Signs

Posted on November 28, 2024 by Rosalind C Hughes

Though the sun fail, I will look for your light.
The scarred and subtle moon draws tides high
above our understanding of the depths
of your mercy or our judgement. The fig tree,
survivor, of your kindness growing peace
offerings in the midst of a world inflamed
with dissipation, marriage of desire
and despair, bearing hope against all
expectations, a lantern swaying
from the heaving, lowering heavens;
in the evening sky, fire from another age
whispers conflagration over a troubled earth.
With that ancient, ebbing star in the night,
though the sun fail, I will look for your light.

Jesus said, “There will be signs in the sun, the moon, and the stars, and on the earth distress among nations confused by the roaring of the sea and the waves. People will faint from fear and foreboding of what is coming upon the world, for the powers of the heavens will be shaken. Then they will see ‘the Son of Man coming in a cloud’ with power and great glory. Now when these things begin to take place, stand up and raise your heads, because your redemption is drawing near.”

Then he told them a parable: “Look at the fig tree and all the trees; as soon as they sprout leaves you can see for yourselves and know that summer is already near. So also, when you see these things taking place, you know that the kingdom of God is near. Truly I tell you, this generation will not pass away until all things have taken place. Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away.

“Be on guard so that your hearts are not weighed down with dissipation and drunkenness and the worries of this life, and that day catch you unexpectedly, like a trap. For it will come upon all who live on the face of the whole earth. Be alert at all times, praying that you may have the strength to escape all these things that will take place, and to stand before the Son of Man.”

Luke 21;25-36

Posted in advent meditations, lectionary reflection, preparing for Sunday with poetry, sermon, sermon preparation | Tagged , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Christ the King (or, the king is not the thing)

Posted on November 24, 2024 by Rosalind C Hughes

Biblically speaking, unless the king is God, then the king is not the thing. Think back through our written faith history: the first kings we encounter are foreign and dangerous (think Abraham disguising Sarah as his sister to curry dubious favour (Genesis 12:10-20; 20:1-18)), or factional and fractious – little kings of little tribes. When the people of God dare to ask for a king of their own, God is discouraging (1 Samuel 8:1-22). Yet the people persist in requesting a monarch, a sovereign, as though God were not all the king, queen, emperor, and sovereign one might need. When God relents and lets them have their way, the succession of kings who become adversaries of the words of God spoken by the prophets is interspersed only by the occasional success story. Even David and Solomon are mortal in their failings. By the time we reach Herod, the dye is set. The king is not the thing.

Pilate doesn’t know this. Pilate serves an emperor who thinks that he is god; who knows what Pilate thinks of that. Pilate is used to kings like Herod and his family who are happy to knuckle under to the empire in exchange for a little bit of pomp and ceremony, and the head of John the Baptizer, a little bit of vengeance. Pilate is, though, worried about the possibility of a popular king who is not obedient to the empire, since any challenge to the emperor from Pilate’s territory should end poorly for poor Pontius. His loyalty was as much to his own skin. Hence, he was known as a ruthless overseer of the land.

Jesus, true to form, is not willing to play into Pilate’s power play, nor to succumb to the competing values of political movements. He has his own value. He is the Son of God, the living king, the only sovereign worth worshipping.

One of my favourite biblical reflections on kingship and humanity is Jotham’s parable from the book of Judges (Judges 9:7-15):

The trees decided to anoint themselves a king. First, they asked the olive tree: Come be our king! But the olive tree did not want to give up its vocation to produce oil for anointing, to honour and to heal, in order to govern other trees. So they asked the fig tree. But it would not give up its vocation to feed people and animals, birds, and all with its sweet goodness, so it declined. So, too, the vine, when asked, said why would I give up wine-making in order to govern other trees? Finally, they asked the bramble. The bramble, said, if you can find shelter under me, fine, go ahead; but if you are pricked by my thorns and shut out or caught up in my briars, it will be the worse for you.

