16 October

This is a risk-filled moment in the gospel.  In the language of our time, it’s a set-up.  Jesus is in a public place.  Around him is the usual mixture of people, some attracted to his teaching, others just curious.  Mingling with the group are some of his enemies.  He is too popular to attack openly so they try to trap him into saying something that can be used against him, something to show that he is subversive.  It’s a tactic as old as politics.  With wide-eyed innocence, someone asks the dangerous question prefaced by a stream of flattery.  “Is it lawful to pay taxes to the Emperor or not?”  There must have been a dead silence.  Anyone with any intelligence in the crowd would know what was at stake.  If the teacher said yes he would be making enemies at every level of Jewish life.  If he said no he would challenge the Roman occupation.

Jesus’ answer has come down through time.  It is the reply of a razor-sharp mind.  He holds up the coin and says, “Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s.”  Centuries roll away but the question and the reply remain.  Why?  Because the question and answer present men and women with an eternal equation which has to be worked out in human life. 

We all live somewhere between the two poles expressed as Caesar and God.  Each of us has to live in what we tend to call the real world, the world of nine to five.  Whether it is really the “real world” is another story.  Each of us has to decide what we give to the “Caesar” of our nine-to-five life.  Do we give everything, all our time, all our energy?  Do we make that part of our life an ultimate value; in a word, do we make it our God?  Or do we acknowledge that only God is ultimate and that this God demands our allegiance, our integrity, our trust, our worship.  That’s the real question. 

It is a matter of not looking at our lives as being divided into two worlds, the world of work and the world of worship, with God in the latter but not in the former – a sort of life with a set of compartments.  Thinking like that has long been the trap of our culture.  God is the God of both worlds.  Not until we realize this are we able to begin to work out the relationship between Caesar and God for our lives.  Even then, working out the balance of that equation is always difficult, and there are no neat answers.  The important thing is to realize that the equation must be continually worked at if we are to be responsible stewards of the one life we have to live.

Peace, 

Bob+

9 October

It’s not often I get jazzed about the 2nd Reading, mainly because Paul drives me nuts.  But I do resonate with most of Paul’s letter to the Philippians and this Sunday’s passage is one of my favorites.

First, it is one of the few places women leaders and mentioned and supported by Paul.  Next, the following bears quoting:

Finally, beloved, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is pleasing, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.

What a commendation!  Think about what is just, what is honorable, what is true.  Sometimes, in today’s world, we have no idea what is true.  Just because we hear a story on the news or read something in the paper, or follow a link on-line, do we know it’s true?  Is that journalist writing to sensationalize or to expose truth and make us want to respond in an honorable, just way?  Paul is telling his readers, the Philippians and us, to think!  And then, go and do!

M.E.+

2 October

Jesus offered a vision to the people of his own time.  As the risen Christ, he offers the same vision to us.  The vision is of a kingdom, what he always calls the kingdom of heaven.  It is another way of living life, a kind of alternate universe.  And Jesus didn't just talk of that vision - he was the vision.  He didn't just speak of the demands of that kingdom – he did them!

So why didn't it all work out in a wonderfully successful way?  Why didn't everybody think that Jesus and his vision were just what this hurting world needed?  It's difficult to frame a simple answer to this, but we can try.

In his Gospel, John has two phrases which express the tragedy without necessarily explaining it.  He says "The world knew him not . . . his own people received him not."  Why?  John later reports a statement of Jesus which seems to answer that question.  Jesus says, "This is the judgment, that the light has come into the world, and people loved darkness rather than light"(John 3:19).  There it is in the clearest and simplest words – the tragic heart of the human condition.  The Bible's word for this condition, itself simple and clear, is sin.

This is what this parable of Jesus is about.  In it, he tells his own destiny.  Jesus had no illusions about the consequences of his words and actions.  He knew the dark depths of human nature which surrounded him.

