"I saw your light on"

Sermon notes from 1/30

Saint Paul first visited the city of Corinth around the years 49 or 50 AD. The Acts of the Apostles, chapter 18 tells us that he remained there for about a year and a half, establishing a church and nourishing its leadership. There was a reason that Paul traveled far across the Mediterranean Sea to this particular place: Corinth was a vital port city. Even in these early years, the population included over one hundred thousand people, and the travelers, merchants, traders, and soldiers who passed through it animated the city with the vibrance of an urban diversity that would not be unfamiliar to those of us living in cities today. Corinth was a place where people came to get things done. And in Paul’s case, his work was to preach the Gospel of Jesus Christ. 

Of course, human beings have always been human beings. When the worshiping community has been established and leaders have taken up their mantles of service, Paul departs to continue his missionary journeys. It isn’t long before he begins to receive reports about the welfare of the church he left in Corinth. And the reports are disconcerting. After Paul’s departure, the Corinthians experience what we might call a crisis of leadership and a crisis of culture. On the one hand, in Paul’s absence, different teachers have stepped into positions of authority, and the Corinthians find that their loyalties to these teachers have superseded their loyalties to Christ. They like one priest better than the other priests, and these divisions are drawing their gifts and attentiveness away from the work of the Gospel. On the other hand, the Corinthians are being challenged by their diversity. This was a community of followers of Jesus who arrived at their faith by way of distinctly divergent paths. Many were Gentiles who had adopted the faith by Paul’s preaching. Others were Jews, still very much invested in their Jewish families, neighborhoods, and traditions. A great many in the Corinthian church were poor, relying on manual labor or even the charity of others to survive, but there were some who were wealthy, powerful, even elected to positions of political influence. There were already signs that the wealthy and powerful were receiving special treatment. It had also - unsurprisingly - become difficult for the Corinthian church to resist the pressures of the culture of commerce and self-interest that surrounded them. Theirs was a city where pagan worship, gladiatorial competition, and financial corruption were rampant, and it was easy - maybe, they thought, even necessary to participate. How could Paul expect them to escape the overwhelming pressure of the city around them? How could a person possibly be expected to escape reality? 

It doesn’t take too much of a leap here to see the Corinthians to whom Paul writes and to see a conspicuous portrait of ourselves. Diverse. Divided. Longing to believe in the promises of the Gospel but still so mightily tied to the mechanisms of commerce and culture. 

Paul’s first Epistle to the Corinthians is Paul at his finest as pastor. The entirety of the letter unfolds with urgency and yes, correction, but it also brims with compassion. He is writing to people he loves, and with methodical care, he reminds them of what they are meant for. 

The text of the 13th chapter that we encounter today is often read at wedding Masses and ceremonies, sometimes by people who aren’t even Christians. “Love is patient, love is kind. Love is not envious or boastful, arrogant or rude.” It can be easy for us to forget that Paul is not talking about romantic or even familial love here. He is talking about a greater, broader, more numinous and extraordinary love – a love that is meant to thrive among all of us as members of Christ’s holy church. This is no exercise in affectionate feelings or passionate sentiment, but instead a living reality that God invites us into and helps us choose to see. This is the love of Jesus Christ. The love that is God, incarnate in the world. This is the love that walked among us as brother and friend, the love that healed the sick, ennobled the poor, and blessed the oppressed of this world with radiant dignity. This is the love of the Cross, the love of a Savior who died - brutally - for the forgiveness of the world. This is the love of Resurrection and the enduring promise of eternal life. This is the love of the Church, and this is the love - patient, kind, bearing all things - that each one of us is meant for, together. 

There are articles upon articles these days that lament the decline of Christ’s church. And you know, we are in need of a Saint Paul these days, perhaps more than ever, because it doesn’t take astounding powers of observation to look around and see where we’ve gone wrong. We hear the stories of the people the church has persecuted or deliberately injured, excluded, or abused - perhaps we even have those stories ourselves - and it is understandable to think that if the Church is nothing but a place of division, corruption, and unbreakable ties to a culture of death, then let, you know what? Let it go. Let it die. Someone please - for the love of God - write us an epistle

Well, we have an epistle. For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then we will see face to face. Now I know only in part; then I will know fully, even as I have been fully known. And now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is love. 