When Jesus told Pilate, my kingdom is not of this world, he was asserting his vocation, his identity, his reason for being, over against Pilate’s assumption of power.

Like the olive tree, he would continue to anoint, to honour, to heal everyone who needs him. Like the fig tree, he fed thousands with the sweetness of God’s mercy and the bread of life. Like the vine, he would continue to pour himself out for the sake of the world, and for its gladness. This was his kingship, and blessed be those who take shelter in it.

There is a call to us in all of this, isn’t there? I saw, like you did, the videos of masked, swastika-bearing people in Columbus last weekend. There weren’t many of them, but the symbols of power that they chose to carry were chilling – and rightly and swiftly repudiated by the governor and mayor. I know at least some of the effects of such imagery, or rhetoric, or actions, what it represents for individuals among us, and for our common life together. We have to take care of one another. We have to care.

But this is where the symbols of power that we carry are different. Our hope is in the Lord. Our call is to remain true to our calling, our identity as Christians: to honour actively and explicitly the image of God in each human being, to heal where we are able, to produce sweet and good fruit to feed our communities, to fill the hearts of those around us with gladness, sharing the irrepressible love of God, the undying compassion of Christ with those the most in need of it.

The power that we have, the authority that we are given to do good in the world comes not from the dubious choices of the crowd (who too often cry Barabbas), but from the giftedness with which God has endowed us. The world, like Pilate, will not always recognize it – but neither can the world take it way from us. We are unstoppable.

Because Jesus, whom even death could not keep from loving this world toward salvation – Jesus has made us his kingdom. As the writer of the Revelation puts it,

Grace to you and peace from him who is and who was and who is to come, and from the seven spirits who are before his throne, and from Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the firstborn of the dead, and the ruler of the kings of the earth.
To him who loves us and freed us from our sins by his blood, and made us to be a kingdom, priests serving his God and Father, to him be glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen.

Featured image: Cristo avanti a Pilato/Christ before Pilate, Pietro Fontana (1762-1837), Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Posted in holy days, homily, lectionary reflection, sermon | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

All that we had to live on

Posted on November 10, 2024 by Rosalind C Hughes

A sermon for the Sunday after the 2024 election, the Sunday after our 208th Diocesan Convention, the Sunday after I told our parish that I will be leaving as their Rector after we celebrate Epiphany together in January 2025 …

I am fairly sure that I have trodden the grounds where Jesus sat and watched the people coming in and out of the treasury courtyard. If I quiet my heart enough, in my mind’s eye I can see the rich robes swishing and the poor widow behind them with the offering of all that she had to live on.

Every time I see her, she is different. She is young, old, shuffling, striding. She is destitute because she has thrown her money away. She is depleted by her own generosity, because she has given it all away. She was deceived by those who devour the houses of widows, and left with nothing. She had nothing to begin with. Any of those could be true; maybe more than one.

But when she was down to her last penny, her last nerve, her last hope, her last laugh, she brought it to the treasury, deposited it along with all of the others, and Jesus saw her. Jesus saw her, and recognized her, and knew her situation. No need to wonder how; he just knew.

I feel as though the widow knew the situation, too, within the treasury walls. She knew about the scribes in the long robes with the long speeches that masqueraded as prayers. She knew about the shortcuts that funded their bonuses. She felt in her own bones the corruption that built empires – personal and political – on the backs of the poor. And yet she let go of that little offering, all that she had left to live on, because she knew, too, that somewhere deep inside that place lies the Holy of Holies. Because she trusted God. Because she believed that, despite her grief and her widowhood and the corruption and the peeling paint on the temple walls, God is still true, and she will cling to that hope as though it were all that she has to live on.

May we have such enduring, generous, forgiving faith.

My friends, this has been a tumultuous week. Since we gathered here last, we have completed an election that has shocked many in this room and around the world, and delighted others. With such polar opposite reactions, we may wonder how we can ever bridge our divisions. We wonder whether the poor and the immigrant and the queer and the oppressed and the other can ever be safe. We wonder whether we are safe with one another, to tell our true opinions, without being cast into the outer darkness. 

