocent children died – and I was furious – and filled with the darkest anger I have ever known.

I had no idea how to be a pastor to these people: I could barely look at them, I didn’t know how to express, let alone share, anything of God’s comfort at this tragedy because I blamed these two wounded, sloppy drunks for this horrible mess. I didn’t even know what to pray for let alone hot to put together a liturgy that made sense in this context. So I found myself going back to the old words – I dusted off my trusty old Book of Common Prayer – and somehow we made it through. To this day I have no idea if there was even a ray of light in their darkness because shortly after the funeral they went back to drinking and then moved out of the area.

To add insult to injury, for the longest time afterwards I continued to be haunted by both my anger and my agonizing inadequacy as a pastor: I was supposed to be a man of God, for God’s sake, and I couldn’t bring comfort. I was worthless – and here’s the really odd thing, it was only when I really owned that truth – that I was empty and angry, inadequate and lost – that another truth began to take root. Yes, I began to realize, it will always be true that left to myself I will never have enough fire and spirit to bring a healing faith, hope or love to people in that kind of pain, which is why God has promised never leave me all by myself.

Are you with me? It took me years to get it but in time it became clear that God will never leave you all by yourself when you’ve been given a mission. God has shared the Holy Word to encourage us in the depths of our broken and empty hearts; God has given us Christ to take on the full fury of our blame, guilt and anger; and God has sent the Holy Spirit to fill us and heal us from the inside out so that we are able – even in broken and imperfect ways – of making the love of Christ visible and real. I wept like a baby when I came across these words from the prophet Isaiah:

My thoughts, says the Lord, are not your thoughts nor are your ways my ways. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than you ways and my thoughts higher than your thoughts .And as rain and snow come down from heaven and do not return there until they have watered the earth, making it bring forth and sprout, giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater, so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth… it shall accomplish that which I purpose and succeed in the things for which I sent it. Isaiah 55: 8-11

There is nothing sentimental about a heart broken for love of the Lord writes Frederick Buechner. When Jesus stood by the dead body of his friend, Lazarus, “he is not Gregory Peck. He has no form or comeliness about him that we should desire him for he is as one from whom men and women hide and turn their faces.”

To see a man weep is not a comely sight, especially this man whom we want to be stronger and braver than a man, and the impulse is to turn from him as we turn from anybody who weeps because the sight of real tears, painful and disfiguring, forces us to look to their source where we do not choose to look because where his tears come from, our tears also come from.(Listening to Your Life, p. 104)

But that seems to be how it works: our hearts are broken first by the pain of the real world and then by God's amazing grace and there is new birth – the Holy Spirit comes to us to make clear the cost of discipleship and the possibility of transformation occurs – this is what is at stake at Pentecost. And it can change our lives and our church if we are open and tender and ready to let go of our fears. So let those who have ears to hear, hear.