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set free

My past does not predict my future. I am set free from limitations or fears that may have influenced me previously. The past is past-and I let it go.
 

Acting in the present moment from my Christ nature, I imagine the future I desire. I connect with the Christ within and ask, "What is mine to do? What action am I to take?" Then I listen. The answer may come as a slight whisper or as an intuitive feeling. When I am guided to the next step, I take it.
 

I am set free from any limitation or fear, because I know that as I live from my Christ nature, I am always safe. I trust in the guidance I receive and step forward into my good.

 ~~~
For when Jesus saw her, he called her over and said, "Woman, you are set free from your ailment." ... immediately she stood up straight and began praising God.-Luke 13:12, 13

 

Story of Emma the dog

You Save Humans and Animals Alike, O Lord (Psalm 36:6)

                A couple weeks ago Emmanuel had the wonderful opportunity to rescue a homeless, hungry and ill dog. Our parishioners met the call to rescue and help fund her care, and she was named Emma after our church. This is a clear demonstration of stewardship and love for all of God’s creatures. Over the past few weeks, and particularly when I got to see a healthy and refreshed Emma , I have had many thoughts about why she chose our church and the workings of God’s providence in our lives. Was it blind luck that Emma happened to wander into the cemetery of a church that has a pet ministry or did God lead her to us? I’d like to share these ponderings and where we stand on proper environmental stewardship.

                About a year and a half ago I first visited Emmanuel with my partner Michael. I quickly discovered that Emmanuel is unlike any church that I have ever attended. With a firmly placed foot in the 21^st Century, Emmanuel is a wonderful steward, and a necessary member of our community. With tremendous community involvement, it’s amazing to think that our doors aren’t being torn down from the people that we help. We recognize that our job is not only to feed the hungry and clothe the homeless. It is to be servants of the entire community, including animals and the environment.

                The bible mentions over 120 different species of animals (none of whom are cats; sorry cat lovers). Sadly, in both Testaments, dogs are mostly mentioned is in degrading terms. One of the most profound is in 2^nd Kings. After her death, Jezebel’s body is eaten by dogs (2 Kings 9:36). Jezebel was not to receive a proper burial. Instead, her flesh was eaten by dogs so that she was unrecognizable and, in many ancient Hebrew traditions, cursed. In Matthew 15, Jesus tells us that it isn’t fair to give food designated for children to dogs (Matthew 15: 22-26).

                 Nonetheless, we do find a couple instances of dogs that are positive. In the apocryphal book of Tobit, we learn that Tobit had a dog. The story of Tobit is quite fantastic. It most likely didn’t make the Biblical cut because of its stories of disguised angels and magic fish as well as its similarities to Homer’s Odyssey. In verses 6:2 and 11:4, Tobit’s dog appears. He has nothing to do with the story and could be excluded all together with no consequence. What we find is historical evidence that domestic dogs were present, and dogs of that time act much like our modern pets. That is, they seem to just show up whenever something exciting is happening. Consequently, the popular dog name “Toby” is attributed to Tobit having a domestic dog.

                Now for the really good news. Psalm 36:6 tells us, “Your righteousness is like the mighty mountains, your judgments are like the great deep; you save humans and animals alike, O Lord.” This passage speaks to me as a charge to do God’s work on earth as God’s representatives and stewards. We were created in the image of God and were given dominion over animals. Understand that nowhere is it mentioned that we are given domination over the earth. Having dominion means that while animals can be used to serve us, we have a responsibility to ensure that they are treated fairly and kindly, and that we never abuse this privilege. God will save both humans and animals alike through us, God’s servants.

                So we come back to Emma. Her situation reminds me of something that could be in a Shakespearean play. She was gravely ill and chose a cemetery to die. The allusion is there in the most poetic way (think Romeo and Juliet going to the family tomb to commit suicide). Thankfully,  Rev. Alley and Rev. Messer have windows that overlook the cemetery. There they found her. She was hungry, dehydrated, exhausted, nails so long that it was probably hard for her to stand or walk, skin eaten up by fleas, and had a terrible scab on her ear. As a congregation we came together to feed her, provide medical care, and ensure that she have a home. We named her Emma, after our church, Emmanuel. Of course Emmanuel means God is with us. I can attest that God was with Emma that day in the church cemetery.

                The Holy Spirit works in wonderful, amazing, and often confusing ways. I don’t think it was an accident that Emma came to us to be saved. God protected Emma and gave her one of the best places to be found. That day we met our charge of saving animals as we meet our charge to save humans every day. The Holy Spirit worked through Emma to help her find her way and it has worked through us to give us guidance, love, and compassion for all of God’s creatures. Remember that God is with us. God is with the hungry, homeless, imprisoned, in danger, in grief, in sickness. God is also with animals. God saves both humans and animals alike.