The Church is meant to be a community gathered upon the foundation of the love of Jesus and united in our hope to share that love among one another and with the rest of this marvelous created world. This is a different, altogether broader and deeper sort of love, rooted in no human skill or emotion but in the pierced heart of the living and eternal God. 

 Sometimes we do it right. Now we see as in a mirror dimly, but sometimes, we really do see. I remember when I moved to Los Angeles and I was looking for a church, I walked through the doors of a parish on Hollywood Boulevard and was greeted by an older gentleman who has attended that parish for over forty years. He took me around the nave and the side chapels, and in an unassuming, dignified sort of way, told me about how that church - during the AIDS crisis in the 1980s that devastated that city in ways that are still being grieved - that church was the only church that would offer funerals for those who died from AIDS and HIV. The columbarium was in the walls, and they are filled with the memories of Episcopalians, Roman Catholics, Orthodox, Evangelicals, agnostics, and countless others whose bodies could not find a resting place until that place - that church - welcomed them home. 

I know that this place can tell similar stories. Sometimes, we get love right. 

A few weeks ago, at one of our simple suppers for folks in their 20s and 30s, someone came into the building looking for some assistance with food and warm clothes. A few of the attendees let this person inside with generosity and grace. “I saw your light on.” The person said. 

If nothing else is ever said about us in the church, let this be said: “I saw your light on.” In the dark and frigid night of a world turned inward upon itself, someone saw a light on. Someone saw that there was a place that was different from the other places on this block, in this city, on this earth - there was a place that was different from the doors that had closed and the faces that had turned away. There was something else, here, and there was a light on. 

That light is the love of Jesus Christ. It is the light by which all else is seen and known and cherished. It is the light that reminds us that there is no division too great to be healed by the promise of the Resurrection, and no person who is not deserving of wholeness, welcome, and care. Sometimes we get it right. If there is any hope for this church of ours, it is only in this love of Jesus: a love so patient, kind, and without end. 

Preached by Mother Brit Frazier
January 30, 2022
Saint Mark’s, Locust Street, Philadelphia

All the Information We Need

The NY Times obituary of the Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh concludes with the intriguing report of a comment he made when teaching at the headquarters of Google in 2013.  With his bald head and his brown and saffron robes, he told those masters of big data something that cannot have been easy for them to hear.  “‘We have the feeling that we are overwhelmed by information,’ he told the assembled workers. ‘We don’t need that much information.’”*

We don’t need that much information.  I suppose that out of politeness, the Google executives supressed their laughter.  I don’t suppose that they had vetted his comments before he delivered them.  The masters of endless information may, in fact, have gravely nodded their heads, as though they agreed with Thich Nhat Hanh, when he said, “We don’t need that much information.”  Maybe they knew, deep in their hearts, that we are, indeed, overwhelmed by information, even as they (and many others) furiously mine it and store it in electronic heaps of ones and zeros.  Maybe no one is more overwhelmed by information than the people  who have to handle its relentless flow every second of every hour of every day, across every inch of this planet.  

But what can they do about it?  The information harvest is plentiful, and is making people at Google and elsewhere rich, as they pile up information in ever-larger electronic barns.  But maybe we don’t need that much information?

The thought exercise of imagining how we could live without so much information is daunting for all of us - not just for the people at Google.  Which bits could we do without?  The other side of that exercise, is to ask which bits of information we most need, and what to do with that precious, and crucial information.  And part of being overwhelmed by information is the very real struggle to answer this question: What information do I need?

When we think about how little information Jesus and his companions had about the world, it’s enough to make us laugh.  The verses we heard from St. Luke’s Gospel provide some of the only evidence that Jesus even knew how to read.  Jesus’ own teaching unfolded entirely in the oral tradition, except that once he wrote something in the sand.  Here in the synagogue of his hometown of Nazareth is the only time I can think of that we are told explicitly that Jesus interacted with a text of holy scripture.  It’s telling to see what information he imparts.

St. Luke tells us that “the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was given to him.”  And Jesus might have turned to something more completely self-referential and revelatory, like the so-called “Servant Songs” of Isaiah.  “Here is my servant,” he could have read, taking on the voice of the Lord from Isaiah 42.  “The Lord called me before I was born,” the Servant says in Isaiah 49.  Then, “I will give you as a light to the nations,” declares the Lord later in that chapter.  “See, my servant shall prosper; he shall be exalted and lifted up, and shall be very high,” begins the Servant Song in Isaiah 52.  Jesus might have used the opportunity in the synagogue in Nazareth to establish his credentials and assert his authority as the chosen Servant of God, albeit a suffering servant.  That’s the kind of information Jesus might have shared with those who were listening.

