Patricia Homilies

It has happened all over the world, all through history. It happened in small villages in Africa. “The traders are coming! If you don’t flee, you will be put in chains and we will never see you again!

It happened on Kristallnacht, that infamous night in 1938, when the whisper ran through Jewish neighborhoods in Germany and Austria. “The stormtroopers are coming! Wrap up your children and flee!”

And it happens from other causes unrelated to the inhumanities we sometimes impose on one another. There are tidal waves and volcanoes and incurable epidemics.

So Joseph and Mary are far from being uncommon in their escape to Egypt, making a long trek across the land seeking for a peaceful village where they can raise their son, where Joseph can find work to support his family, and where Mary can find a community of women to help and support her.

They are, in fact, like émigrés everywhere, crossing borders in the hope of making better, safer lives for themselves. Perhaps Egypt at that time welcomed in the tired and the poor, the homeless and the tempest-tossed, those longing to be free.

After a time, the family must make the trek again, still in the face of danger, finally settling in Nazareth.

Scholars have argued for ages over Nazareth—did it exist? And what does “Nazorean” mean? Is it a play on words, meaning someone coming from Nazareth, or does it refer to a related word, which means “sprout”?

If it’s the latter, it is probably a reference to Isaiah: There shall come forth a shoot from the stump of Jesse, and a branch shall grow out of his roots.

Or maybe it means Nazirite, another disputed word which, depending on the times, was a disparaging term for a heretical Hebrew sect—that is, Christian; or meant someone dedicated for a time to a disciplined life; or. . .

But in the real world, Joseph is desperately searching for food for the family; looking for hides and tent-poles to house them. Mary is trying to keep clothing clean and mended, trying to keep up her strength for the long road ahead.

This morning, Fr. Jim talked about the general feeling of relief that some have over Christmas being “over,” so to speak; of things getting back to “normal.” And he set me to thinking about what “normal” is.

Part of normal is that retailers are already setting out spring items—go to Michael’s, go to Hobby Lobby or Kohl’s, and you’ll see what I mean. One celebration over with, and another one to begin.

And I think that while the desire for the celebration of new life is on the right track, it has been misconstrued, reinterpreted as the pastel hues of paper flowers and the chink of cash registers. And will be reinterpreted again into hearts for Valentine’s Day, plastic shamrocks for St. Patrick’s Day, red, white, and blue teeshirts for the 4^th of July, and so on throughout the year. In short, in “normal” times, the celebrations never do end.

But that really is the truth. For Mary and Joseph, celebrating the birth of the Son really does never end.

That’s what “normal” means. It means commitment—taking on faith, as that couple did so long, long ago, the responsibility and the joy of the Christ child.

It means being counter-cultural, walking a long road with Christ, no matter what our neighbors say, the ones who think that “normal” is wrapping the child away with the tinsel and the toys.

It means that the child will be with us through thick and thin, joy and hardship, laughter and pain.

HOMILY DEC. 26^TH

Many moons ago, I was convinced that every sermon I heard was a call to the diaconate, even though knew that Fr. Peter couldn’t have been preaching every sermon at me. It finally grew irresistible, of course. So I finally concluded that at least some of what I heard was probably not what was really said.

Which is why I begin with an apology. Because this morning Fr Peter’s excellent sermon sent me away with a lot to think about. But you may not have heard what I heard.

I focused on the idea of the transformation of light into enlightenment.

And I’ve been pondering the 18^th century, the Age of Enlightenment. It was less a set of ideas than it was a set of values. At its core was a critical questioning of traditional institutions, customs, and morals, and a strong belief in rationality

Alexander Pope, in An Essay on Man, is a good spokesperson to turn to. Here’s what he says:

Of systems possible, if 'tis confest

That wisdom infinite must form the best,

Where all must fall or not coherent be,

And all that rises rise in due degree;

Then in the scale of reas'ning life 'tis plain

There must be, somewhere, such a rank as Man:

And all the question (wrangle e'er so long)

Is only this,--if God has placed him wrong?

Cease, then, nor Order imperfection name;

Our proper bliss depends on what we blame.

Know thy own point: this kind, this due degree

Of blindness, weakness, Heav'n bestows on thee.

Submit: in this or any other sphere,

Secure to be as bless'd as thou canst bear;

Safe in the hand of one disposing Power,

Or in the natal or the mortal hour.

All Nature is but Art unknown to thee;

All chance direction, which thou canst not see;

All discord, harmony not understood;

All partial evil, universal good:

And spite of Pride, in erring Reason's spite,

One truth is clear, Whatever is, is right.

That is one kind of Enlightenment.

The other kind is different.

With Christ’s birth, the light has come into the world, and that is truly what we are celebrating. But it is not physical light that we are talking about, but rather a way of seeing something, of understanding.

And what we see, I heard Fr. Peter say, what we are given to understand, is the way to transform the world into the way it should be. Christ gives us the impetus, shows us the way to make a profound difference. But it is dangerous, incredibly dangerous.

And as I sit here thinking of the path the Christ child will grow up to take, I wonder. . .

Why it was so dangerous to freely heal anyone who is ill. No appointment necessary—the day of the week doesn’t matter. No question about where the suffering person came from. No need for payment.

· Why it was so dangerous to feed the hungry, to distribute food to whoever was in need.

· Why it was so dangerous to question why commerce had infiltrated the church, to bar the money-lenders and profit-takers from accosting the worshippers.

· Why it was so dangerous to empower the poor folk—shepherds and widows, strangers and fishermen.

Those are the paths of love for others that lead to the crucifixion. And I could go on and so, I am sure, can you.

The Age of Enlightenment didn’t really have the answers. And while we can talk about how attractive power is and wealth and control, we don’t really have the answers either. Because if we did, there would be no poor among us. The hungry would be fed and comfort given to those who suffer.

Yet we have been given an inestimable gift, the gift of light—the understanding not so much of answers, of the whys and wherefores, but rather the understanding of action—of what to do to transform the world.

Walking on the path of Love may indeed be dangerous. It means walking with Faith, our arms linked with her sisters Hope and Charity. And it is what gives us the incredible joy of acting as the Christ-light in the world. Amen.

Once upon a time, in a distant kingdom, long, long ago, someone raised the mountains until their peaks glistened with joy and their heads were adorned with clouds. He curved out the valleys and drew out the high waters tumbling down into rivers.

Once upon a time, long, long, ago, he cleared the ground and tilled the rich brown earth with such loving care that even a tiny seed, falling on his fields of praise, would stretch out its roots and its arms and raise its head to the glory of the warm sun.