Emma asleep in her new home.

Us VS Them

August 6, 2012

The Rev. Marguerite C. Alley

Us Versus Them

So let’s think about the Chick-fil-A situation for a few minutes. Following the president of that company’s statement about his stance on the blessing of same sex unions, there has been a load of responses, both in support of Chick-fil-A and against. Some responses have been very compassionate and thoughtful (as in discrimination for any reason is wrong), some have been pragmatic (it is private company, he can say or do anything he wants) and some have been down right mean spirited (maybe if all restaurants would stop serving them, they would starve and the problem would go away). Sadly, the overall dialogue has once again caused bigotry to rear its ugly head in the American Christian churches. The potential for any meaningful dialogue has been lost in name-calling and who can shout the ugliest rhetoric the loudest.

I kind of wonder what Jesus would have said to us about this?

Picture this: Jesus is on a lovely grassy hillside, teaching a large gathering of people. He says: "Treat people the same way you want to be treated." Don’t just love the ones you like because they look, act and think like you, I want you to love the ones who are different from you and you find hard to understand and disagree with, too."

As Jesus is closing his day and coming down from the hillside, he is approached by a leper. Now, in this time, a leper was required by law to shout “unclean! unclean!” as a warning to anyone who came near that they were infected with leprosy. Jesus reaches out and touches him! Right there in front of God and everyone he was just teaching, Jesus completely ignores Jewish custom and law, and touches the man. The touch brings healing and restoration to the “unclean” one and the crowd (presumably) sees the importance of his teaching. Do you think that example changed their thinking? Does asking and reminding ourselves “what would Jesus say/do in this situation” change how we think or act?

 

Not too long ago, a well-known young minister was just about to publish a book. In that book, he questioned a long held theological precept that only Christians go to heaven, by asking if Ghandi was in heaven or hell.

That question caused quite a stir and the author was accused of being a heretic and more or less became an “untouchable”. That one single question ended up being more important in the minds of many Americans than the earthquake and tsunami in Japan that killed over 25,000 people!

It would appear that here in the last few weeks, the choice of whether or not to eat at Chick-fil-A is more important than the tragic shooting in Colorado, the huge forest fires making thousands of people homeless, the trial of a pedophile, the genocide happening in Syria, or even the Olympics. I would think that Christians would have loads to discuss about how we have an opportunity to work with God in the reconciliation of all things rather than whether or not we should eat at Chick-fil-A.

This brings me to my real point. This controversy is not a new one, nor is it actually about sexuality at all. It is about people who are different. Sexuality is just the newest label we have affixed to this age-old issue of people who are different from us. We do or have done the same to dark skinned people, people who don’t speak English, people who have been in prison, Buddhists, Hindus, Muslims, no faith, democrats, republicans, libertarians; even people who live in different states, go to different schools or root for different teams! We do it with anyone  we view as "them."

So really, we are the problem. We try to understand the teaching of Jesus but it challenges our understanding of “others”. Sadly, we try to get others to believe exactly the way we do BEFORE we agree to have dialogue with them at all! If we try rather, to engage each other in helpful informative dialogue, before we decide they are “them”, we are more likely to discover that our commonalities far outweigh our differences.

So for the time being, what do you say we completely ignore the question of whether or not to eat at Chick-fil-A and focus instead on reaching out and touching “them”, whoever “they” are for you? I suspect that Jesus would be a lot happier with us all if we tried to follow his example rather than trying to bully/coerce/force someone into seeing through the same tiny lens.

Finish the sentence: I dream of a church

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Please post below your responce to "I dream of a church ...."

Reflection: J2A pilgrimage

Counting our Blessings
By The Rev. Marguerite Alley

           I have just returned from Pilgrimage with 8 amazing young adults and three very brave and committed “full fledged” adults. During our time together we learned a good bit about the Heifer International model, sustainable farming, the global distribution of wealth along with practical stuff like how to make and cook over an open fire, milking a goat and farming. We participated in two amazing service projects. The first was to help a young priest in an inner city parish beautify and re-organize some of the church space and the other was to host lunch and participate in an outdoor Eucharist at a very cool church called Common Cathedral .

            In all of our adventures together we were able to identify and give thanks for the blessings we enjoy often without thinking about them. Hot (daily) showers, running water, beds, bug spray, food prepared for us, food we prepared for ourselves, food we gathered, food we served, sleeping bags, A/C and so forth were but a few of the things we became more aware of in their absence. If there were ever a time in our lives when we were likely to “count our blessings” it was in the last 13 days.