But apparently he thought we don’t need that much information.  Here’s what information Jesus gives to us at the outset of his ministry on earth: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor.  He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor…. Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.”

That’s it.  That is all the information Jesus provides about himself and his work.  Everything else he does will have to speak for itself.  If you want to know what Jesus thinks you need to know about him, that’s it.  He has come for the sake of the poor, the captive, the blind, and the oppressed - for all those whose hope has been crushed.

As it happens, even this small bit of information is often too much for us, and we don’t know what to do with it.  The thought that Christ’s church should pick up his ministry of care for the poor, the captive, the blind, and the oppressed - even allowing for the metaphorical use of those terms - has often proved to be too much of a challenge for us.  Generally, the information we want is of a more self-referential kind.  If we are going to follow Jesus, what’s in it for us?  His first disciples asked essentially that very question, and most of us ask it too, in one way or another.

It’s telling, too, that in establishing a new covenant with his people, God did not send down more information.  He did not inscribe text onto stones, or parchment, or golden sheets, or in the clouds, or even in the sand.  Instead, he sent us his Son, who is not a fount of information to be processed; he is a person and a Presence whom we can either get to know or not; we can either embrace or not; we can either love or not.  (Maybe we don’t need that much information.). And that person, that Presence, came to us, and is with us still, anointed by the Holy Spirit, to bring relief to the poor, the captive, the blind, the oppressed.

Here is another question: are you poor, captive, blind, or oppressed - even metaphorically?  If the answer is yes, then Jesus is providing you with almost all the information you need about him, if you are looking for good news: he came to bring you relief.  And since his mission is anointed by the Holy Spirit, Jesus can give what he promises.  Maybe we don’t need much more information than that.

However, the other piece of information that Jesus gave us to consider is the Cross.  Nailed to the Cross, having been rejected by his people, abandoned by his friends, beaten, humiliated, and sentenced to death, Jesus is in league with all of us who have been rejected, abandoned, beaten, humiliated, and who are headed toward death.  The Cross is the inevitable information that results from Jesus’ ministry for the sake of the poor, the captive, the blind, and the oppressed, all of whom generally know more or less what he means when he calls them to take up their cross and follow him.  And the mystery and the wonder of the Cross is that it does not lead to death - it marks the path to resurrection.  It does not signal failure - it is the very symbol of triumph.  It does not lead to despair - it is the promise of hope.  That’s the information we need to know about the Cross.

And those of us who know ourselves to be poor, captive, blind, and oppressed need to claim the promise of hope, need to cling to that symbol of triumph, need to know how to find the path of resurrection!

Oh, we are overwhelmed by information - perhaps never more-so than in these past two years of pandemic.  But it is possible that we don’t need that much information.  It is possible that nearly all the information we need to lead a holy life is shared with us when Jesus tells us that the Spirit of the Lord is upon him, because he has anointed him to bring good news to the poor; that he has sent him to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor; and that the only other piece of information we really need is the Cross, which leads us past death and into resurrection life, and which shows us that the first piece of information is true?

That’s the information that we need.  May God help us to hold it in our hearts, and to learn from such scant information the truth of his love.

Preached by Fr. Sean Mullen
23 January, 2022
Saint Mark’s Locust Street, Philadelphia

* NY Times obituary for Thich Nhat Hanh, by Seth Mydans, 21 January, 2022

The Prestige

There was a film*, years back, that introduced us to the language of illusionists, or, more specifically, the language of illusions.  Whether or not these terms are actually in regular use among magicians, I don’t know.  But they make sense to me.  This is how it goes:

A really good illusion comprises three parts, or three acts.  “First comes The Pledge: The magician shows you something relatively ordinary, like a dove.  Second is The Turn: The magician takes the dove and makes it do something extraordinary, like disappear.  Finally, there’s The Prestige: the magician tops that disappearance and makes the dove reappear.”**

Using the lens of this language of illusions we can examine Jesus’ miraculous transformation of water into wine, and see if we can learn anything helpful from applying the language of magic to this miracle.  Jesus and his disciples are at a wedding, and Jesus’ mother is there too.  Word reaches Mary that the hosts have run out of wine, and Mary turns to Jesus and tells him, “They have no wine.”  Jesus acts annoyed.  Clever.  He seems entirely disinterested, and protests that the situation has nothing to do with him.  It’s almost as if he is showing us he has nothing up his sleeve.