And the people who were there marveled at the light and the air. They raised barns and roofs, left their footprints on paths for their children to walk on, and took simplicity as their daily bread. It’s Dylan Thomas who gives us a glimpse of what it was like:

And all the sun long it was running, it was lovely, the hay
Fields high as the house, the tunes from the chimneys, it was air
And playing, lovely and watery
And fire green as grass. . . .
And then to awake, and the farm, like a wanderer white
With the dew, come back, the cock on his shoulder: it was all
Shining, it was Adam and maiden,
The sky gathered again
And the sun grew round that very day.

And after that came the golds and browns of the harvest, the smell of hay and the sweet tang of the fruit. And their hearts were swayed, and they rejoiced only in the bountiful table spread before them. They forgot about the strait and narrow paths they were laying for their children; they stretched out their arms as far as they could and gathered in the earth’s goodness for themselves.

And soon their houses grew larger to hold all their treasures; they tore apart the mountains for the glimmering gold and mined the sea for oil.

And those tiny seeds that took such joy in the sun and rain grew parched and shriveled, putting out fruit that nourished no one. Briars and thorns grew up, poor shelter for those who began to walk the land without food or homes.

Well. Where do we go with such a parable? The myth of the golden age is a lovely one, but perhaps it is just that—a myth.

But it is troubling, nonetheless, because it raises some good questions. It seems that the one who planted the vineyard had rather high expectations of his tenants.

If they were just stewards—that is, guardians, rather than owners—were they really expected to roll up their sleeves and work with each other for a common goal?

Were they supposed to take care of that land as if it belonged to them, to turn the harvest of the grape into the harvest of the soul? To bring warm blankets to their needy neighbors with as much joy as they lavished the warm earth around their own vines? To bring food to the hungry with as much care as they watered and fed their crops?

Were they to welcome in strangers—with their odd dress, their shawls and scarves and djellebahs, with their faces darkened by the sun or bleached by the sea, whether rich or poor, slave or free, male or female (Galatians 3:38) and share with them the fruits of their labor?

We, of course, are those stewards, holding the land in trust. And when the real owner comes, may we come forward with shining faces and outstretched hands, saying, “Welcome home! Here is our harvest—these happy children, these strong, loving families, all rolling up their sleeves and pitching in to put a roof over every head and food upon every table. Here is our harvest— the joy of creative work, teaching and building, painting and medicine—more than can be named! Can’t you see the pathways we’ve laid for those to come?”

Oh Lord, may we be given the grace and the strength and the courage to make that myth of the golden future come true.

Vespers Homily 15 Pentecost PR18 MATTHEW 18:15-20

“It looks like Greenwich Village in the ‘60’s!” said the person next to me, as I peered in the window of one of those eclectic shops that carry everything from hand-woven head scarves to blown glass witch-balls, from organic chocolate to stationery made from scraps of linen and flax.

He was talking about the scene in the park behind me, in the center of downtown Asheville. There was a lot going on, as the wisp of fragrance in the air suggested; a lot more than the hula hoops, music, and laughter.

“I saw that in the ‘60’s too,” I thought, as I turned back to the window. I saw it from the perspective of someone who had lived in the Village, who really had worn flowers in her hair, really did think—still do--that peace is possible, really did think—still do--that a thread of creative love runs through the universe. But my view was from the periphery, from the perspective of one who grieved over the way the cult of Timothy Leary twisted the idealism, inserted LSD and other false promises between so many members of my generation and the goals they might have achieved.

My eyes fastened on the Howrah Women’s Association motto painted on the wall of the shop. “We bind our hands together with the sacred thread of unity, Muslims, Sikhs, Hindus alike come all and work together for peace, friendship and unity.” Insert Christians and Jews and all other shades of belief in that statement and I’d be happy, I thought.

Asheville is a town of many contrasts. The day before we had visited the Basilica of St. Lawrence, that faithful deacon who was martyred during the Valerian persecutions in 258. He was the one who, when told to give the wealth of the church to the emperor, gathered up the poor, the lame, the hungry, and the suffering, and presented them as the treasures of the church.

There, hanging in the main entrance of the basilica was another motto, a banner whose cloth was woven into a loving proclamation. “Pray for Priests” it read: and the words “faithfulness” and “sacrificial love” were bound together in sacred unity. In the center were chalice and bread, the sacred heart aflame behind them.

Further back, in a small side chapel, there was a poster. “You go down on your knees and acknowledge your nothingness,” it read; “and you arise a priest forever.”

Well. Between that time, when I really was moved beyond words, and tonight, when I really must use words to move, I have pondered the last sentence in our reading from Matthew.

It is an old statement that has its roots in what is called the Pirkei Aboth, or the Sayings of the Fathers of the Synagogue, a compilation of oral commentary on the Torah. And here is what it says:

"If two sit together and there are no words of the Torah between them, this is the seat of the scornful, . . . but if two sit together and there are words of the Torah between them, the Shekinah rests between them.” And the Shekinah is, of course, the presence of God.

So, if we truly are members of the priesthood of all believers—what happens when two or three are gathered in one place? The hula hoops and the hoop-la are a distraction, as is the self that intrudes with its everlasting demands for attention.

If we truly are members of the priesthood of all believers, then peace really is possible, because we help spin the thread of creative love that binds all peoples together.

If we truly believe that we are to follow Christ’s faithfulness and sacrificial love—

If we have the courage to go down on our knees and acknowledge our own nothingness—

then we too will sit together with St. Lawrence’s treasures of the church, and Christ himself is there. Amen.

“For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father who is in heaven.”

That is the phrase that has remained in my heart. It is written there in large letters and small letters, in all forms of type—italics and boldface, in Calibri, Garamond, Brush Script, and Verdani—you name it. These fonts are like the faces of the crowds that pour out of the subway in NY at rush hour, jumbled, almost indistinguishable, until you quietly take them one by one. And then they settle into their own individualities, their own spirits showing forth in the expressions on their faces, in their reactions—almost like the swirls and serifs that create a font.

In any case, that phrase has remained with me, perhaps because recently I’ve been thinking about what we see. My own eyes are growing weaker—I now have to wear reading glasses to do the crossword puzzle, a fact that sends me scurrying from one end of the house to the other to find the very glasses I can’t see to find.

And perhaps the eyes of the culture are growing weaker in a different way. Last week someone came up to me, horrified and still shaking—she had almost run over a student who, intent on her cell phone, had stepped off the curb in front of her car.

Is it the dining room table with its paper flower arrangement at Heritage House? It is transformed into the altar of God when Peter+ celebrates the Eucharist there. Is it the shaky gait and uneven speech of the young woman who comes to worship? She loves to help unpack the bag, carefully fitting the candles in the candlesticks and moving the salt and pepper shakers. She grinned last week when I told her she was my helper, my acolyte.

The list goes on forever. There is always something hidden behind whatever we think we see. It is the center of the labyrinth that gives rest when all the walking is done; it is the core of the multi-faceted prism that shines a rainbow into the room.