Bring it to Jesus. Bring it to God. All that we live on – our fears, our hopes, our anger, our love – bring it all. 

This weekend, members of our diocesan family gathered to talk about the work that we have to do together, to make the love of God for all people known in this divided and too-unloving world. We talked about how to proclaim the good news of God in word and deed, respecting the dignity of everyone we encounter. How to share what we know to be true: that God is not far from us, but is all that we have to live on.

And while we were doing all of that, I shared with you the news (and here is where I really hope you got the email or the letter or the homing pigeon message; I tried at least to share with you the news) that after twelve Spirit-filled, remarkable years – because you are a remarkable church – it is time for us to work toward something new. 

In the new year I will be moving full-time into the work of supporting all of our churches and faith communities and friends in becoming beloved community. We can talk more about what that means as we go on. But that also means that you, church of the Epiphany, will be moving toward a new relationship of your own, with the beautiful and strong lay leadership that you already have, and with the support of the diocesan transition team, who have already visited the Wardens and are already active in their care for this parish, moving toward a new pastoral relationship. 

It is difficult to let go. It can feel dangerous, it can feel like a bereavement; it can also feel hopeful to trust in the Holy Spirit to lead us into a new thing, and to let go of what has been, and believe that God sees us, recognizes us, knows us, and loves us. That God will love us into whatever comes after this little bit of tumult.

I am not going to begin my goodbyes today. There is time enough for that, and we have more than enough to do before we get to that day. We have more than enough to do, to share the love of Jesus and to keep faith with the hope that has been set before us with a world that is sorely in need of some good news. 

The world is sorely in need of good news, and I encourage you, not only this week, but in the weeks and months and years to come to continue to check in with and hang out with and care for those who feel as though they have given all that they had to live on, and have no hope left. For those who feel as though they have given all that they had to live on, and have been devoured by the systems of this world. 

Because we have more than enough to live on. We have the hope that is in Jesus, the comfort of Emmanuel, knowing that God is with us whether we are on top of the world or lying wrapped up in the tomb. We have mercy, and we have one another. We have all that we need for today, and tomorrow will bring hopes and fears of its own; and we will rejoice in it, one more day that God has made. Let it be enough.

Amen.

Posted in sermon | Tagged , , | 3 Comments

All she had to live on

Posted on November 7, 2024 by Rosalind C Hughes

As he watched, the rich dropped their fractions,
deductible, of course. The prideful deposited
a smear of contempt, sliding it through the slot
with ease. The guilty let slip a quick confession,
reaching as they did for the next pilgrim’s pocket.
The powerful ordered the poor box opened,
beheld its contents impassively. The confident hummed
tunes created by the clang and clatter of their coins.
One who had already lost everything that mattered
most held up the procession searching for change,
shedding her cloak, heavy as grief,
revealing her last shred of dignity to the scandaled crowd,
wrapping her gift in paper-dry hands and letting it fall,
drifting from them lightly as a sigh, heavy as a cloud.

As Jesus taught, he said, “Beware of the scribes, who like to walk around in long robes, and to be greeted with respect in the marketplaces, and to have the best seats in the synagogues and places of honor at banquets! They devour widows’ houses and for the sake of appearance say long prayers. They will receive the greater condemnation.
He sat down opposite the treasury, and watched the crowd putting money into the treasury. Many rich people put in large sums. A poor widow came and put in two small copper coins, which are worth a penny. Then he called his disciples and said to them, “Truly I tell you, this poor widow has put in more than all those who are contributing to the treasury. For all of them have contributed out of their abundance; but she out of her poverty has put in everything she had, all she had to live on.” (Mark 12:38-44)

Posted in lectionary reflection, preparing for Sunday with poetry, sermon, sermon preparation | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

Witness

Posted on November 3, 2024 by Rosalind C Hughes

A sermon for All Saints Sunday

We all know about Lazarus, don’t we? Lazarus has become a byword for those who return from the dead. In paleontology, Lazarus names those species that disappear from the fossil record as though extinct, only to reappear maybe even millions of years later in the same form. Even in contemporary biology, the name Lazarus adheres to those we thought were lost, but that we find again. Everybody knows about Lazarus, but paradoxically, we know next to nothing about Lazarus.

