“Coming To”

Tags

Advent, be alert, be watchful, come to, Corinthians, grace, Jesus, Latin, Mark, Paul, preparation, prepare, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, wake up

Today is the first day of the season of Advent, a time of preparation for the great feast of Christmas when we celebrate the incarnation – the birth in flesh – of Jesus, the Christ. Paul is quite encouraging this morning in his greeting to the Corinthians as he writes (in part), Grace to you and peace! You are not lacking in any spiritual gift as you wait for the revelation of Jesus Christ…He will keep you firm to the end…God is faithful. (1Cor 1:3-9) Paul had already met Christ in a flash of insight, a personal revelation that turned his life around. If it could happen to him, a former persecutor of Christians, it could probably happen to anyone although he was also convinced that Christ was coming back soon for the whole world. Accordingly, he could be speaking to us today.

Jesus was a bit more challenging in his words. “Be watchful! Be alert!” he says. “You do not know when the time will come. May he not come suddenly and find you sleeping.” (MK 13:33-37) Jesus was telling a story about a master who went on a trip and left his servants in charge. In all similar parables, servants were strongly advised to be ready to greet the master upon his return. Just as in the first instance, we could be the audience for this message.

In the first reading, Paul is confident of a good outcome because of God’s fidelity. In the gospel the challenge of fidelity is ours. I learned in my youth as a Girl Scout to be prepared and I have always loved this season as a chance to settle into the quiet of winter and reflect on what it might mean each year to welcome Jesus more deeply into my life. This morning as I thought about the word – Advent – that characterizes this time of waiting and preparation as well as the stance of expectation, I played with the Latin – one of my favorite subjects in high school because of my stellar teacher, Sister Thomas Aquinas. The preposition ad gives the verb “to come” a nuance that focuses us on the arrival, i.e; to come to = to arrive. What I experienced this morning was another sense of to come to which was what Jesus was talking about this morning. “Wake up!” he was saying. “Recognize what’s going on here! Prepare your heart because I’m already here. It’s time to notice your potential for transformation. It’s time to come to!“

Ready?

Tags

Advent, alert, Christ, Christmas rush, consumerism, end times, Jesus, Maranatha, preparation, reason for the season, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

This is my second try at saying anything worthwhile today that has not been said by wiser people. I was lamenting all the focus on consumerism that has blossomed into “Black Friday” beginning on Thanksgiving Day or before and continuing at least until the end of today (which is clearly not Friday any more) and then morphing into “Cyber Monday” when we can find the best deals on everything on the internet. It is rather depressing to me, a person who loves to give gifts, but who is keenly aware of the vast economic diversity in our country and elsewhere.

Today is the last day of the Church year and the gospel reading is sobering. Jesus is warning his listeners not to be spending their days in “carousing, drunkenness and the anxieties of daily life” such that “the day of the Lord will catch you by surprise.” (LK 21:34) Although he is speaking of the end times we might consider that tomorrow is the beginning of the season of Advent. The psalm refrain announces that by crying out Maranatha! (Come, Lord!) If we are caught up in the anxiety-producing frenzy of the “Christmas rush” we may miss the opportunity to focus ourselves in preparation for the “reason for the season.” You can see, perhaps, why I am stumbling in an effort to say something unique about all this. So I’ll leave it there, with just one question for us all:

How will I create in myself a state of alertness for the next 25 days that will find me calling out to Christ from a place of readiness for his arrival in my heart?

Feed the Birds

Tags

birdfeeder, birds, praise, psalm 84, snow, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

We’ve been blessed for the last few years with new visitors to our bird feeders, including bluebirds, flickers and an amazingly vibrant scarlet tanager. Lately there has been a large gathering of our familiar mourning doves around the sliding glass door to our deck, looking like a women’s study group at the obligatory coffee break. Seed is scattered regularly around the deck in winter to calm the human anxiety of birds’ ability to find nourishment as the snow deepens. It is here, as the psalm refrain proclaims this morning, that “God lives among his people.”

I love Psalm 84 for its inclusive vision of the reign of God where “all creatures great and small” are welcome and cared for. As the snow continues to fall gently this morning a beautiful image seems quite apt for me: Even the sparrow finds a home and the swallow a nest in which she puts her young…Blessed are they who dwell in your house! Continually they praise you! I’m tempted to snuggle back under my bedclothes and listen to the birds, joining them in their morning song.