Without that core, there is nothing—only show, only flesh and blood. It is, I think, no accident that Jesus’s question about who he is is framed by the city of Caesarea Philippi. Here these dusty pilgrims pause to look up at that great administrative capital, crowned with a white marble temple. Here they would have seen a great spring gushing down the mountainside from a limestone cave dedicated to the worship of the god Pan.

Ah, but that is the “flesh and blood” account of the view. Dig deeper, and you find that the spring tumbles down into the Huela marshes, source of the Jordan river. The Jordan, where gushing waters from a pagan spring are transformed by John, who baptized Jesus there.

Dig deeper, and you find out more about how radical, how life-changing, how significant Peter’s moment of blessed clarity is. This city, named to honor Emperor Caesar Augustus, is replaced by a new kingdom, built upon the rock of Peter: it is a safe and glorious kingdom, over which death has no dominion.

And why is that? Well, let’s ask the god Pan--who do we say he is? Why he is the god of shepherds and flocks, a fertility symbol, depicted with the legs and horns of a goat.

Truly, flesh and blood reveal just so much. We are flesh—made of dust, our very mortality knit into our bones and sinews. But it is the ruach, the breath of God that transforms us, transforms us utterly.

It is the spirit of God that is written on our hearts, that animates our souls, that shines through our skins, whether they are the rich brown of the earth or carry the pale sheen of satin; whether our skins are creased by age or smoothed by the suppleness of youth; whether they are stretched tight over the bones of poverty or enfold the riches of wealth.

And it is with the eyes of Peter, who looked through the dusty garments of his enigmatic leader and saw the Son of God, that we need look around us.

And we pray that we can focus, that we can really see well enough to reply, “You too are the child of God.”

“This is the best of all possible worlds!” the philosopher Pangloss says over and over again in Voltaire’s [work] Candide. And he says it in the face of flood, fire, and famine; he says it to the unbelieving stares of his compatriots; and he almost does the innocent and pliable Candide in, by that philosophy.

Some falling stones had wounded Candide. He lay stretched in the street covered with rubbish.

"This concussion of the earth is no new thing," answered Pangloss. "The city of Lima, in America, experienced the same convulsions last year; the same cause, the same effects; there is certainly a train of sulphur under ground from Lima to Lisbon." [Pangloss never lifts a finger—just stands there arguing.]

"Nothing more probable," said Candide; "but for the love of God a little oil and wine."

"How, probable?" replied the philosopher. "I maintain that the point is capable of being demonstrated."

While Pangloss never really learns, Candide does—he learns the hard way that we must indeed roll up our sleeves and make use of all the benefits that we have been given. At the end he realizes that the smallest gesture has untold consequences, that “we must cultivate our gardens.” Candide learns that while we are given a mustard seed, we must plant it; that we may have yeast at hand, but must knead it if we want bread; that treasure is at our fingertips, but we need reach out our hands for it.

So. We do not have a mustard seed, a grain of yeast, or a pearl at hand, but we might follow that thread and ask, what is the use of a single stitch?

[do it] By itself it is useless, a mere loop of the string of fate. It goes nowhere, leads to nothing; it can’t even hold its own under the force of a determined tug.

What good is one knitted square, we might ask? I guess it could serve as a potholder, or a hat. But really, it’s no good at all.

Except when you take another stitch . . . well, again, what good is that single stitch? Followed by another, and another, you can pull the thread and stuff the head and –lo and behold, if you work at it a bit longer, you will have—a bunny!

A single stitch turned into a bunny rabbit. A single stitch transformed into a toy that will bring joy to a child at the Haven, in the Dominican. A tangible, countable thing transformed into laughter and love.

So this is the parable of the single stitch, that a knitter made, who showed it to Julia, who sent it to me, who gave it to the Stitchers of Love.

With God’s grace, which makes all things grow, if we reach out our hands to others even in the smallest imaginable way, we have the power to help transform this world into the best of all possible worlds—which is, the kingdom of heaven. Amen.

I have a friend who is gracious and compassionate, and has a strong sense of fair play. She listens to both sides—really listens—before she makes up her mind.

But a green thumb she does not have, and she’s the first to admit it. Some years ago, her mother gave her a potted shamrock, which has clung to life through thick and thin. Every so often, she’ll bring it to me for what we’ve taken to calling “spa treatment.”

The last time it happened, I thought, “This is it! It will never revive!” It had two leaves, which were bravely hanging on; and the soil was parched.

But I tried anyway. First, a repotting and cleaning out the drainage holes of the old planter, which were stuffed with the remnants of things past. Then enough water to run freely through, and taste of some lovely organic plant food I found somewhere last year or so. Finally, a window sill with enough light, but not too much; the poor thing had been burned by the sun.

So I moved it around from sill to sill, and—yes, I talked to it. All things are possible, I said; and here you are safe.

And . . . lo and behold! When shamrocks grow, they put up tiny green stems bent in half like a hairpin, with a miniscule leaf cluster at the end. There it was! And another, and another, so that when my friend returned from her trip, there were at least a dozen healthy and happy leaves.

So back home it went. But I started to think about that shamrock, and the soil it grew in. And I wonder. Wonder how much is given, and how much we are expected to do.

Think of it. That fine, crumbly dust that was so stirred by the ruach, by God’s own breath, that it raised its head and then stood on its own two feet. There it was, with the stewardship of the whole world put into its hands, setting out on a path paved with—what?

We’re not the only one on this path. There are other people, too. Some go wandering away into the wilderness—you can see the faint trails through the grass. Others sit, exhausted, hungry for the word of the kingdom that they had grasped so fleetingly. And what are we to do? Pass them by?

On that path there is rocky ground to trip you up. It is rather bleak—the land is parched and clogged with good intentions not fulfilled, with bad decisions and angry words. And those who fall by the wayside are hot and disgruntled, coping with pain and tribulation, sorrow and unanswered questions. What are we to do? Leave them without hope or help?

Others stumble along with the weight of possessions on their backs. These are the ones who, I expect, never had ears to listen to what Thoreau said in his work Walden—“a man is rich in proportion to the number of things which he can afford to let alone.” The cares of the world and delight in riches—these are the thorns that pierce to death, not that triumphal crown of thorns.

Let us go back to that dust, to that good earth, that we are made of, and search for what was planted in us. Those disciples who stood with Jesus and looked out over the great crowds that followed—we, we are those disciples today, we are God’s own stewards, standing before our neighbors. And if we have ears to hear and eyes to see, we will find the answer to what we should do. It is there, in the seed that was sown in us. It is the Word itself, the Word that blossoms in the face of all adversity.

“Please, Miss, please, tell me when the lady with the cup is coming again.” The woman in the wheelchair tugged at the arm of our prize-winning volunteer at Heritage House.