We know from the biblical record that Lazarus lived in Bethany. We know that he had two sisters, but we don’t know if he was older, younger, or in between them. While his sisters give voice in the gospels, none of their brother’s words are recorded. Despite later legend, we really know nothing of his parents, whether he was ever married, had children, took lovers. We don’t know if he was a particularly good man, or a particularly grumpy man, or a particularly ordinary man. We don’t know what he did, what he said, how he lived.

The thing that everyone knows about Lazarus, though, is that he spent four days in the tomb before Jesus called him out. That is what he is famous for. That is why everyone knows Lazarus’ name.

Lazarus is a saint of the church not for anything that he did, but for what the love of God, whom we know as Jesus, did for him.

It’s quite a thought, isn’t it? We call the church as it is gathered together the saints of God. We are the saints of God, but not because of anything that we have done. Not because we got up and showed up and sat in church on a Sunday morning. Not even because we let the other person go through the door ahead of us, or resisted the temptation to honk our horn at the person sitting two seconds too long at the green light in front of us. Not because of what we believe, or fail to believe, or hold in tension, neither believing nor disbelieving, but because of what the love of God, whom we know as Jesus, has done for us.

This, of course, doesn’t mean that we are free to slam the door in the face of another, or succumb to road rage. On the contrary, it means that we are called to live as saints in the world, but not for fear of punishment or death, but because of love, because of gratitude, because of mercy.

We are called to live as saints in the world because, after he had regained control of his emotions – for he was deeply and gravely disturbed by the grief of those around him, and the grief he had on their behalf, and the troubling and tumultuous effects of love – after he had regained his composure and his voice, Jesus looked up to heaven and spoke aloud. He said, “I know you always hear me, but I need these witnesses also to know that you and I are one in love and in life.” He spoke his prayer aloud for the sake of those listening, to bear witness to the power of the mercy of God.

So it is that what the love of God, whom we know as Jesus, what Jesus has done for us is not for our sakes alone, but so that others may see and hear and know what it is to experience the mercy of God, to feel the power of the life-giving Creator, the liberation of the Saviour, the fire of the Spirit. Our new Presiding Bishop Sean Rowe said in his sermon yesterday that Jesus left the miracle unfinished, telling the crowd to step forward and unbind Lazarus, and set him free, finish setting him free from death and the tomb. This is the work of the saints, isn’t it, to bear witness to the love of God in the world, and to make it manifest. To make it real. To make it human. To bring it near, as though the very kingdom of heaven were at hand.

And we do not need to be especially good nor especially wise nor especially gifted nor especially anything in order to bear witness to what the love of God, what Jesus has done for us. Lazarus – what did he do? What could he do? Only hear the voice of Jesus from beyond the door of the tomb, and shuffle his way toward it. So we have only hear the love of God, and make our unwieldy way toward it.

My friends, we live in untrusting, unyielding, unforgiving times. We are weighed down with many worries and bound by many ties. But Jesus is calling to us, to bear witness with Lazarus, to bear witness by our very lives to the unstoppable, unconquerable justice, which is the mercy, which is the love of God. Jesus is calling to us, and if we will hear him,

It will be said on that day,
Lo, this is our God; we have waited for God, so that God might save us.
This is the Love of God for whom we have waited;
let us be glad and rejoice in Love’s salvation. (Isaiah 25:9, amended)

Posted in holy days, homily, sermon | Tagged , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Jesus wept

Posted on October 29, 2024 by Rosalind C Hughes

To suffer the indignity of grief, 
that utter exhaustion of the spirit 
that has sucked hope from the air 
too long after the dew has dried; 
the kind of defeat that drives you 
to your knees and elbows, heaving 
with the ground, troubling 
the very earth upon its axis; 
so it is to be the Son of Man. So, 
casting your eyes and voice to heaven 
you dare God not to listen, 
hurl your ultimatum: 
come out now 
from the shadow of death. 

