Children and worship part 1

Some of my earliest childhood memories are of church. The Episcopal church my family attended when I was a small child was full of children, and the way I remember it, friendly to children, too. Of course there were rules and boundaries. We had to be quiet. We had to sit and stand and kneel. We had to wear our Sunday best. Going into the area behind the altar rail was strictly verboten (we had to go inside the rail for the Christmas pageant one year, and it seemed sort of scary). But despite all this, I always felt at home there.

When my older kids were young we went to a church that was (from my perspective at least) child welcoming. The kids went to church--church school was beforehand--and they participated, even if they didn't pay attention ALL the time. They were part of what was going on.

I am puzzled and dismayed whenever I come across the attitude that kids shouldn't be in church, or can only be there when their behavior is perfect or very nearly so. I want children to be in church. And how on earth can we expect them to feel any connection to worship, to liturgy, to church when they are older if we don't welcome there from the beginning?

So how do we incorporate kids into the worship life of the congregation? It's something I've been thinking a great deal about lately. A few weeks ago I attended a workshop about children in worship, and I found myself disagreeing with some of the ideas presented there. This workshop started with the premise that we should "throw out the prayerbook." For me, a cradle Episcopalian, this is an automatic non-starter. Adapt the prayerbook--sure. Make the liturgy a bit more kid friendly--okay. But make it watered down, less authentic--um, no.

I'm thinking of how I might design a service that would be "child-friendly" or "family oriented" and I'll write more about it as time goes on. But for now, do you have ideas? Experienced good liturgies which welcomed children and youth? Share them with me.

The Eighteenth Sunday after Pentecost

The Eighteenth Sunday after Pentecost
Proper 21 C Luke 16:19-31

“In all this, between you and us a great chasm has been fixed, so that those who might want to pass from here to you cannot do so, and no one can cross from there to us.”

You would have had to be secreted on a deserted island somewhere this week to miss that fact that the Episcopal Church was once again in the news. Whether you turned to NPR or BBC or the Boston Globe or the New York Times, the Episcopal Church was right there, as the House of Bishops met, in part to discuss the demands made by the Primates of the Anglican Communion a few months ago, demands that center on issues of sexuality. As you may have gleaned from the many (and sometimes contradictory) news accounts, the House of Bishops issued a statement reaffirming the resolutions passed at General Convention 2006 which stated that restraint would be exercised in consecrating bishops who might be a challenge to the rest of the communion and that no official rites for blessing same sex unions would be authorized at this time. That this is a consensus statement arrived at after much hard work is witnessed by the fact that no one outside the House of Bishops is really happy with it—neither the Primates and the conservatives who think it did not go far enough to conform to their demands, nor those who believe that it did not go far enough to affirm the place of gay and lesbian persons in the church.

In the midst of this I began to think about today’s sermon, and what first crossed my mind as I read and reread the gospel was the stark contrast between the message we’ve been hearing Jesus emphasize recently—discipleship in general and wealth in particular—and what the Primates seem most fixated upon—power in general and sexuality in particular. But as I continued to read and ponder, I began to see a thread in today’s gospel that might, just might, pertain to both.

This week’s gospel is another one of those hard messages. The parable Jesus tells is a rich one—no pun intended—with many layers to pull apart, but its meaning—its surface meaning at least—is immediately clear. There is a very wealthy man—we know he’s wealthy because he wears purple and linen, expensive commodities in those times, and lives in a gated home—a man who passes by the beggar Lazarus whenever he sets off through his gates. Lazarus is destitute—he’s looking just for the crumbs from the table, the meagerest of the leftovers. He’s so destitute that he’s covered in sores, and cannot keep the wild dogs that roam the city away. Eventually Lazarus and the rich man both die; Lazarus is gathered into the bosom of Abraham, while the rich man languishes, tormented in she’ol, the place of the dead. The rich man begs Abraham for relief, and then for a message to be sent to his brothers so that they might avoid his fate. His requests are for naught, however, and Abraham reminds him of the chasm that separates them, a chasm so wide and so deep that it cannot be crossed.

If we’ve been following the gospel of Luke closely we shouldn’t be surprised to hear this story. Jesus begins his ministry in this gospel by standing in the synagogue and reading a passage from Isaiah, which says,

He has brought down the powerful from their thrones, and lifted up the lowly; he has filled the hungry with good things, and sent the rich away empty. (Luke 1:52-53)

Later in the sermon on the plain Jesus preaches,

“Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God...
Woe to you who are rich, for you have received your consolation." (Luke 6:20, 24)

And in recent weeks’ gospels we’ve heard Jesus say things like,

“You cannot serve God and wealth." (Luke 16:13)

“For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” (Luke 12:34)

Jesus’ message is consistent; devotion to money and devotion to God are antithetical. It’s not that having money per se is bad, it’s what you do with that money, and what that money does to your relationship with others and with God that is the problem. And in this week’s gospel we see the consequences of allowing wealth to be foremost—a separation from God, a separation so deep and wide that it cannot be breached.