Frances laughed at herself as she told me about the encounter some time ago. “The lady with the cup,” she thought. “I have no idea! I wonder if she’s thirsty?”

And then it dawned on her. This was one of the dear souls who come to the monthly communion service. It’s like an off-campus parish, an extension of our own Christ Church family. And what that woman wanted to know was when we were coming back.

When we’re there, we set up on one of the tables in the dining room. So we begin by moving salt and pepper shakers and the little paper flower that is the centerpiece. And we never know who will be there, although there are some regulars.

The large lady in the wheelchair, the one who proudly wears a little picture of her grandbaby on the collar of her dress. The tiny lady with her hair in a twist, whose hands are too shaky to hold the bulletin. What things she has seen in her 101 years! And the man who finally decided to trust me enough to smile back at me. He told me that he never learned to read.

Oh it’s a world, a different world, a world where tears are hidden right behind the surface, and where amazing people in the guise of regular folk work in the kitchen, clean the halls, give medicine. Where they are the hands and feet and ears and eyes for those they help. Where Tan and Debra set up birthday parties and bingo, singalongs and bible studies.

Where we are warmly welcomed. And we aren’t prophets; we hope we’re upright, but that’s not the point. We are welcomed by those who are there because they want to be fed; they come for the bread and wine. The sacrament of love.

Somewhere in the capacious heart of that woman who is so proud of her grandbaby is a thread of love, burning deep within; love for that child, love for her daughter. She smiles, and her whole face lights up. I do know that somewhere in there, because of that love, Christ is at home.

The tiny lady who has seen more than a century has gnarled hands, creased and knotted. One of them shakes uncontrollably. And she told me that she had done so much repetitive work in the factory with that hand that now it won’t hold still. But she reaches for the bread nonetheless. And in her there is a thread of determination and the understanding of hard work, something that Christ, who walked a long weary path would understand, something that He who faced the same varieties of illnesses and pains day after day would understand.

And that man who well on in years never learned to read? He knows the letters are there, and he sees the shape of the sentences; and they make no sense. But he is reading the Word nonetheless; somehow, he knows that he can come with nothing in his hands and find them filled with the spirit.

And we even have an acolyte of sorts; a young woman in her twenties, a stroke victim, helps to blow out the candles each time. She sits right up front, as close as she can get. And she is learning the responses.

It may look to the outsider as if we are welcoming these folks into the service; after all, we hold open the door and set the table. But really, it is the other way around. They are the ones doing the welcoming, welcoming Christ into their lives. Because they know what it is like to climb the Mount of Olives; they wrestle daily with pain and weakness. They are the ones who will receive their reward. They are the ones who trust in God’s unfailing love, the ones whose hearts look forward to the beautiful cup of salvation.

There is a portion of Psalm 116 that we did not read, words that are branded on my heart and soul. They are written there with the sharp pieces of twisted metal that once held the Twin Towers soaring in the sky; etched there by the pieces of bricks and mortar that fell; branded there by the red hot flames that engulfed the tourists, the office workers, the firemen on that day.

Because he inclined his ear to me, therefore I will call on him as long as I live.

The snares of death encompassed me; the pangs of Sheol laid hold on me; I suffered distress and anguish.

The problem was, those cords really did entangle me. Through a crack in the universe, I saw into the rubble of the Twin Towers. I was praying for someone trapped in a small crawl space. His leg—or maybe it was mine; I couldn’t tell—was crushed under a beam, a wall, the whole building itself. And we were gasping for air; we could smell and taste nothing but plaster and dust. And although we could see light through a tiny hole in the rubble, we knew that for us, there was no rescue.

Well. That was nine years ago. Or was it? Perhaps it is still with us. Somewhere on the cobblestone paths of memory wander ghostlike traces of that day, of the aftermath. The children’s notes pinned to the wall outside St. Paul’s Chapel, where the injured and dying were sheltered; the shoes, the torn briefcases strewn everywhere; the origami cranes sent by sympathetic mourners in Japan—oh they are all still there, these fragments of the past, wandering harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd.

So perhaps it is well not to raise these specters; perhaps it is well to concentrate on the first line of the psalm, “I love the Lord, because he has heard my voice and my supplications.”

And if we make those supplications, if we plead for the dead, the dying, and the living, what then?

Well, to begin with, that is what we are told to do—told to do so by someone whose heart was breaking over disease and sickness, whose anger was raised by bedeviling demons, whose patience was tried by those who walked in privilege and wealth.

“Ask the Lord of the Harvest,” Jesus says, “ask him to send out laborers into his fields.”

And so, while I am standing in the midst of plenty, in the safety and security of my house, with the freedom to worship God openly and the joy of going about in my red car wherever I wish, with my pantry overflowing with food—that is when the surprise comes. I am the laborer.

Go, He says. Go and proclaim the good news. Go and do what for you seems to be impossible. Cure, raise, cleanse, and cast out.

What an agenda! It seems that the good news takes determination and hard work; it seems that the good news is to be transformed into action.

it means that we do need to cure—that is, in the word’s root sense, to care, to be concerned. To be the presence of hope in the midst of illness, of despair.

And it does mean that we raise from the dead. To bring the good news of the resurrection is to shine a light in darkness, is to bring the spirit of life where there is no hope—and we can, with grace, do that.

And cleanse? Oh yes. In a sense, I think that means to sweep away the dust of old superstitions and disbeliefs and to bring the joy of a glorious promise where there was none.

And those demons? Well, in a certain sense, they are all about us—fear; unhappiness; ambition; greed; you name it. And those we must confront and cast out—first of all, in ourselves.

And then comes the really good news. It is given to the disciples; and it is given to us.

If you were the Son of God, if you were the Daughter of God, what would you do on that mountaintop?

When you were hungry, would you wave your hand over the stones and turn them into bread?

Or would you look around and see that you are not the only one who is hungry. Would you see that all of us, in our human flesh, hunger in all sorts of ways. For food, yes; food to make the thin arms and fragile bones of the Malawi babies strong so that they may plant their fields. Food to bring hope to the mothers searching for their children in Haiti, in Guatamala, in the rubble of war-torn Iraq.

Food of another kind too; the kind that makes the spirit grow. The small shred of bread and drop of wine that brings the body and the blood of Christ into our very veins, makes Him part of the very cells of our bodies. And food that is the Word itself; it is written on our hearts, it is in our mouths.

And if you were asked to prove that you were the Son of God, the Daughter of God, would you indeed throw yourself from the highest steeple you could find, confident that you would float through the air in defiance of all the laws of nature that the good Lord had established? Confident that He would so protect you that you would not even gash your finger on a sliver of wood?

Or would you recognize that your body is indeed a temple, to be cared for as if it were indeed part of your holy nature. That it is dust that is animated by the grace of God, blown through by the ruach, the breath of God, and so not to be treated lightly. Would you know in your heart of hearts that those who treat the sacredness of the body with carelessness, that those who put power and pride above life will threaten you? That the purpose is not to throw yourself down but to be raised up?