Giving Thanks

Tags

blessing, happy thanksgiving, joy of heart, Peace, pilgrims, Sirach, Thanksgiving, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

This morning my world is blanketed in white. I give thanks for the beauty of snow as I pray for safety of travelers, shelter for the homeless and peace in places of unrest. Because we celebrate in our country today the great feast of Thanksgiving, I reflect on those early settlers who came here seeking new life. Remembering that it wasn’t an easy journey but that over time and generations immigrants like my grandparents built a nation that is strong in its foundations if imperfect in its unity, I am grateful. Today we cannot think only of our own surroundings or our country as we have become a world community in our time. I celebrate the cross-cultural connections that are possible now through which we celebrate the diversity among us even while we are stretched toward understanding of the ways in which we are the same.

I choose the wisdom of the Book of Sirach 50:22-23 for a blessing to all today with a wish that giving thanks becomes ever more prominent in our daily practice. It says: Now I bless the God of all, who has done wondrous things on earth; who fosters people’s growth from their mother’s womb and fashions them according to his will. May God grant you joy of heart and may peace abide among you.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Hospitality

Tags

God, honored guest, hospitality, praise God, psalm 98, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

I facilitated a retreat once for lay ministers on the theme of hospitality. It consisted of three segments: hospitality to ourselves, to others and to God. Hospitality to others was easy enough for people to comprehend but the other two were new concepts for some. Welcoming ourselves means accepting ourselves as we are now in the totality of our being – which does not, of course, mean complacency with those aspects of ourselves that need improvement. Once we got over that hurdle, in theory at least, we had to consider our willingness to treat God as an honored guest in our lives – maybe by remembering to say grace as we gather for a meal to remind us that God is present. And that’s just the start. Offering God a home – a comfortable place – at the center of our hearts takes a deeper kind of awareness and welcome. I’m reminded of that effort this morning by Psalm 98 that speaks of the whole of creation offering such a song of welcome, led by us. It sings:

Praise God till earth itself becomes a song, till seas and all the waters flow and waves begin to dance with land and all the peoples sing. Let every river lift its hands to clap in time, while hills and valleys join in song to offer hospitality to the Holy One, who comes to right our every wrong. (vs. 8-9, alternate translation)

Prayers, Please

Tags

Ferguson, Michael Brown, prayers for ferguson, racial discrimination, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, unity born of love

As light returns silently to the sky in the Southern Tier of New York this morning the photos and reports of destruction in Ferguson, Missouri are in direct contrast in the wake of the decision of the grand jury in the Michael Brown case not to prosecute the policeman responsible for the death of Brown. As I reflect on the statement of the district attorney announcing the decision, which seemed to me so clear and well-founded from all the evidence presented, I feel only helplessness. Perhaps that is the feeling that comes closest to what those driven to violence are feeling. Their rage is incomprehensible to me because I am a Caucasian woman living in a rather racially homogeneous area of Upstate New York. I cannot feel from inside the black skin of the people of Ferguson whose experience of racial discrimination is unknown to me. I only pray, as does the family of Michael Brown, for peace and willingness to examine the evidence that is, uncharacteristically, being released to the public in its totality.

I have no more words this morning. My heart longs only for reconciliation and the unity born of love. May it be so.

Who Wants To Be A Billionaire?

Tags

billionaire, generosity, gratitude, Jesus, Luke, offer of ourselves, open hands, open hearts, poverty, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

I watched a segment of 60 Minutes on television recently that was featuring some of the 400 billionaires who reside in the United States. The focus was on those who had accepted Warren Buffett’s challenge of giving away at least half of their money. Just the concept of “billionaire” is incredible to me and I wonder, as did Buffett on that occasion, why someone would ever “need” more than five hundred million dollars.

Today Jesus was observing some wealthy people “putting their offerings into the treasury.” (LK 21: 1-4) He noticed a woman who was most likely unremarkable by most standards. He singled her out because, unlike the others who gave out of their surplus (which was also a good thing), she gave from her poverty. In the words of Jesus, she had offered “her whole livelihood.” The message is clear and probably one that most of us have heard from childhood. Today I think it’s worth repeating. It isn’t even necessarily about what we put on the collection plate in church. It’s all about how we live our lives and what we are willing to offer of ourselves to God and the world. How do we open our hands and our hearts to those in need of us? And this week another question rises up for me: what is the level of our gratitude for the gifts – large and/or small – that we have received through the generosity of others?

