Mission Sunday: Mission to Haiti and the Holy Trinity Cathedral

The Rev. J.W. Messer
Mission Sunday
5.15.2011

About a year ago, I graduated from Virginia Theological Seminary (VTS) in Alexandria, Virginia.  During my time at seminary, we were expected to daily attend one of the three services held in the chapel.  For the most part over those three years, I met daily with a 129 year old prayer friend, Immanuel Chapel, on the VTS campus. The VTS chapel was one of my favorite places on campus, and when stressing, it was very peaceful and restorative to go into the chapel when no one else was there and kneel at the altar rail under a great stained glass window that was above the altar. The window depicted THE GREAT COMMISSION, with Jesus preaching with his disciples gathered around him at his feet, and the words inscribed above the window read “Go ye into all the world and preach the Gospel.”

On the night before graduation, family, friends, seminarians, faculty and church leaders all gathered in the chapel for what is known as A Service For The Mission Of The Church.  This service celebrates the conclusion of the mission of the seminary which was to prepare us for the new state of our ministries in the Episcopal Church.  My class was the last graduating class to gather for this service in Immanuel Chapel.

On October 22, 2010, I lost my prayer friend, and VTS lost the central and the spiritual focus for the soul of campus, in a fire.  Luckily no lives were lost.  The accidental fire demolished the historic Immanuel Chapel, with flames so intense that firefighters could not even enter the building to try to save the historical and sacred objects.  In just 40 minutes or so, our chapel with the iconic window, “Go ye into all the world” was destroyed and lost to us forever.

Current and past students, faculty, staff and friends all grieved together over this irreplaceable loss. Immediately, however, fundraising began in order to build a chapel, one that would be a new chapel for a new century. Money instantly started to pour in; without hesitation VTS is going to replace the building that was, and will be, central to VTS gathering. 

This leads me to today’s Gospel reading where Jesus, in conversation with Thomas and Philip, tells them that God sent Him to prepare a place for them in God’s Kingdom.  Jesus said that if you know Him, then you know the Father.  And since you know Jesus and the works He has done, then we are all to do the works that Jesus has done. Jesus was sent by God into the world to call people to go forward in his name. This is mission, and it is central to the Christian faith. Mission is the act of sending and being sent across significant boundaries of human experience to bear witness in word and deed to God’s action in Christ in the power of the Holy Spirit.[i] Mission means sending and being sent.  But it is also has a counter, that is, it is important to have a place to return to – a physical place to gather and a place in which to be rooted.  This is why it is vital for VTS to rebuild the chapel. Even a spiritual body of future priests and leaders of the church still need a physical location to gather in, a structure that serves as a beacon to all being formed for ministry and the local community to gather.

However after a disaster strikes, not everyone is as blessed as VTS has been. Ten months before the VTS chapel burned, Haiti was decimated by an earthquake.  This earthquake killed more than 250,000 people and made millions more homeless. Many of the services we expect from the government—healthcare, education, culture—were provided by The Episcopal Church in Haiti. In the wake of this devastating earthquake, about 85% of the Episcopal Diocese of Haiti’s institutions were destroyed or severely damaged.  In Port-au-Prince, Holy Trinity Cathedral was in ruin and rubble.  This Cathedral was more than an historical church of the Episcopal Church’s largest diocese of 100,000 members.  It was also the center for so many, particularly in the capital city of Port-au-Prince, with a population nearing 3/4ths of a million.  The Cathedral was more than a church building; it housed and trained a touring choir and the nation’s only symphony orchestra, providing both cultural development and income in a country where the annual per capita income is less that $400. Holy Trinity also helped to educate the next generation.  It housed a primary, a secondary school, and a Professional School offering education and spiritual guidance to hundreds.  Clearly, many people of the city looked to the cathedral for help as it has served as a focus for so many for so long.

A National effort is being led by The National Episcopal Church in an effort to focus its mission towards our Diocese in Haiti.  While many government agencies from all over the world have been working over the past year to help those left in the aftermath, there is one thing no one else can rebuild, the Holy Trinity Cathedral.[ii] The national church is asking us to help to rebuild, one brick at a time. Brick by brick, we can have a hand in helping our brothers and sisters in Christ to rebuild their beacon of hope to their nation -- all with two simple acts.  First, we can donate our money.  The national church suggests that $10 buys a brick, but by donating even a few dollars, we help our sister Diocese of Haiti as they begin their resurrection projects to rebuild a broken nation, a broken cathedral.  At Emmanuel, we are the recipients of a challenge grant from one of our parish families. Every gift of $25 or more will be matched, up to a total of $1000. And the second act we can offer to them is our prayers. These two acts are simple but have transformative powers.

        We are all called as Christians to go out into the world and make disciples, to help and love our neighbor as ourselves.  We are called to be God’s hands on Earth!  Shouldn’t we use those hands to make a place, a home on Earth for our neighbors? Even if all we can offer is one brick at a time, one prayer at a time, we, as a Christian body, can help resurrect from the rubble the Holy Trinity Cathedral, the beacon of hope for so many Haitians.

        VTS needs and will get its’ chapel rebuilt; there will be a physical location for a community to gather in.  The people of Haiti deserve the same.  The question is not are we able to help, but WILL we help?

Let us at least begin this journey with a pray.

Let us pray:
Almighty and loving God, all of creation is yours.   We are joined together with our brothers and sisters in the body of Christ, so that when one hurts, we all hurt, and when one rejoices, we all rejoice together. Today we pray especially for the Diocese of Haiti, for we know what it means to have something we hold dear, something that seems bigger than us, destroyed in a moment. The loss is painful which can shake us to our core, but it is does not end there.  We also face the struggle to rise out of the rubble and to restore our lives to what is now the ‘new normal.’ In all of this, we turn to you for strength and grace.  We turn to our neighbors for a helping hand. You call all of your children to go forth and to be your hands in the world. Help us as we discern how best to use the gifts and talents you have given us to aid our brothers and sisters in Haiti, as they work to rebuild your Church. All this we pray through your name. Amen.[iii]

+And in God’s name we pray. Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. +

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[i] Horizons of Mission pg 18

[ii] Diocese of Haiti website in their plea for help

[iii] Prayer written by JWM