           We have heard that phrase “count your blessings” since we were young. In some ways we have made a religion of counting our blessings. But one thing I became aware of in the past 13 days is that counting is not enough. Being aware is not enough. What I realized is that like saying “sorry” and not changing my behavior, counting my blessings, while doing nothing to guarantee being able to pass them on, is a waste of time, a waste of resources and misses the whole point of being aware in the first place. If you are aware of a danger down the road, you pass that info along to people you pass heading in that direction. If you are aware of something, doing nothing to make others aware is as good as being oblivious.

           Let me explain what I mean here. Being aware and thankful is certainly a good thing. But it is just the beginning. It should not ever be the end result. It does not require action to be aware, to acknowledge the source. Jesus didn’t say “be thankful” and just sit there. He said “go take care of the poor, the widowed, the orphans”. Take care of the earth, be good stewards of your resources. Maybe not in so many words, but I can’t find any compelling evidence to suggest that Jesus’ message was to use up, destroy and ignore. Being a follower requires action. It requires us to live in such a way as to reflect the gratitude we feel, not just say we feel it. Being truly thankful means when we see something wrong we work to change it. We don’t just say “Boy, I sure am grateful I don’t have to live that way”. This to me is the difference between being a follower of Christ and being a “Christian”. Identifying myself merely as a Christian only designates that I am neither Jewish nor Buddhist nor Muslim nor Agnostic. Living in such as way as to reflect the message of Jesus so that others may see it and understand it is being a follower.

            Sometimes I have made the made the mistake of confusing all the things I enjoy in my life with blessings. Blessings, in my mind, are not synonymous with “things” like money, A/C, cars, houses, jobs and so forth. Those are merely things we enjoy. The tricky part is if we consider these blessings, then we are essentially saying that those who do not have these things are somehow “cursed” and that is just not true. To believe that these things we enjoy (education, jobs, health care, etc) are blessings is to say that God wants us to have these things, but wants others to suffer which of course doesn’t line up with our theology. To continue to believe that I am blessed because I live in a wealthy country, in a wealthy state in a well to do city and neighborhood and enjoy the fruits of my labor to the extent I do is to say that God has singled me out for blessing and has frozen out the homeless guy I passed this morning packing up his stuff to begin his daily search for food, water and a cool spot to spend the day. I just cannot buy into that. Instead, I believe I am called to begin to separate the threads of blessing from privilege. In order to more fully show my gratitude for the real blessings we enjoy as children of God, I intend to be more intentional about living in such a way as to reflect that gratitude in everyway. From consuming less to giving more, we can all be a blessing to each other, to the church and to the world.

Sermon: The "ICK" factor

July 1, 2012John A. Baldwin

I want to do a quick poll this morning. Please raise your hand if you have read and studied the Book of Leviticus recently... Hmm I thought so... I haven't looked at it in great depth myself since my seminary days. It isn't what I'd call exciting, edge-of-our-seat scripture. In fact, it's probably better suited for putting us to sleep. Nonetheless, it does give us some interesting insights into the ritual and worship of the ancient Israelites.

Leviticus is the third book in the Old Testament, and it rests on the belief that the faithful enactment of ritual makes God's presence available, while ignoring or disobeying it undermines the harmony between God and the world. Chapters 1-10 describe the proper procedures for handling the blood of animals in the sacrifices that are offered to God, and describe the work of the priests who offer these sacrifices. Chapters 11-15 instruct the laity on purity (or cleanliness). Eating certain animals produces uncleanliness, as does giving birth; certain skin diseases are considered unclean, as are certain conditions affecting walls and clothing (mildew and similar conditions); as well as genital discharges, including female menstruation and male gonorrhea.

Leviticus 16 concerns the Day of Atonement, the only day on which the High Priest is allowed to enter the holiest part of the sanctuary to sacrifice a bull for the sins of the priests, and a goat for the sins of the laypeople. Chapters 17-26 contain the "Holiness Code". It prohibits a long list of sexual contacts and also child sacrifice. Penalties are imposed for the worship of false gods, consulting mediums and wizards, cursing one's parents, and engaging in unlawful sex. The code ends by telling the Israelites that they must choose between the law and prosperity on the one hand or horrible punishments on the other.

I'm sure you're wondering why on earth I'm talking about the Book of Leviticus, when it isn't even one of the scripture reading this morning. It's because it gives us a peek at what I would suggest is a very strong "ICK factor" in the psyche and character of the Israelites of long ago. For reasons we don't fully understand, they felt very strongly about the uncleanliness of touching certain things - animals, foods, diseases, body fluids, and dead things. 'Ugh! Don't touch them!' If you touched them, you yourself became unclean. Being unclean meant that you couldn't come to the Temple to worship the holy God. If you were unclean, you had to go through a rite of purification or cleansing in order to be welcomed back into society and into the presence of God.