Think about this: we don’t know that the rich man was a bad person; we don’t even know if he was generous in other ways. Perhaps he was a good employer and a kind person and gave alms to the poor—we just don’t know. What we do know that he walked past a beggar, someone who was invisible to him in his poverty—every single day. Lazarus was a non-entity to him, inconsequential, nothing. Lazarus was the invisible other.

We don’t know much about Lazarus either, beyond the facts of his destitution. Was he a good person—kind and loving and devoted to God? It’s impossible to say. But God’s love and mercy for Lazarus reached across that chasm—the chasm that Lazarus himself did not have the power to bridge—to enfold him, to cradle him in the bosom of Abraham.

It might be enough to say that today’s story of the rich man who failed to use his wealth to reach out to the poor at his gate is another stark reminder that God calls us to hold onto our money lightly, that God calls us to share the abundance that is entrusted to us and to share it joyfully and generously. That message is certainly here for us to heed and it is an important one. But I think if we go a bit deeper we can reach that thread that connects this story to the Primates and the House of Bishops.

If we look more closely we can see that there’s more than wealth involved here. The rich man had wealth to be sure, but he also had power—the power to see beyond a filthy, dirty man covered with sores, the power to see the humanity of Lazarus and to reach out to him as another child of God. The chasm that separated Lazarus and the rich man did not open only after their deaths; that chasm was dug during their lifetimes. It deepened every time that the rich man walked past Lazarus, oblivious to his need. It widened every time the rich man relegated Lazarus to the ranks of the unseen and unwanted. It grew as the rich man forgot God’s commandment to love neighbor as self.

We in the church are called to be generous with our wealth to be sure. But we are also called to see those who are often invisible in society, to see the image of God in all our sisters and brothers—no matter how different from us they may seem, no matter if they are dressed in rags or the finest clothes, no matter if their skin is white or pink or brown or ebony black, no matter whether they are gay or straight or male or female or young or old—to see them and to include them fully. Jesus is really clear that this is our call, but let’s be honest here: the church has a really poor track record in following that call. All too often the church has put up walls, yes, has allowed chasms to open between the people like us, those on the inside, those with the power, and others who are perceived to be different, the ones we’d like to exclude. The irony of course is that today’s gospel tells us that the ones who ultimately will be excluded are the ones who allow the chasms to open.

It’s only been in the last 40 years or so that the church, and specifically the Episcopal Church, has begun to recognize those chasms and to work to close them, close them so that all of God’s children—especially people of color and women and gay and lesbian persons—can be fully included in the life and work of the church. It’s hard work and it’s radical work, and it’s controversial work, just like the gospel. And it’s necessary work if we truly want to build the kingdom of God.

The Episcopal Church faces a difficult task now—the task of balancing what it sees as its prophetic witness to ALL of God’s children with the demands of church leaders who see things differently. The statement from the House of Bishops this week, no matter what you think of it, is an attempt to do this, and we have to live with it for now. But that does not change God’s call to us to close those chasms, to really see and to really include all of God’s children as full and equal members in the church, in the body of Christ.

Like the rich man and his brothers we have Moses and the prophets, and we have the one who has risen from the dead, Jesus our savior who reminds us again and again that there is no one outside the bounds of God’s love. Will we hear this message? Will we—finally—heed this call? Will we work to close the chasm that keeps out the other so that we may all be enfolded in God’s love, cradled in the bosom of Abraham?

I pray that it may be so.

AMEN

The Thirteenth Sunday after Pentecost

The Thirteenth Sunday after Pentecost
August 26, 2007 Proper 16 C
Luke 13:22-30

Many of you know that I’ve just returned from two weeks of vacation in Maine. This vacation was not the “sit quietly on the beach and read” sort of vacation; no indeed, it was more the “start early in the morning and go all day long” kind—full of fun activities of all sorts. And so it was that one bright and sunny day last week we decided to take part in a truly quintessential New England end of the summer ritual—we went to the fair. It was a wonderful fair, complete with a dazzling array of midway rides and games, 4-H’ers showing their cows and sheep, a whole barn full of prize chickens, the mouthwatering smells of cotton candy, funnel cake, fried dough, pizza, barbeque and hot dogs wafting from colorful concession stands—there were sights and sounds and smells to delight folks of all ages.

Tucked in the midst of a row of food stands we came across a small booth that didn’t quite fit in with all the rest. There were no flashing lights, no enticing smells, no hawking proprietor. Instead there was a table holding two boxes. One of them said, “Look inside to see why Jesus died” and the other, which had three doors, said “See three things God cannot do!” Beside the table a woman and several teenage girls were handing out literature. “Do you know Jesus?” it asked. “Are you saved?”

