Sermon: C Baptism of Our Lord 13 January 2013

Is 43: 1-7; Ps 29 1-11; Acts 8:14-17; LUKE 3: 15-17, 21-22

Gracious G*d, grant that those baptized into your Name may keep the covenant they have made. AMEN.

This morning we celebrate three distinct occasions, all connected through the presence and revelation of Jesus Christ, and also each connected to us in the here and now. First it’s the season of Epiphany, the season of light, when each week someone or some group understands that this baby, this particular person, is, in some way, in such close relationship with G*d that he made and makes real, an experience of G*d, with G*d, to those who are in these weekly stories. Second, the Sunday after the Epiphany is always the baptism of Jesus, and so we’ve heard that account. Since it’s Epiphany Season and the Baptism of Jesus, the Church has selected this as one of the liturgical dates appropriate for baptisms in the church. We are honored and blessed to be baptizing two children Theo Gray and Arthur Patrick Watson to welcome them into the church, this congregation of St. John the Evangelist, this parish of the Episcopal Church, the larger Anglican communion, and the whole Christian community—and with the human family reaching towards a connection with the eternal and Holy.

Sermon: B 14 Pentecost 17 Proper 2 September 2012

Song 2:8-13; Ps 45: 1-2, 7-10; Jas 1: 17-27; MK 7: 1-23

This is the Day the Lord has made; let us give thanks for it, health and strength to work, minds to think, and hands to serve. AMEN.

“But those who look into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and persevere, being not hearers who forget but doers who act—they will be blessed in their doing” instructs James. Jesus replies to some accusing Pharisees, “Isaiah prophesied rightly about you hypocrites, as it is written, ‘This people honors me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me; in vain do they worship me, teaching human precepts as doctrines.’ You abandon the commandment of God and hold to human tradition.” The struggle in these lessons is about hearing and doing, upholding religious traditions and doing what religion values doing. Goodness knows, Anglo-Catholic parishes, ones of “smells and bells” are accused of doing dead or passé forms, and not getting out there, rolling up our sleeves, and bringing about the reign of God.

Sermon: B 12 Pentecost 15th Proper 19 August 2012

1 Kgs 2:10-12,3:3-14; Ps 111; Eph 5: 15-20; JOHN 6: 51-58

Hallelujah! I will give thanks to the Lord with my whole heart. AMEN.

Since we’ve been listening to John’s Bread of Life discourse, I’ve kept the image that’s been with these Meditations on my desktop. I don’t know whether it’s the two, egg-brushed shiny loaves with the budded (or bottony) stubby crosses sitting on each, or the brightly colored, geometrically patterned plate itself that draws me in. “This is the bread that came down from heaven, not like that which your ancestors ate, and they died. But the one who eats this bread will live forever.” It’s the bright image that reminds me of the double point John makes, of Jesus as the bread of life, while some around Jesus neither sees him, nor the bread, as that which promises and delivers eternal life. The more cheerful and well made the bread and its plate is, in some ways, the harder it is to see it as a mystery, and not just an attractive plate.

Trinity Sunday

Is 6: 1-8; Cant 13; Ro 8: 12-17; JOHN 3: 1-17

Glory to you, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit; we will praise you and highly exalt you forever. AMEN.

We don’t say we’ll understand you now or soon. Kathryn Piccard suggested that I show this lovely Andrej Rublev ikon and preach with or about it, because it’s often referred to as his Holy Trinity ikon. It’s a particularly good place for me to have started my thinking, since it wasn’t named “The Trinity,” but the “Hospitality of Abraham,” who’s not present in today’s readings, the ikon, the Trinity, or in Christianity— so a clarifyingly confusing place to start.