Posted in holy days, lectionary reflection, preparing for Sunday with poetry, sermon preparation | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

Ransom

Posted on October 20, 2024 by Rosalind C Hughes

I know that you know Aesop’s fable of the sun and the wind:

The north wind and the sun were having a “conversation” about who was stronger, better, greater.

The north wind blustered, “I’m obviously strong. I can blow the anything off anyone.”

“Is that so?” answered the sun.

“Anyone can see,” the north wind continued huffily, “that I am the greatest. I can blow anything you like into kingdom come.”

“Is that so?” replied the sun.

“I’ll prove it,” the north wind pouted out its cheeks ready to blow. “Any time you like.”

“Is that so,” smiled the sun. Then it continued, “Look! See down there that traveller, with the cloak and the staff. I tell you what, whichever of us can get his cloak off him, that one will be acknowledged as the greater.”

The north wind agreed readily. Thinking this was its game, it blustered and blew and huffed and whistled, but the traveller, disturbed and chilled, only pulled his cloak tighter. The more the north wind assailed him, the more closely the traveller wrapped himself in his cloak, as though he might blow away with it if he dared to let go.

Eventually, the traveller sat down for a rest beneath a tree. The north wind also needed a breather. So the sun took over.

First, it shone gently through the leaves, dappling the traveller into soft dreams. As the beams grew stronger, and the traveller more relaxed, he began to loose his grip on his cloak. As the sun cleared the tree’s canopy and shone fully on the traveller, he shrugged off his cloak, folded it up, and put it in his pack to use as a pillow.

***

The Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many. The Son came to serve, to warm and melt the hearts of the heartless, to overcome the coldness of sin with love.

I am reminded by a preacher’s podcast called The Lectionary Lab that the language of ransom can cause some theological problems for some of us. So let’s be clear: God is not a hostage-taker. Jesus is not saving us from God; Jesus is God, who loves the world and its creatures so much that God became human to set us free, to show us the way of freedom, the way of love.

God is not a hostage-taker. We, like James and John, like their aggrieved and angry companions, tie ourselves up in knots, bind ourselves to ambition and external recognition, envy and rage – these are not the attributes of God.

Left to our own devices, to our own imaginations, to ourselves – well, the devil makes play for idle hands and inflated egos. James and John, the anger of the disciples, left to spiral like a cyclonic wind, their bloviating would only cause them to wrap their errors more closely around themselves. If Jesus had agreed that they could sit at his left and right hands, the next argument would be who got right and who got left!

But the ransom of love, the profligate and abundant outpouring of love, that is the ransom that frees us, not from God, but from sin and its consequences in and for us.  

When Jesus asks James and John, can you be baptized with my baptism, isn’t he remembering that moment in the river, with his cousin John, who said, “Should I baptize you?” Isn’t he remembering that immediately afterward the Spirit drove him into the desert where he fasted until he was famished, until he could dream of stones becoming bread, until he was tempted to simply grasp the power of the world, and let it go to the devil, rather than wait a minute longer for a single sip of water?

But he resisted. He stayed true to his journey of love. In the desert and on the cross, he defeated the devil and all of its evil ways. He put to death in his body, through fasting and through death, the sin of the world.

When he asks James and John, can you drink the cup I drink? He is asking them, can you, too, absorb the pain of this world, the pain caused by its overweening ambition and selfish pride, can you absorb that pain and turn it to healing? Because that is what resurrection requires. That is the ransom.

The disciples, the twins, say, “Yes, Lord, we’ll get right on that,” but they still don’t understand. We still don’t get it most of the time ourselves. We get caught up in power plays and righteous anger and we imagine that God wants us to fight for God.

But what if instead, God wants us to love for Them, to warm the hearts of those around us with the love of God, to melt the armour off them, as Jesus, God’s Son, has melted our coating of sin until, at least from time to time, the glory of mercy shines through.