And when you were asked to do a very simple thing in order to gain power over the whole earth—when you were given permission to devote your whole life and spirit to self-gain or pride or any of those seven deadly sins (actually I think there may be more lurking in the wings)—when, in short, you were asked to spend the gift of life on the very devil himself—would you bow and scrape?

Or would you have the courage and grace to say, “Worship God only,” and know what that means.

Here, at the end, after the crucifixion, we are again on a mountain. And it is the culmination of this earlier test, the 40 days in the wilderness—or desert—that Jesus experienced after his baptism. Here is the point where indeed the stones have become bread; the angels have lifted Jesus up; and the whole earth belongs to him. Here is the point at which Jesus acknowledges who he is: “All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth.”

But it is also the point at which we, his disciples, are tested. Because just as Jesus refused the easy way of possession and power, we are given a commission that calls us to do the same thing. We cannot just assume that we will never be hungry or in danger or in want. Because we are told not just to glory in power, but to roll up our sleeves and go out and do something.

Do what? Why – Go! Go and teach!! And not just a select group of good students, but all nations. And teach, not an easy lesson to be sure, but one that is memorable—“Teach them to obey everything I have commanded you.”

Love God with all your heart, and soul, and mind, and love your neighbor as yourself. That’s the lesson.

And surely Christ will be in you and around you and with you to the end of the age. AMEN!

Well, apologies to Dylan Thomas, of course. But when I was indeed green and carefree, I packed my bags and boarded a ship called the Groote Beer. I had wanted to go around the world on a tramp freighter; but assistant editors weren’t paid much in those days for all the reams of typewritten copy they generated. So a student ship to Amsterdam was the way to go.

And so I bedded down in the women’s dormitory in the veritable bowels of the ship, right under the galley—I’d wake up each morning to sound of the Italian cooks shouting to one another and banging pots and ladles. I’d get dressed as fast as I could—when the mirror dips one way and you the other, the best thing is to get topside as fast as possible.

I went alone, of course; I’m rather like what Dennis calls a fermion, a quantum particle that likes to be by itself. I love you all dearly, by the way; and I enjoy being with you; but to get recharged, as it were, I need to sit quietly under a fig tree, rather like Nathaniel, before Philip came to find him and take him to meet Jesus.

Besides, I wanted to go to art galleries and museums, plays and historic buildings, and I wanted to travel at my own speed. So city by city, I’d check into a student hostel, pull out my maps, and plan my visit. And I rarely got lost! Maps were my salvation. Don’t laugh, anyone.

But then, many years later, Dennis & I traveled to Turkey. And together, with no guide, we walked into the Souk. Imagine all the street markets in China gathered into rows along narrow streets. Imagine an enormous yard sale set up in tiny shops along narrow streets, the owners outside persuading, inveigling, daring you to come in and buy.

There is no map. Oh the natives know where to go—it is bred in the bone, inscribed in the heart from the time they are young. But for us? No map.

So with some trepidation, you simply put one foot before the other. Ahead there are flowers spilling out of one store and furniture out of another; tools, tires, hats, clothing, books, papers, lamps—well, you name it.

And in the midst of all that, a narrow shop comes into view, its bins and burlaps stuffed with spices, the fragrance pulling you in, swirling around you. Beautiful ground spices, all yellow and red, brown and green. The single beam of sunlight –how did it make its way through that narrow swatch of sky—makes the dust in the air dance with golden joy.

You have to see it. You have to try the scariest thing of all—go without a map, let your heart and mind and soul discern where the treasure is.

And that is what Thomas must learn. “We don’t know the way,” says this practical man, speaking, I think, for many of us.

And Jesus answers with one of the great “I am” statements. “"I am the way, and the truth, and the life.”

Frightening and exhilarating. “I am the way.” And Jesus goes on: “those who believe in me will also do the works that I do.”

“Show us,” says Philip. But we don’t have what Thomas really is asking for, a map, a list of laws, like the 613 laws in Leviticus. So much easier to check them off, one by one.

No, instead we are called to action—“ those who believe in me will also do the works that I do,” says Jesus. And then we are plunged back into the confusing hubbub of the world, crowds pushing and shouting. We have neighbors right and left and sideways, all wanting, all needing something. Feed us, they say – and how can we make those loaves and fishes plentiful enough? Heal us, they say – and how can we learn enough, be inventive enough, to reach out and heal them? Comfort us, they say – and how can our arms stretch far enough?

And the streets are narrow and the noise is overwhelming and distractions are all around us. But somehow, if we are really trying to follow the way, really trying to see what is right in front of us, really aware of the living Christ in everyone we meet, something extraordinary will happen.

We will catch the scent of spices drifting our way; and we will find our way to where, into the darkness streams a golden sunbeam, the light of resurrection grace.

The fig tree. Trees abound in the Old Testament. They sprout in the sacred pagan groves in the mountains; they flourish in the oases, giving shade and water to nomadic peoples; they are the bearers of good fruit; they are the backbone of Solomon’s temple. The roots of these trees, which seem to sprout from the tree of Knowledge of good and evil in Genesis, find their flowering in the “tree” on which Jesus was crucified. So perhaps it is no wonder that marvelous things happen in these “thin” places under trees, where heaven and earth touch. After all, Abraham entertained three angels under the Oaks of Mamre; and Deborah sat as a judge under the palm tree before she energized the nation to vanquish Sisera.

And Nathaniel sits under a fig tree when he is called. It is quiet there, I imagine; the trunk gnarled and the leaves green, with the promise of fruit in the budding branches. Perhaps Nathaniel is still enough that curious animals come to investigate, sniffing the aroma of his scented clothing, cocking an inquisitive eye at the Torah he is studying.

There he sits, pondering the law of Moses, the Pentateuch, the first five books of the bible. Perhaps he holds a parchment rolled on two wooden poles—in the Temple, those would be the “Etz Chaim,” Hebrew for “Tree of Life.” Nathaniel, an Israelite in whom is no guile, would know where that phrase comes from: the Book of Proverbs, which says that Torah “is a Tree of Life to those who cleave to it” (3:18).

And then, in the midst of this blessed space where all time and space converge, where Nathaniel is sitting with Abraham and the angels, comes Philip.

“We’ve found him!” he says exultantly. “It’s Jesus, the one Moses and the prophets wrote about!”

He might as well have shouted, “Stop reading and come and see the real tree of life, the Messiah himself, the Word made Flesh!”

No wonder Nathaniel gets up and goes to see, despite his momentary quibble. Nazareth? the Tree of Life coming from Nazareth, that small town that lay on the Roman road to Jerusalem, that place—perhaps like Valdosta in the 1950’s—where travelers stopped to get their carts repaired or to pick up some food for the long journey to the city.