Are you saved? For many (although not all) Christians, this question about salvation is THE question. For some it is an intensely personal question: Am I saved? For others, like the proprietors of the booth at the fair, it is a matter of evangelism: Are you saved? And if not, let me tell you what you need to do. But always it seems to be a question aimed at dividing people—those who are in and those who are out—and a matter of affirming one’s own status as part of the in-group.

Of course, this question of salvation is not a new one; in fact, we hear the roots of it in today’s gospel. In our reading from Luke, Jesus is continuing his long and winding journey to Jerusalem, teaching along the way, when someone asks him, "Lord, will only a few be saved?" In his typical way, Jesus doesn’t give a completely direct answer. “Strive to enter through the narrow door, for many will try to enter and not be able.”

At first glance, Jesus’ answer might seem to imply that salvation is an exclusionary affair, available only for the select few who are able to “enter through the narrow door.” And in some ways, this may be the answer the crowd was looking for. Over the course of his travels, Jesus has been teaching about discipleship, about the kingdom of God, and those with him may have been looking for affirmation that they indeed were part of the in-group, the select. But if affirmation of their status was what they were looking for, the rest of his answer was sure to disappoint. Even those who had shared table fellowship, those who ate and drank with Jesus, might be turned away while others who come from east and west and north and south are included in God’s banquet. This sounds bad enough, but if you understand that eating together, sharing table fellowship with someone was an important marker of identity, of belonging in 1st century Palestine, you can begin to see why this answer might have shaken up some of the crowd.

What is it then that Jesus is trying to tell his followers? Perhaps the message is not that just a few will be saved, but rather that the desire to define and be part of an exclusive group is misguided. And in fact, all our efforts to define in-groups and out-groups, to say who will be saved and who won’t are likewise misguided. Because ultimately it is not up to us to determine: it is completely and entirely up to God.

Does this mean that we shouldn’t be concerned about salvation, about our faith, and how we live, that what we do doesn’t matter? I don’t think so. Jesus clearly teaches about what it means to be a disciple, about what we are called to do—it’s what he’s been teaching about all along his journey to Jerusalem. When he says, “Strive to enter through the narrow door” he is likely encouraging his followers to live a life of discipleship, with all that entails, as difficult and challenging as it may be.

But if we want to be succinct, I think we can boil it down to this: Jesus calls us to a radical love. Jesus calls us to love God and he calls us to love one another—completely, fully, without reservation, as we would love ourselves. And if we do that, truly, completely and without reservation, then we should no longer be interested in creating in-groups and out-groups. Instead we should want our neighbors—all our neighbors—to share fully in the kingdom of God with us-the kingdom we experience in the here and now and the kingdom that is to come.

That sounds so simple, so easy at first. But in fact, our radical call to love isn’t easy. In a sense, that narrow door that Jesus urges us to strive to enter is the door of that radical love. It’s a challenge to us, as it was to Jesus’ followers, to really truly include EVERYONE—people who are dirty, people who are homeless, people who are different from us, people with whom we disagree, people whom we don’t even like, people with whom we would just as soon not associate. If we can love that way and if we are really interested in salvation, we should want it just as badly for all those others as we do for ourselves.

I said that my vacation was not a “sit on the beach and read” kind of vacation, but I did read some while I was away. One of the things I read was a memoir (1) written by Kate Braestrup, a woman who after undergoing a life-changing tragedy becomes a Unitarian Universalist minister and a chaplain to the Maine Warden Service. It’s a story about her experiences in dealing with tragedy in her life and in her work, but more than that it’s a reflection on love—the radical kind of love that God calls us to.

At one point, Braestrup is talking with her 13-year-old son, Zach, who having been raised as a Unitarian, doesn’t know much about Jesus. She tells him some of the gospel stories she’s been learning about in seminary and talks abut what she sees as Jesus’ radical call to love. After listening thoughtfully for a while, Zach says to his mother, “So, Mom…. [let’s say…] I die, and because I’m a Christian, I get to go to heaven instead of hell.”

“Yeah.”

“If I really take Jesus seriously, if I really am willing to give up everything I am and everything I have in the service of love, if I am really a Christian…it seems to me I would have to give my place in heaven to someone else, someone who otherwise wouldn’t get to go.”

“I’d have to go to hell, so this other person could be in heaven. Right, Mom?” (p. 134)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I don’t really know the motivation of the women with the Jesus booth at the fair; perhaps, like Zach, they would be willing to give up their place in heaven for the salvation of another. But I am sure of this: God’s love is big enough for all of us, and Jesus calls us to live fully into that love. If we do so, we don’t have to worry about who is in and who is out, who will be saved and who won’t; we can give that over to God. And when we do that—live fully into God’s love and let God shoulder the rest—wonderful things will be in store for us and for that we give thanks to God.

AMEN

(1) Here If You Need Me, (2007). Kate Braestrup: Little Brown and Co.