Posted in homily, lectionary reflection, sermon, story | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Greatness

Posted on October 17, 2024 by Rosalind C Hughes

The body remembers, quakes away a frisson
as though the cool river ran still from your shoulders
beneath the treacherous sun, hollows out a growl
as though still hungry enough to break your teeth on stone,
suffer the delirium of flight, temptation to succumb
to the delegations of power and principality in return
for the bread of mercy; palms the smooth river rock
that once became a crumb gathered from a thousand
leftover from the fast that became a feast. All this
in the briefest lowering of the lashes, blinking away
astonishment that anyone would seek a baptism
of such dereliction, rinsing away glamour,
as chaotic and pluripotent as the waters over which
your Spirit brooded before creation began.

And they said to him, “Grant us to sit, one at your right hand and one at your left, in your glory.” But Jesus said to them, “You do not know what you are asking. Are you able to drink the cup that I drink, or be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with?” They replied, “We are able.”  Mark 10:37-39

Posted in lectionary reflection, preparing for Sunday with poetry | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Worth it

Posted on October 13, 2024 by Rosalind C Hughes

It’s not about the money – or at least, it’s not only about the money. It’s about everything that the money represents. 

As I have said before when considering this text,[i] money buys prestige, reputation, name recognition. How many impoverished famous people can you name? How many billionaires? Money buys airtime, advertising. Money raises profiles, puts faces in front of the public. Money talks. Money buys privilege, which means, literally, private law. You have heard it said that there is one rule for the rich, and another for the rest. Maybe a democratic society tries to close the gap, but we know that if we were in trouble, we would do better if we had money to bail ourselves out, buy ourselves sound legal advice. Money brings privilege. Money buys influence. It buys access to the people of power; it buys their attention. A word or two at a fundraising event. Money is a lever to move the world. 

So no, it’s not just about the money. It’s about that young man having to tell his father and his mother that he no longer wants to take over the family business, that it’s not going to be as all-consuming for him as it was for them, that he wants something better, something more. It’s about telling his friends that he won’t be coming to dinner on the town Thursday night because he’s going to be volunteering down at the soup kitchen instead. It’s about suffering their jeers and their mutterings as he walks away from the hedonistic playground of the rich and the famous. It’s about risking shedding the protections of privilege and walking around in his own skin. It’s about a whole new way of life, and it’s going to hurt, not only his pocketbook. He has to ask himself, is Jesus worth it?

Jesus looked at him and loved him. That’s the line. That’s the hook. That’s the promise: Jesus looked at him and loved him. Jesus didn’t want to destroy the young man’s life. He wanted to show him something better, something deeper, something more. He wanted to show him the love of God.

A colleague asked earlier this week, what’s your one thing? What is the one thing that keeps you from going all in with Jesus? What is it I need to let go of, with all of its baggage and weight and freight, if I am going to travel with Jesus?

It may be something tangible, like money or overly-prized possessions. It may be an addiction to something that is diverting our love away from its proper source and end. It may be more elusive, like the culture of busyness and time poverty that keeps us from spending time with the one who loved us into being and who loves us through eternity. It may be the mask that we wear in order to appear to ourselves and to the world as though we were self-sufficient, as though we didn’t need saving. It may be something we need God to take for us: some grief or pain that we need healing from in order to see past it.

Whatever it is, whatever we are relying on to save us, to make us good, or good enough – if it is not the love of God, it is not good, it is not enough, for no one is good but God alone, says Jesus. 

Jesus looks at each of us, you, me, and loves us. That’s the line. That’s the hook. That’s the promise.

I went to a wedding yesterday. Two young women made promises that can’t possibly be kept without giving something up, whether it’s the upper hand in an argument or the need to know that everything will be alright. Promises that cannot be kept except through the grace of love, through the mercy of God, with the support of a loving community.