Nathaniel is like that wise one who figures in a Jewish midrash about the world to come. As the story goes, the Tree of Life is surrounded by a thick hedge formed by the tree of knowledge; and only the wise one who clears a path for himself by studying Torah will approach that Tree of Life.

But once you approach that Tree, nothing will ever be the same again. “Come and see!” says Philip. Studying the Word is important; but come and see. Come and see a new sacred place, a still point where the heavens open and God’s own Spirit flows upon the Son of Man.

And your life will be changed, totally and completely changed. Studying under the fig tree is good. But when you find the Son of God—rather, when he finds you—your world is turned upside down. The words of Torah become charged with energy. The words of the law that used to follow in fine array across the page, one word decorously following the other,

Taking its place to support the others,
The word neither diffident nor ostentatious,
An easy commerce of the old and the new,
The common word exact without vulgarity,
The formal word precise but not pedantic

--those words of Torah, I say, burst out like the fig tree in bloom. They are written in the fine bones of the hungry, they are woven into the very sinews of the needy, they pour out like tears from those who grieve. You will see those words fold themselves into the very rags that clothe those who have nothing.

I’m not sure how much decorating we will do this Christmas. For me, the garland will be the smile on my husband’s face; and the holiday music is the sound of friends’ voices. My Christmas china is my usual Pomona, a Portmeirion design bearing the fruit of all seasons. And I think the real celebration will be right here at Christ Church with the glorious promise of a new beginning offered freely and generously in the bread and the wine.

But now in the third Sunday of Advent we are at the still point, suspended in time somewhere between the promise and the fulfillment. We are

At the still point of the turning world. Neither flesh nor fleshless;
Neither from nor towards; at the still point, there the dance is,
But neither arrest nor movement. And do not call it fixity,
Where past and future are gathered. Neither movement from nor towards,
Neither ascent nor decline. Except for the point, the still point,
There would be no dance, and there is only the dance.

But what does John the Baptist say? John the prophet, holding out the promise; John the believer, preparing the way for the fulfillment.

John, out there in the wilderness, away from the noise and turmoil of everyday life, with nothing but the rustle of animals in the underbrush and the song of the birds to distract him. I wonder whether he had planned simply to sit still, enjoying the kind of peace we all crave during this season of jangling jingle bells and incessant sales.

But that wasn’t possible, because he was called—called to create a path, making the rough places plain for others by walking—dancing, Eliot might say— in his forbears’ footsteps.

Breathed on by God’s own breath and called by God’s own still, small voice, he came out of the peaceful wilderness to face a crowd of regular folks. I would guess they were noisy, with children crying for lunch and parents tired of walking; folks worrying about missing days at work and others limping in pain; and everyone worried about a host of questions and perplexities that overflowed in their hearts and minds.

Like John, they had all walked their way through a wilderness—many, through a personal soul-shattering wilderness. They had pushed through a thicket of troubles; they had lost their way and questioned their purpose.

No wonder they hoped John was Elijah; no wonder they hoped he was the Messiah, a savior who would rescue them from the thorns and tangles of their lives.

And maybe, as they thought about their past, they recognized that indeed, they had not loved the Lord their God with all their hearts and minds and souls. They weren’t thieves, but they had fudged; weren’t murderers, but had turned away from the needy. They hadn’t exactly worshipped Baal, but they certainly had pursued things instead of God. So even if John exaggerated a bit—surely they weren’t as bad as a brood of vipers!—they felt ashamed enough of their own serpentine twistings and turnings and repentant enough to feel the bite of sin.

The answer is commonplace. No need to give up the world and all that is in it; no need to become hermits. Just—be radical (a lovely word that means going to the essentials, the roots of things). Return to the basics, John says: give to the poor; feed the hungry; be honest; try to live on your own wages and don’t break faith with others.

And wonder of wonders! John’s advice is the kind that would help create a Promised Land right in any day or age. Act justly, love mercy, and walk humbly with your God. Doing all that would cut down thickets of selfishness, the thorns of dissention, the hard-heartedness of indifference.

So what should we do? With John, we are to prepare the way; to turn the purple of repentance into the rose of hope.

Now and here is the still point, the place where all journeys begin. Now and here is where the dance begins, one that celebrates a new birth, a new beginning. Now and here is the time for the fire of the Holy Spirit to blaze so brightly in our hearts that it shines on the paths of our brothers and sisters, that they too may find their way out of the wilderness.

We heard that in this morning’s reading. “Follow me”--the two most frightening and exhilarating words in any language.

This evening, that phrase might be replaced by another: “Come when called.” Every good dog, snuffling under the table near his master’s feet, knows that rule. Every child, heedlessly running into traffic, knows that rule. But adults? That’s another story altogether.

The candles are lit, the table is set, and the invitations go out. And they are from the king himself. What an honor to be chosen! But, as Mark tells us, the guests “would not come.”

They are indifferent, perhaps. And it is the kind of indifference that T. S. Eliot describes as akin to death; it is like “Being between two lives—unflowering, between / The live and the dead nettle.”

But the King is patient. So he sends out other servants with more details about the feast, perhaps thinking that if they really understood how well they would be fed—if they could only smell the succulent odors wafting through the hall—they would come.

But this time the invited guests laugh. They have more important things to do: “I have to wash my car,” says one. “There’s a big sale at Belk’s,” says another. “I have papers to grade, forms to fill out, meetings to attend,” cry a host of others. “We can’t be bothered with festivities.”

Others become downright hostile --they accost the King’s servants and drag them away. At that point, can’t you just see the gargoyles at Gehenna grimacing with glee?

Then, something strange happens. The King is angry—rightly so—but he does not slam the doors shut or cancel the feast. Rather, he pronounces judgment: “Those invited were not worthy.” Those are the ones who created their own gods out of whatever they loved best—their own position or ambition, or belongings. Those are the ones who danced around the golden calf. Those are the ones who will utter that chilling cry, “Crucify Him!”

And then this King—this patient king, who knows what suffering is, who knows what poverty and illness are, who knows what it means to have no roof over his head—this King throws open his doors to whoever is willing to come. He invites them all--both bad and good. He invites the fellow in the Gucci suit and the one in the tattered shirt and torn pants. He finds a seat for the woman in pearls and the bag lady in the crazy hat.

And then looking around at all of his guests, he sees one out of place. “How did you get in here without a wedding garment?” he asks.

And we are speechless too. What are we supposed to wear? We thought that everyone was welcome—rich or poor, black or white, even good or bad. And we hesitated before coming—we remembered the angry word, the lie, the unfair business deal. And we felt unworthy. But still . . . the light from the candles, the joyful music, the abundance of good food . . . and above all the open-handed hospitality, the sense of being needed no matter what: all that made our other activities seem meaningless.