A Different Kind of King

Tags

Christ the King, Ezekiel, flock, Matthew, Psalm 23, shepherd, Thanksgiving. Advent, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

Today, as we in the United States of America move toward the celebration of Thanksgiving for all the blessings we have received, the Christian Church calendar moves toward a new year that begins next Sunday with the first Sunday of Advent, a short season that culminates in the great feast of Christmas. Today, then, finds us standing “on tiptoe” in expectation of the coming of Christ into the world.

At the same time as looking forward to the birth of Jesus, we pause to consider the mystery of God’s reign present now and to come at the end of time. We celebrate this reality today as the feast of Christ the King. It is significant that the Scripture readings for this feast speak of a king interested not in power over others but rather acting like a shepherd feeding his flock, carrying the lambs in his arms (EZ 34). This tender Shepherd is our constant companion on our life’s journey as Psalm 23, the great Shepherd Psalm, tells us. And the gospel of Matthew (chapter 25) lays out our role of responsibility in the kingdom of the Good Shepherd. We are to feed the hungry, give drink to the thirsty…knowing the edict that “as long as you do this for the least of these brothers and sisters, you do it for me.”

Psalm 23 and Matthew 25 are among the most familiar texts in the  Judeo-Christian Scriptures, bringing first comfort and then challenge to all who are willing to pay attention to the message. They are the perfect “hors d’oeuvre” to bring to my heart’s Thanksgiving table, a motivation to love that may, if I stay awake, carry me all the way to Christmas.

 

Everybody, Sing!

Tags

God, Jesus, joyful, martyr, saints, singing before the Lord, spiritual practices, St. Cecilia, St. Francis of Assisi, St. Marianne Cope, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

Several years ago I watched a DVD about Church history where theologian Rev. Michael Himes made a statement that remains with me. He said that one of the reasons that Christianity has endured is the doctrine of the communion of saints. It is remarkable, he continued, that we are able to have “conversations” with people who lived in the 1300s, the first millennium and even the first century of the Christian era – as well as from our own time. That being true, we can find out what it has been like over the period of 2,000+ years for human beings like us to journey toward the God of Jesus Christ. The stories of “the great ones” are mixed in with some who are obscure but sometimes very engaging. And occasionally there is a named saint from a place close to us whether we live in Assisi in Italy (St. Francis) or Syracuse, NY/Molokai, Hawaii (St. Marianne Cope). Whether or not we are prone toward deep devotion to saints, I believe there is a sense of continuity in reflecting on their lives.

Today is the feast of St. Cecilia who lived in the 3rd century and was martyred in Rome for her faith, as were many people in that time of persecution. The stunning thing for those of us who are well aware of St. Cecilia as the patron of musicians is that very little is known of her although she is remembered as one of the most famous of the martyrs of her time. Perhaps that is because “singing before the Lord” is one of the most joyful of all spiritual practices. There will be many music festivals today at Christian churches and much fanfare as churches celebrate the feast of Christ the King this weekend. I, for one, am always grateful for good liturgical music (and any other good music as well…) and will sing my best at any opportunity today to give thanks for all the musical “saints” in my life!

The Power of Words

Tags

Jesus, language, Luke, prophesy, Psalm 103, psalm 119, Revelation, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, words

All three readings for this morning speak of words. The Book of Revelation (10:8-11) and the Psalm (119, vs. 103) create strong visual images. The first is of “a voice from heaven” to John that commands him to swallow a scroll (!) after which he is to prophesy – apparently about what he has eaten which, by the way, soured his stomach. The psalmist sings of the word of God which is “sweeter than honey to the mouth.” In the gospel (LK 19:45-48), Jesus has some harsh words for those selling things in the temple saying that they have turned the temple from a house of prayer into a den of thieves. It seems that “every day he was teaching in the temple area while the chief priests, the scribes and the leaders of the people” were trying unsuccessfully to silence him – actually by putting him to death. The reason for the failure of this project, according to Luke is that “all the people were hanging on his words.”

There is so much here to contemplate! Language is the most fundamental method of communication and even the way we “deliver the message” can change it entirely. People with the gift of oratory can woo us into compliance – sometimes without our knowing it. Tone of voice can make us cower and sometimes those messages received can do even more damage than “souring” our stomachs. When there is a sign language interpreter at church the ritual becomes more profound for me if I listen and watch at the same time. In singing I find that my words of praise or longing touch me deeply as I hope they are touching God. Words have power for great good or devastating destruction.

All of this leads me to spend the day watching and listening to the words that inform my day, assuring that what comes out of my mouth adds to the building up rather than the tearing down of my personal “universe.” Let my first task be to wish you “Good morning!”