It is harder for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle – yet God shrank Godself into a human body, a human soul, a human being, in order to reach us. It is harder for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle – yet God reaches through the eye of the storm to grasp our hands and pull us through. It is harder for the camel to pass through the eye of a needle, yet Jesus looked that young man in the eye, and he loved him.

The young man is trying to be good enough for Jesus, without giving away the farm, and the disciples worry whether they have done enough, given away enough to follow Jesus, but Jesus tells them that all they have to do, all they need to know is that God is good, and that God loves them. To trust in that love instead of in the powers and privileges of a corrupt and sinful generation. 

What is it that keeps us from living in the skin that God created us in, living into the love into whose mould God poured us, living into the intimacy with which Jesus looks at us, and loves us?

Is it worth it?

[i] https://rosalindhughes.com/2012/10/14/year-b-proper-23-sermon/

Posted in homily, lectionary reflection, sermon | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

Earth and angels

Posted on October 6, 2024 by Rosalind C Hughes

“What are human beings that you are mindful of them, 
or mortals, that you care for them? 

You have made them for a little while lower than the angels; 
you have crowned them with glory and honor, 
subjecting all things under their feet:

“All sheep and oxen, even the wild beasts of the field,
The birds of the air, the fish of the sea, and whatsoever walks in the paths of the sea …”[i]

The author of the letter to the Hebrews quotes from Psalm 8, and Psalm 8 refers to the stories of creation in Genesis, in which God gave the human authority and dominion over all of God’s creatures; in which God delegated the loving care with which God had made every good and living thing, delegated that love and protection to the creature made most like an angel on earth, most closely in the image of the living and loving God.

My friends, I don’t know about you, but I am no angel. This language of subjection, of dominion, the language of our Eucharistic prayer, in which we remember that God made us to rule and to serve all of creation: this language makes me deeply uncomfortable. To serve, sure, I can get down with that; but to rule? Please don’t put me in charge. I don’t think that I am capable. I don’t think that I am worthy.

But here’s the thing: it’s right there in the holy Bible that God gave us, gave humanity, the responsibility, the role, the power, to govern God’s good and beautiful and bountiful creation, in the name and image of its living and loving Creator. Part of what it means to be human is that we, like it or not, for better or for worse, affect every other piece of creation with every move we make, every decision we break, every breath we take.

And we’re good with some of that, right? We have our pet blessing today, because we love to live in harmony with the birds of the air, and the wild beasts of the field, and the small creatures we have invited into our homes and our hearts. We get that love of God that named every living thing when we tickle the ears of our furry family members, and we weep for their trials as though they were human. We get what it is like to be other, and to be connected, and to love across categories of creation.

But we are less good with the pieces that take real sacrifice. Do we respect the dignity of the mountains, are we as careful not to harm the forests as the trees, do we consider our exploitation of the environment part of the loving kindness which God has delegated to us, or are we content to be powerful, and to forget the charge of protection that comes with it? Do we even think about facing up to, let alone curbing our addiction to oil before opening up new habitats to destroy with the drill?

What happens when we reap the harvest of environmental destruction that we have sown? Are we willing to accept climate refugees and call them our neighbours, and share our resources, without reserve, without resentment, because it is, for many of us, sheer dumb luck that we live in a place with fewer storms than many others? It is not because we have managed our environment better, polluted less, sacrificed any more for God’s good and beautiful and bountiful creation than anyone else. Far from it.

When we look at the devastation of the storms over North Carolina, when we consider the suffering of our neighbours, we should be moved to help, to contribute to their care, but we should also confess that we are part of a human race that has fallen short of its responsibility to care for and tend and nurture creation as God intended for us to do.

There are no easy answers to the predicament in which we find ourselves. But denial is not an option. God created humanity to be the stewards, the servants of creation, and it is part of who we are, made in God’s image, to care. We are made in the image of love, and if we set our hearts to love, as God loves us, then we will find ourselves to be only a little less than angels. 

Amen.

[i] Hebrews 2:6-8; Psalm 8:8-9

Posted in lectionary reflection, sermon | Tagged , , , , , , , | Leave a comment