And so we came, as Eliot might say, “With the drawing of this Love and the voice of this / Calling.”

And if we are wearing the proper garments—whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just; whatever is pure, pleasing and commendable—if we are wearing the cloak ripped in half to warm someone at night; the tee shirt made dusty by building someone a home; the skirt stained with the soup that fed the child in need—

You see them everywhere. Men standing at the edge of the road, their hands in their pockets, their caps pulled over their eyes. They wear worn-out jeans and tee shirts, and shoes that have seen the dust of cropland and construction work. We saw them in Russia, outside of Moscow; they were Chechnians, we were told, looking for work. We’ve seen them in New York, in Philadelphia, in Valdosta, standing under bridges and at gas stations. Many are Hispanic, and they are looking for work. Many have wives, who, if they are lucky, are down on their knees scrubbing someone’s floor while their husbands are out in the blazing sun.

And we’ve heard them called shiftless and lazy; we’ve heard that they take jobs away from good, hard-working folk.

Yet when Jesus found them standing there, I wonder what he saw. Was it hunger? Was it the shadow of despair? Whatever it was, he hired them—five times over, the last time at the eleventh hour, the last possible chance. And he paid them all at the same rate! Shouldn’t the first hired, the ones who had pulled and pushed and sweated and gotten torn by brambles and reddened by the sun, whose muscles were complaining and whose hands were sore, shouldn’t they have earned five times as much as those shiftless folk who came in for the last hour?

I wonder, for instance, whether the families who came late to the wedding in Cana were offered water instead of wine. After all, no matter why they arrived late—a sick child; a camel that stumbled; a forgotten appointment—their tent was pitched pretty far from the one at the center, where the well-dressed merrymakers held court.

And speaking of water, I wonder whether there was enough water in the Jordan to baptize all those who came, especially the stragglers . . . a foolish question, perhaps, but . . . after all, some arrived just at the eleventh hour there too. They heeded John’s call to repentance, but perhaps it took a bit longer than it should have. (Look in the back of the crowd—that’s me, waving.) And no matter how many--the venial sinner and the mortal sinner, the respectable and the notorious—no matter how many crowded around this honey-bearded prophet, the water flowed and flowed with generous currents over all those who knelt there.

And what happened when Jesus looked around and suddenly realized that he had invited 5000—actually more, if you count the women and children—to dinner? Given the prospect of that many guests, a pantry stocked with five loaves and two fish would scare even the capable housewife we heard about this morning, the one more precious than jewels. Yet at the end of the feast there were twelve basketsful left. And with that kind of bounty, even the thresher, fresh from the fields; even the shoemaker, who had just stitched the last leather strap on a shoe; even the mother, loathe to leave her child ill with fever; all of these, rushing to the outskirts of the crowd at the eleventh hour, all of these were satisfied.

“Take, eat. This is my body, given for you.” The invitation at the Last Supper holds no sense of hierarchy, no hint that the bread was broken in smaller pieces for the disciples who sat at the far end of the table, no hint that Nathaniel received a crumb while Peter received a mouthful.

The invitation at the Last Supper holds no hint that the body that was broken, that the promise that was given, that the life that was glorified, is offered in smaller measure to those who, at the eleventh hour, turn and say “My Lord and my God.”

A friend called me this past Friday. She had had a very busy week, watching over a mutual friend of ours who is hospitalized. And while I shared some of the time with her, she really was the one who was always there, two steps ahead of everyone else.

“Take care of yourself too,” we had said to each other the last time we met, and then laughed. It was the pot calling the kettle black, we decided.

But on Friday she called me to find out whether all was well, whether I had baked my cake and finished my sermon for Jim’s ordination. She had to do the entire service for the little church in Adel where she is the shepherd, and so we talked about that; talked about the loads of laundry waiting for us and some of the other household things we needed to do.

This is someone with a loving, caring heart; a person who, I thought, would be first in line to share her oil to help light the lamp of someone standing in the darkness. And so reading again the parable of the wise and foolish virgins, I wondered. Aren’t we told to love our neighbor as ourselves? Aren’t we told to feed the hungry and help those in need? Why, then, are the ones with plenty of oil praised, while the others consigned – quite literally—to darkness?

Forget about the number 10, all the commentators advised me; focus on the message of being prepared.

Lovely, liquid oil; thick and gleaming, it permeates many a verse in the Old and New Testaments. This is what the Lord commanded Moses to burn in the tabernacle:

"And you shall command the people of Israel,” says the Lord, “that they bring to you pure beaten olive oil for the light, that a lamp may be set up to burn continually.” (Exodus 27)

This is holy oil, the oil of miracles. In the Second Temple in Jerusalem, where there was oil to fill the menorah—the 7-branched oil lamp—for only one day, it burned for eight days.

Oil is used in all traditions—in Hindu temples and in Orthodox churches, where the sanctuary lamp and the icons are illuminated. For Muslims, the olive tree is holy, and its oil is used for anointing. There is a wonderful verse in the Koran:

"God is the light of heavens and earth. An example of His light is like a lantern inside which there is a torch, the torch is in a glass bulb, the glass bulb is like a bright planet lit by a blessed olive tree, neither Eastern nor Western. Its oil almost glows, even without fire touching it, light upon light. God guides unto His light those that will [to be guided]; and [to this end] God propounds parables unto all people, since God [alone] has full knowledge of all things.”

It is that statement—“God guides unto His light those that will [to be guided]”—that gives us our clue.

Oil means light. Christ himself warns us against putting our lamps under a bushel basket. Christ, who wants everyone to see the light. Christ, who says that our eyes are the lamps of our bodies; when our eye is sound, our whole body is full of light; but when it is not sound, our body is full of darkness.

And that is the clue, of course, the clue to why the oil is so precious, why it cannot be shared. In this parable we are not talking about selfishness in not sharing. Nor—pace the weight of many commentaries—are we talking only about preparedness.

We certainly aren’t talking about real lamps and real oil. Or perhaps it is the really REAL oil that is meant. The precious oil, made drop by drop, not by cold pressing the olives; but by pressing ourselves to serve those in trouble, want, or grief.

That is what makes our hearts glow; that is what kindles in us the Christ light.

Martin is the one, you remember, who cut his military clock in half to give to a poor man; the next night, Jesus appeared to him, covered in half a cloak.

It is called Candida Casa, or the White House, because it was plastered in white like Martin’s monastery. It was an unusual style at that time in Scotland.

Now, if you are geographically challenged, as I am, it may help to envision this:

Galloway is southwest of Edinburgh and north of Hadrian’s Wall, the 2^nd century defensive boundary of Roman Britain.

That’s important, because there is evidence of Ninian’s travels throughout northern Scotland as he moved about, converting the Picts and the peoples in the Lake District of England. He has been compared to Patrick and to Columba in his influence in forming the character of Celtic Christianity.