Now comes the Pledge.  St. John tells is that there just happened to be standing there six stone water jars… each holding twenty or thirty gallons.”  Just ordinary jars, nothing unusual about them at all.  Have a look in them yourselves.  Check the bottoms of the jars.  Make sure there are no holes or hoses, or underground connections.  In short order, Jesus says “fill the jars with water.”  And St. John tells us that “they filled them up to the brim.”  Just ordinary water, have a look at it yourself, see that it is perfectly clean and clear.

Next comes the Turn.  Jesus says to them, “‘Draw some out, and take it to the chief steward.’  So they took it.”  And when the steward tastes what they have brought him, they all see that the water has become wine.  Gasp!  Amazement! Applause!  You would think that this would be a sufficiently impressive miracle, but no, there’s more.  

Next comes the Prestige: “the steward called the bridegroom  and said to him, ‘Everyone serves the good wine first, and then the inferior wine after the guests have become drunk.  But you have kept the good wine until now!’”  Tah-dah!  Jesus takes a small bow, with utmost humility, as all are amazed that he turned water into wine, the best wine of the evening.  

And the whole thing followed the formula of a really good illusion.  The Pledge: ordinary jars, ordinary water.  The Turn: the water is turned to wine.  The Prestige: the wine is the best wine in the house!  Abracadabra!  If what the world needed was an illusionist who could amuse and amaze us, this reading of the miracle of water-turned-to-wine, would be a great start to Chapter 2 of  John’s Gospel.  But I am pretty sure that, actually, what the world needs is not a magician who can turn water into wine.  No, what the world needs is a savior.  Now, this statement is no longer one that wins broad agreement, acceptance, or approval.  But it happens to be the attitude and conviction of the church: the world, and each of us, needs a savior.

It is tempting to look back at history from our contemporary perspective, and see how in modernity we have gradually outgrown foolish, old-fashioned, and, frankly, ignorant reliance on un-provable, unreliable belief systems, like magic and religion.  Like the belief that Jesus Christ is the Son of God and the Savior of the world.

It would, of course be laughable, in our day and age, to predicate such belief on what amounts to a magic trick - turning water into wine - or any other miraculous illusions performed by a wonder-worker long ago, who, after all, died a humiliating death at the hands of the authorities.  Especially if, when you look at the very first miracle of Jesus, you can see how easily it falls into the pattern of a magic trick; an illusion performed by a gifted illusionist: meant to impress and inspire, but a trick all the same, with the Pledge, the Turn, and finally the Prestige - Wow!  This wine is really good!

But I am not entirely sure that that reading of history is correct; that it accurately identifies what has changed, in modern thought, from the way people of old thought.  I am not entirely sure that  what has changed is that we are no longer so easily taken in by magic, by scams.  And  I am definitely not willing to concede that religion is little more than belief in magical thinking, and that it’s the greatest scam of all.  Though I am sure there are many people out there in the world who do see things this way.  It seems possible to me, however, that what has really changed is this: that many people no longer believe that they are need, that we are in need, that the world is in need of a savior.  Because so many of us believe that we can save ourselves from whatever threatens, worries, or troubles us.

Having accomplished so much in the world: having split the atom, having traveled to outer space, having cured incurable diseases, having put people back together when they have been horribly broken, having built everything we dream of building, including towers up to heaven, is it any wonder that people no longer look to heaven for a savior?  What biblical illusion could provide any meaningful counterpoint to these points of modern history, modern fact?  In the face of modern human achievement, the Christian narrative can seem quaint at best, and maybe a little pathetic.  We don’t need to turn to an ancient, wonder-worker for a savior who knows nothing of our modern lives, and who could not have dreamed of our modern ability, and cannot match our modern achievements; we take matters into our own hands.  We can save ourselves, can’t we?  And the quaintness of the magical formula of the miracle of turning water-into-wine just goes to show how naive and pathetic it is to believe in that other stuff, doesn’t it?

