10 years

This Sunday we celebrate Charlie's 10th year at Our Saviour. The program notes indicate that this is the longest continuous run of his career. Some one needs to tell me the average tenure of an Episcopal priest. It seems that there is a shortage of priests out there, but fortunately our new ex-governor/seminarian from New Jersey will be available in a few short years for those of you who are priestless at present. We are lucky to have Charlie and Gwen for the past 10 years. After all, he could stand up there and say that he is tired of Sunday afternoon quarterbacks like the Pewster posting comments on the Sunday sermon. Speaking of which, "brown people?" (twice) Oh well, as he said during the announcements, sometimes the wrong words come out. We should remember the good words of the anthem, "Oh my God, bestow thy tender mercy, blot out my transgressions, cleanse my sins...." While more appropriate for Lent, the Pewster will take them to heart and beg forgiveness for my transgressions. Still, I wonder what Green people think of Brown people.

Jesus Jambalaya

Holy Gumbo! Fr. Dunbar in his sermon today reminds us that Jesus was executed in part because he broke the laws that separated people and did not permit mixing, a practice we still see today. Does Judaism have discrimination built into it's core? The old laws were discriminatory, but isn't that the nature of man? As babies we automatically discriminate between faces we accept and those we reject. As children we learn the prejudices of our culture, as teens we divide into cliques, then as adults we get to write the laws. Laws by their nature discriminate between right and wrong, and they have been used to the point of creating separate water fountains, swimming pools, and schools for persons of different race, who can sleep with who, who can fight in the military, and who can vote. Jesus' message was one of inclusion except when he picked his 12 (in whom we do not exactly have the diversity of the star ship Enterprise). He picked his crew carefully. I think Fr. Dunbar's point is that there is room in the pot for a wonderful mix of peoples, of shades of belief, and the "Ya Ya" of everyone speaking at once. The end result could be a great dish. Just remember that even a good Jambalaya can be spoiled by including bad ingredients.

Servitude

Fr. Dunbar reminds us that "God does not want us to be his slaves" by using the illustration of the somewhat wayward Trappist monk who lived apart from his community and engaged in the sin of excessive letter writing (only 2 per month were allowed). By breaking the rules of man, and marching to the beat of a different drummer he was disobedient, but he was not cast out completely. He still chose to follow God albeit in a different way. If as Bobby says, God has freed us, have we become like the Christians of St. Augustine "free to do what we please." In this day and age doing what we please may not be pleasing to the Lord (oops there I go being servile). Choices abound... Bobby continues, "everything flows from God," so if we jump in and swim along, will we be taken to the sea where "go the ships" and "that Leviathan whom thou hast made to play therein." Psalm 104:26. Or can we fall in like so much flotsam more by accident and wind up in the same sea as the dedicated swimmers. I recall the saying that all religions are like streams or rivers. They all head towards the same sea. It would seem that the Spirit of Pentecost has blessed the water for us Christians. So do you jump in by choice, fall in by accident, or choose to stay on the bank and watch the waters flow? Once in the river do you go with the flow, swim upstream, lose it and drown, get out and dry off, or do you try to try to slow the torrent by building dams? (Dam builders beware, the Army Corps of Engineers will tell you that eventually all dams fail) Fr. Dunbar has again provided us with food for thought, and he did it in far less time than it took for me to post this comment.

Recommended Reading

When you have the time, digest this view of the state of TEC. http://anglicancommunioninstitute.com/content/view/85/1/
I enjoyed the historical perspective as well as the explanation of TEC's schizophrenic appearing thought processes.

Ascension Sunday (the abridged version)

"Therefore, since brevity is the soul of wit, And tediousness the limbs and outward flourishes, I will be brief."~William Shakespeare, Hamlet
Although I applaud Charlie for attempting to create a new holiday tradition with the Feast of the Ascension, I don't think people will line up if the sermon runs too long.

Revelations

The richest part of today's service was not the sermon where we wallowed in our sinful and "perverted" ways. I thought the reading from Revelation was like hearing some one's dream of Heaven. (Revelation 21:10, 22-22:5) There was just this one unsettling part of the scripture. "But nothing unclean will enter it, nor anyone who practices abomination or falsehood, but only those who are written in the Lamb's book of life." I think Charlie was trying to say that we repent of our sins, are forgiven, and when we repeat the sin, God will forgive us over and over again. So, will we humans ever be clean enough to enter the Holy City? What kind of abominable practice keeps a person out? Can a person rewrite the "Lamb's book of life?" Today's Baptism would have been a good segue to help explain this scripture to us poor pewsters. At least for an hour I was cleansed of sin. Now, here I go again..........

Oct 18 Feast of St. Luke

http://www.goarch.org/en/special/listen_learn_share/luke/learn/index.asp

Read the Hymn for this Holy day.

[1096]Holy Days: St. Luke292. What thanks and praise to thee we owe L.M. [1097]Ely: Thomas Turton, 1844 William D. Maclagan, 1873

What thanks and praise to thee we owe, O Priest and Sacrifice divine,
For thy dear saint through whom we know So many a gracious word of thine;
Whom thou didst choose to tell the tale Of all thy manhood's toils and tears,
And for a moment lift the veil That hides thy boyhood's spotless years.
And still the Church through all her days Uplifts the strains that never cease,
The blessed Virgin's hymn of praise, The aged Simeon's words of peace.
O happy saint! whose sacred page, So rich in words of truth and love,
Pours on the Church from age to age This healing unction from above;
The witness of the Savior's life, The great apostle's chosen friend
Through weary years of toil and strife, And still found faithful to the end.
So grant us, Lord, like him to live,
Beloved by man, approved by thee,
Till thou at last the summons give,
And we, with him, thy face shall see