I visited Whithorn six years ago on pilgrimage and stood at the mouth of Ninian’s cave, a niche in the cliff overlooking the Irish Sea. There, Ninian used to withdraw to meditate and to pray.

Through the centuries, pilgrims have carved small crosses in the walls. In that holy place the sound of the waves and wind washes away all the troubles of the heart.

I wish I could take you all there with me. All I can do is to gift you with an ancient Celtic blessing that perhaps Ninian himself would [like]:

There is a painting by the Belgian surrealist Rene Magritte of a very realistic-looking apple. And the painting is captioned, “Ceci n’est pas une pomme,” or “This is not an apple.”

So in the same spirit of French je ne sais quoi, I proclaim that although I will be talking to you for the next few minutes, “This is not a homily.” Rather, it is, perhaps, simply a collection of thoughts, strung together by your patience and good will.

This past Thursday, in Bible study, we were reading and discussing the verses in Exodus in which Moses calls the people—well, actually, not all of them—to stand near Mt. Horeb, which is covered with dense fog and smoke and flashing lightning, all signifying the presence of the Lord.

“Come all you men,” he says, “purify yourselves and gather around to hear what God has to say to his people.”

After class, I said to our long-suffering instructor that I wondered where all the women were. “Washing clothes,” someone replied. “Oh,” he said, with his proverbially good temper, “given all that smoke and flame, it would probably be best to stay as far away as possible.”

But it was the culture of the day. Women did stay behind closed doors, inside of tents, under veils, whether tangible or intangible. It was the culture of our day, when in the 19^th century women, like children, were supposed to be seen and not heard. It is the culture of our day, when, in the land we read about in the newspapers each morning, members of the Taliban find eleven-year old girls on their way to school so threatening that they hunt them down.

So male or female, we are familiar with the “keep your distance” warning, with the sense that one’s inborn qualities or gifts, whether related to gender or ethnicity, add up to a cultural taboo.

And the woman in the Gospel reading today, the one so driven by love for her daughter that she is willing to break a cultural barrier, she too is familiar—oh so familiar—with what she is “supposed” to do. But she doesn’t follow the rules. Not only does she approach a well-known leader to beg for help, but she does so obstreperously. No good manners there. And women who began conversations with strange men—well, they were rather on the level of the pagan temple prostitutes.

So this woman infringes against unwritten social laws with every breath, every gesture. And to top it off, this
Canaanite woman is not one of the chosen people, one of the “lost sheep” who has a fold to be returned to.

And while I don’t want to get embroiled in conflicting theologies—do not wish to tiptoe between Borg and Luke Timothy Johnson, for instance—I do wonder about the question of Jesus’s unfolding understanding of his own role. Because in tonight’s Gospel story—and elsewhere—it is a nameless outsider, consigned by gender to a class that doesn’t count, that seems to change the very texture of his sense of his calling.

It all begins when he chooses to answer her. “I was sent to the lost sheep of Israel,” he says.

And in the course of their encounter, he actually argues with her—a woman—and discovers that she has the rhetorical skill to answer the seemingly unanswerable put-down: "It is not fair to take the children's food and throw it to the dogs."

Her answer combines her recognition of his status—and her own. As she says, "Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their masters' table."

So perhaps we can say of her, “greater love hath no woman than this one for her child.” Perhaps we can say that in her Jesus sees a startling sign: in her willingness to risk her life that her child may live, she has been taught by love to walk the path that he is walking.

Whatever the case, Jesus’s reaching out has saved two nonentities, the littlest and the least, a woman and her daughter. And this woman, whom Magritte might have painted with the note “this is not one of God’s children” has become His daughter, after all. Amen.

As an only child growing up in the city, I acquired a number of neuroses and phobias. I know when, for instance, not to walk down a certain street—something about it makes me feel prickly all over, and I know it’s not safe. I am suspicious of all public water fountains—anyone growing up during the polio scare knows better than to trust one. And like many city children, I never learned to swim. We didn’t have enough money for private lessons, and the public pool was too dangerous—the threat of polio, again.

But I do know how to walk upstream in a crowded subway station at rush hour; and like a fish nibbling at the tastiest algae, I can ferret out poorly marked used book stores and minor museums. But swim? No.

So I know how Peter felt when he began to sink. What seemed like a great idea, like a wonderful act of courage, turned to folly. What seemed like a just-possible if precarious step became the path to the abyss. I wonder whether everything flashed in front of his eyes—the promises he hadn’t kept, the projects he hadn’t finished, the time he had planned to spend with family and friends, the breaths he hadn’t taken and most likely wouldn’t, now that water was moving to engulf him.

Yet the fear he felt, the terror at sinking, was perhaps equaled by that of the other disciples, who were aghast at the sight of the storm—and even more so, terrified by the strange figure hovering near them. Battered by wind and wave and driven away from shore, their safe place, they were, I suspect, hard pressed to keep afloat without the Jesus they thought they knew: Jesus, their anchor and guide.

But only one of them—Peter—has the strength to hear, really hear, what Jesus says. “It is I.”

The wind does not stop blowing. The boat does not stop rocking. And the water keeps on splashing. But Peter nonetheless has the courage, the fortitude, and some would say the foolhardiness, to act on what he hears. “If it is you, command me to come to you,” he says.

And that is exactly what happens. Peter hears a call and steps out of the boat. He follows a host of others before him. Follows baby Moses, who was put into the water and floated into the arms of the Pharoah’s daughter. Follows the first brave soul who stepped into the sandy bottom of the Reed Sea. Follows those who at John’s urging repented deeply enough to entrust themselves to baptism in the Jordan.

And on the strength of that trust, Peter steps over the side of the boat and begins walking! I think his fellow disciples must have watched with mouths open and disbelieving eyes. But he did it—he actually walked toward Jesus. When his focus was clear, when it was the presence that overcame all else around him, he in fact could do anything he set his mind to.

It is that split second when he receives the invitation, when he hears the word “Come” and moves his human will in accordance with the voice of the spirit, that to me is the most important.

Because I think that we’ve all been there, in both prosaic and serious ways. The call is always there, cloaked in a myriad of ways. It masks itself as the deepest longing for a career; it motivates every creative act, every movement of the hand that reaches out to street person despite the fear and astonishment of those around you. Every good, honest, and wholesome impulse of the heart originates there. And it is in that split second that we are either observer or actor, custom-bound or courageous.

It is at that moment that we must choose whether to stay in the boat and battle the waves by ourselves or risk the total immersion of those who say,

Christmas II Homily Jan. 2, 2011 Psalm 84 or 84:1-8 Page 707 Matthew 2:13-15,19-23

Vespers Homily 15 Pentecost PR18 MATTHEW 18:15-20