The ironic contradiction in human behavior and experience is to reject that which is clearly in our interest to accept.  Our judgment is deeply flawed, and our choices are apt to be terribly wrong.

The kingdom that Jesus offers us is not taken from us by some grudging God; we ourselves choose something else!  But even as we paint that grim portrait of our human nature, another face shines through it, that of Jesus Christ.  The face is a promise that in Christ our humanity is also capable of a shining glory.  Through Christ we can, if we choose, to set foot from time to time in the very kingdom we refuse most of the time.  Thank goodness for our patient, gracious, steadfast and loving God!

The Peace of Christ be with you,    

Bob+

25 September

Ah, parables.  Don’t you get the feeling that sometimes Jesus is deliberately trying to confuse us?  I know I do.

The theme of the parable of the two sons being asked to go work in the vineyard would seem to be obedience.  The first son is asked by his father to go work and the son says “no”, but then has a change of heart and does the work.  The second son, when asked, says “sure, I’ll go”, but he doesn’t.  Jesus asks us which son did the will of the father.  And the consensus seems to be that it is the first son.  But I believe an argument could be made that, while the first son ultimately did what the father asked, he was not obedient – at least not right away.  The hope that Jesus gives in this parable is we can mess up, even be disobedient and still ultimately make the right decision – to follow Him.

May we hear and answer God’s call to us by our actions, not just our words.

M.E.+

18 September

Once again, Jesus is talking to us about the kingdom of heaven in a parable.  When Jesus does this, we know that he is trying to explain to us how the world would be if the rule of God was obeyed universally.

Jesus is speaking about our concepts of justice – and God's concepts.  The scene Jesus paints would be familiar to anyone in the U.S. who knows the pick-up points for day laborers for farms or ranches around a particular city.  Jesus tells of an estate owner who hires workers in the dawn hours.  They agree on a penny or denarius, the official minimum wage for a day's work.  The owner goes out again and again during that day, so that the last to be hired have only about an hour's work.  However, when time comes to pay everyone working in the fields, they all get the same amount, a denarius.  Naturally there is grumbling about unfairness.  The owner dismisses the charge, claiming to be free to do as he wants with his money.

Notice what the unfairness charge focuses on.  No one can say he was given less than he should have been given.  The earliest made a contract, the others after that didn't, but they received more than the minimum rate.  What probably enrages everyone is that the last group hired got a whole day's wages for one hour's work!  Shouldn't everyone have been paid proportionately to the amount of the day worked?

Of course that's right, we say.  But Jesus' estate owner says no, not on his estate it isn't!  Why?  Because remember that this is a story about the kingdom of heaven, about God's ways, not our ways.  Jesus is teaching that God's way is more generous than human justice.  Human justice would have to be in minimal terms;  the contract with the first workers would be the measure and all succeeding agreements would be calculated downwards.  God's justice is that the first contract represents the level to which all others are lifted.

In daily life, what might this be about?  Let's consider two people.  One grows all his or her life in the knowledge of God and with faith, worshipping regularly.  In that life, God is a reality that brings meaning and joy and purpose.  The other person lives for many years without any thought of God.  To that person, faith is irrelevant, religion is for fools, Christ is merely an oath.  Then, at some point, everything changes for this person.  Faith and God become living realities, Christ lives!  There is purpose, new meaning, real joy, all now just as spiritually nourishing as in the first person's life.  One person has served Christ for many years, and the other has just discovered the life of service in Christ.  That is God's way.  And it can be mind-boggling for us.  God does not measure.  God gives the Holy Spirit abundantly!  Thanks be to God!

Peace,

Fr. Bob+

11 September

Isn’t it serendipitous that today’s gospel, the gospel read on 9.11.11, should be about forgiveness.  In the gospel, Peter asks Jesus: “Lord, if another member of the church sins against me, how often should I forgive?  As many as seven times?  Jesus said to him, “Not seven times, but, I tell you, seventy-seven times.”  How do we respond to Jesus’ teaching on the 10th anniversary of 9.11?  One thing to do is take time to reflect.  I felt the following remarks from our Presiding Bishop to be helpful in that endeavor.  I hope you will too.