But let me apply the language of illusions to the miracle of the water-turned-to-wine and see if maybe there is another way to see things.  Maybe modern attitudes that are as easily dismissive of religion as they are of magic do not actually represent a superior outlook, informed by science and technology.  Rather, maybe such dismissive attitudes are a failure to see the Prestige of Jesus’ miracle for what it is.

If we look at the miracle of Jesus turning water-into-wine with a more insightful vision, we might see that the Prestige of this miracle is not that the water-turned-to-wine is the better wine.  No, the Prestige is something altogether different.  For it’s true that Jesus was just a guest at a wedding.  He had shown no great power yet, had taught no important lessons, and hadn’t yet healed anyone, or made anything better.  (Although there had been a cool trick with a dove down by the river.)  When presented with an everyday problem (they have run out of wine), Jesus had no particular expertise to bring to the party - neither in viticulture or oenology, not even in logistics or purchasing.  Nothing was expected of him.  The only reason that the matter came to his attention was because his mother raised it.  It’s as if she knew instinctively that he could do something that even he did not know he was able to do.  She knew it even before he knew it - and she was right!  No one had any reason to suspect that Jesus was the one who could fix the problem - but he was, he could, and he did.  That’s the Prestige.

For so many people in the world today, Jesus is a joke, a farce, and old-fashioned superstition.  And many, I’m sure, are not even convinced that Jesus actually existed, despite a fairly extensive historical record that he did.  Almost nothing is expected of Jesus in the world today.  And by and large, people aren’t looking for a savior.

Here we are at Cana.  But the illusion that’s repeated over and over isn’t that water is turned to wine.  No, the illusion is the idea that we don’t need a savior, that we can save ourselves.

Yes, we take ordinary things and we transform them: sometimes for better, often for worse.  But what’s the Prestige?  We are still in strife and at enmity with one another.  We are still unhappy.  We are still at war.  We are still unable to find justice.  We are still addicted to buying and selling, among other things.  And we are still destroying the gift of creation that was given to us by the hand and heart of the creator.

Here we are at Cana.  It has become apparent that the wine has run out.  You might say the party’s over.  Perhaps there’s nothing to do but call it quits.  But there is One at the wedding banquet who can change all that.  There is One who can bring joy into our midst again.  For a moment, it looks as though he is doing nothing but a party trick - and it’s so outlandish that it’s a pretty good sign that this party is, indeed, over.  OK, so he turned water into wine.  Soon we will all go back to our homes, and nurse our hangovers, and remember the sorry state of the world we live in.  But here’s the Prestige: Jesus’ power is not in turning water into wine.  It’s bringing grace, hope, and love to the party when joy has run out.

Here we are at Cana.  And there is One here who can end our strife and resolve our enmity, who can make us happy, who can end our wars, who can establish justice, who can assuage our addictions.  There is One here who can even restore the gift of creation that we have gotten so good at destroying.  There is One here who can even forgive us our sins and make us whole.  He is easily dismissed.  Many people don’t even think he could even pull off the illusion of turning water into wine, let alone changing the world, restoring hope and making all our lives better.  But that’s the Prestige.  

The audience does not think they need a Savior.  We think we can save ourselves.  But we take a sip from the large stone jars, and we taste grace, hope, and love in world from which grace hope and love have been largely drained.  We drink from the large stone jars, and we sense joy again, when we thought joy had long ago abandoned us.  We watch Jesus set up the Pledge: here are ordinary jars, ordinary water.  And we see the Turn: Wow! the water is turned to wine!  And, yes, it’s so much better than whatever we were drinking before!  But that’s not the Prestige.  

Here’s the Prestige: Jesus can fill up what has become empty; Jesus can restore what was lost; Jesus can replenish what we have run out of; Jesus can bring joy where all that was left had become bitter; Jesus can forgive all that we have ruined with our selfishness and sin; Jesus can bring life where there was nothing left but death.  

And this is no illusion: this is the work and ministry of the Son of God, who is right here with us, even when we expect almost nothing from him.  Jesus is the One who can restore, refill, replenish us.  He is, he can, and he does!

Preached by Fr. Sean Mullen
16 January 2022
Saint Mark’s, Locust Street, Philadelphia

*”The Prestige”, 2006, written by Christopher and Jonathan Nolan, based on the novel by Christopher Priest

**”The Pledge, The Turn, The Prestige” by Tom Zito, altaonline.com, Dec 18, 2018

from “The Prestige”