These practices were very important to the Pharisees and Sadducees of Jesus' day, so it should come as no surprise that they responded with revulsion to the ways in which Jesus and his disciples disregarded them. In our Gospel reading this morning, there is a strong "ICK factor" in play. It begins with a woman, who has been afflicted with a blood disorder for 12 years, touching Jesus thereby making him "unclean" in their eyes. Leviticus 15:19 states clearly that anyone who touches a woman with a discharge of blood is unclean until evening. Jesus not only is touched by her, but he goes on to bless and heal her. "ICK". Then Jesus proceeds to the home of Jairus, grips the dead hand of a little girl and pulls her up. Another big "ICK". And that may have been a typical day in the life of Jesus. He touched lepers, and spent the bulk of his time with the great "unwashed" tax-collectors, prostitutes, the sick and diseased. ICK, ICK. ICK.  They could not understand and see Him as the One who had come to do what the Law was unable to do — make men and women clean and whole.

Jesus boldly moved past the "ICK factor" of his time, culture and society. To Jesus no one was unclean..... beyond the reach of his loving embrace. He set a new standard that the religious authorities found absolutely repugnant. Lest we be overly harsh in judging those religious leaders from a vantage point 2000 years removed from the scene, have there not been big "ICK factors" regulating human society down through history, and are there not still big "ICK factors" present in our own lives today?

Every one of us has things and experiences which cause us to recoil in revulsion. What makes you feel icky? (pause) I might include in my "ick factors" chiggers, tripe, floating dead fish, and a few others I won't mention. Just too icky to be mentioned in a sermon!! I suspect that together we might come up with a lengthy list. When we began our series on "Jesus - who do you say that I am?" I debated what picture I might display that was illustrative of ickyness. I came across one picture of Jesus picking his nose, but I was wisely persuaded to pass that one by. Instead I chose one from Mel Gibson's movie The Passion of the Chris that is very bloody. Not only would the Pharisees say "ICK" to this one, but I kind of feel that way myself. We prefer our portraits of Jesus to be cleaned up, and acceptable in polite company. We err on the side of overly emphasizing the divine in Jesus, perfect in every way, without blemish, sterile. Yet Christian theology is adamant that Jesus was human in every way that we are. He knew and experienced ickiness, and triumphed over it.

Jesus sets a powerful example for us of seeing in every human being, no matter how they might appear in the eyes of others - diseased, sinful, out of step with society - as a beloved child of God, and he treated everyone with grace and dignity. We should do no less.

As I reflect back over my own life, and particularly my growth as a pastor and priest, I have been confronted time and again with situations and people that have raised my ICK radar. I went to an all-boys prep school for 5 years as a teenager where homosexuality was not only taboo but terrifying. In the years since I have been blessed with friendships with many gay men and women who have helped me overcome what once was off-putting, and see them through the eyes of Jesus as fully worthy of respect and dignity. My parents drilled into me that women of another race or religion were absolutely off-limits to a white, Anglo-Saxon Protestant. Yet through the years I have come to witness relationships which are filled with grace that transcend those artificial boundaries based on fear.

During my first year of seminary in 1974, I began field work in a Boston rehabilitation hospital where I visited and ministered to men and women who were recovering from debilitating strokes, and life-threatening malignancies. I remember well the first time I dressed up in mask, rubber gloves, and gown and went in to see a woman who welcomed me with “Here's the lone ranger, come to visit the lone stranger”, and who helped me grasp the fullness of her humanity. As part of our training we went to view open-heart surgery from a gallery, which I found so intense I nearly passed out. Later in time I served as a chaplain in a locked acute, schizophrenic ward where bizarre behavior was commonplace. I also have spent time visiting in prisons, in detox units, and in ICU's. Through it all, I have grown in my ability to confront what once felt threatening, unclean, repulsive, and see beyond it to the person within. I am, I believe, a better priest and pastor thanks to these experiences, able to go into intense situations and be fully present in the name of Christ.

Our Lord Jesus Christ sets a high standard for those of us who choose to walk in his footsteps. Where others put up walls, drew back, employed fear and disdain to isolate, shame or embarrass, Jesus waded in without fear or judgment to love, heal and restore to wholeness.

Our Baptismal covenant calls us to this faithful journey of moving beyond our ICK factors, whatever they may be, in these questions, “Will you seek and serve Christ in all persons, loving your neighbor as yourself?”, and “Will you strive for justice and peace among all people, and respect the dignity of every human being?”

We're not talking here just about those who look like us, act like us, believe like us, smell like us, but about every human being. Jesus calls us to put on the eyes of God and look beyond the ickiness in human living, to the presence of the beloved children of God within. Amen.