M.E.+

The Presiding Bishop issued these remarks on August 18, 2011

As we mark the tenth anniversary of the events of September 11, The Episcopal Church continues to work for healing and reconciliation.

Americans experienced the first large non-domestic terrorist attack on our own soil that day, a reality that is far too much a present and continuing reality in other parts of the world. We joined that reality in 2001. Many people died senselessly that day, and many still grieve their loss. All Americans live with the aftermath – less trust of strangers, security procedures for travelers that are intrusive and often offensive, and a sense that the world is a far more dangerous place than it was before that day. Our own nation has gone to war in two distant places as a result of those events. The dying continues, and the world does not seem to have become a significantly safer place.

Yet we believe there is hope. People of faith gave sacrificially in the immediate aftermath of the plane crashes, trying to rescue those in the Twin Towers and the Pentagon, trying to subdue the aggressors on the plane over Pennsylvania, and reaching out to neighbors and strangers alike on that apocalyptic day. Clergy and laity responded to the crisis in New York, Washington, DC, and Pennsylvania, and prayer services erupted in churches and communities across the nation. St. Paul’s Chapel, near the site of the Towers, opened its doors to the emergency responders, and volunteers appeared with food and socks, massaging hands and praying hearts. Volunteers continued to staff the Chapel for months afterward, and prayers were offered as human remains were sought and retrieved in the ruins of the Towers.

Church communities in many places began to reach out to their neighbors of other faiths, offering reassurance in the face of mindless violence. That desire for greater understanding of other traditions has continued, and there are growing numbers of congregations engaged in interfaith dialogue, discovering that all the great religions of the world are fundamentally focused on peace. The violence unleashed on September 11th and in its aftermath was the work of zealots, disconnected from the heart of their religions’ foundations.

This tenth anniversary is above all an opportunity for reflection. Have we become more effective reconcilers as a result? Are we more committed to peace making? The greatest memorial to those who died ten years ago will be a world more inclined toward peace. What are you doing to build a living memorial like that?

The Most Rev. Katharine Jefferts Schori

Presiding Bishop and Primate

The Episcopal Church

4 September

How are disagreements and hurts to be dealt with in the Christian community?  And when we are hurt or betrayed, how do we deal with it?

Jesus suggests that if somebody wrongs or hurts us, we should make every effort to deal with it at the first opportunity, and, if at all possible, one on one.  Jesus is being very realistic, however.  He knows that one on one may not work.  It may be necessary to bring in someone to check what was heard and said.  Jesus goes further.  If the disagreement between two people is within a Christian community, it may be possible to get a small group together whom both sides trust.  Even then, an utterly realistic Jesus sees the possibility of failure.  It simply may not be possible for the opponents to come to terms with each other.  In saying this, Jesus is not saying that some future opportunity may not come to break through the resistance.

Notice an interesting detail in Jesus’ advice when he mentions “a Gentile and a tax collector.”  The attitude towards Gentiles and tax collectors in Jesus’ society was a finely balanced one.  There was a limit to the degree of relationship that was possible.  In the case of tax collectors, there was a real dislike of them.  But in both cases, and this is the point, there was much practical collaboration.  Many things were done together in spite of the mutual guardedness.  Likewise in the church today, it is possible to do a great deal of God’s work while serving side by side with those whom we may not particularly like, by whom, in fact, we may even have been hurt.  So, it may not be easy.  But if it can be done, it can achieve miracles of reconciliation by sharing in a worthwhile task, knowing that in spite of human feelings about one another, both are involved in the work of the same God.  Is it being unrealistic to think this is possible?  If so, it is amazing how often the vision of Christ challenges our ideas of what is realistic.

The Peace of Christ be with you,

Bob+