Washington DC: Report on "Stations of the Cross" praying for victims of gun violence

Episcopalians go to Washington for prayerful march against violence

Way of the Cross takes ancient ritual from White House to US Capitol

By Mary Frances Schjonberg | March 25, 2013 

Episcopal Diocese of Washington Bishop Mariann Edgar Budde recites prayers at the
first Way of the Cross station March 25 in Lafayette Square in Washington, D.C. Diocese of Connecticut Bishop Suffragan James Curry, left, and Connecticut Bishop Ian Douglas
listen. ENS photo/Mary Frances Schjonberg

[Episcopal News Service – Washington, D.C.] Rain, snow, and temperatures that were barely above freezing did not deter a group of about 400 Episcopalians from taking to the streets of the nation’s capital March 25 to transform the traditional re-enactment of Jesus’ journey to Calvary and the tomb into a prayer procession meant to challenge what they called a culture of violence.

The modern-day version of the ancient Holy Week ritual of the Stations of the Cross began outside St. John’s Episcopal Church, Lafayette Square, at the corner of 16th and H streets northwest, across from the White House. The moving liturgy went past the White House and concluded on the west steps of the U.S. Capitol some two and a half hours later. Bishops, priests and deacons in the procession wore cassocks or other clerical attire, and the worshippers were led by a wooden cross as they made their way past the White House and down a lane of Pennsylvania Avenue that had been blocked off from traffic.

“You walked for Christ at a time when most people would have just gone inside and found something else to do,” Connecticut Bishop Suffragan James Curry told the worshippers after they finished the Way of the Cross.

At a “media availability” event before the Way of the Cross began, Curry had said that “the place of the church in our society is the place of Jesus Christ who faced down violence itself and died because of it.”

“We know that this is a struggle that will take years and years, and our pledge is continue to carry that cross for our children and for our society,” he said.

While there was mention in the liturgy of the ready availability of guns and the grief caused by gunplay, the worshippers during their stops near memorials, government buildings and works of art primarily offered prayers for an end to a culture of violence and the social and economic conditions that spawn violence.

The Stations of the Cross is an ancient ritual that commemorates the ordeal of Jesus from his condemnation by Pontius Pilate to his crucifixion and burial. Worshippers metaphorically walk with Jesus, stopping to offer prayers inspired by events, some legendary, that occurred as Jesus carried his cross.

Diocese of Connecticut Bishop Suffragan Laura Ahrens leads the Way of the Cross station outside the
White House while Connecticut Bishop Suffragan James Curry assists her with the sound
system. ENS photo/Mary Frances Schjonberg

The specially written Stations of the Cross liturgy is here.

Curry, Connecticut Bishop Ian T. Douglas and Bishop Suffragan Laura J. Ahrens organized the service days after the killing of 28 students, teachers and others at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown on Dec. 14, 2012. Among those who died was Benjamin Andrew Wheeler, 6, who was a member of Trinity Episcopal Church in Newtown. The bishops worked in cooperation with Diocese of Washington Bishop Mariann Edgar Budde, and a team from her diocese.

Other Episcopal bishops who participated in some or all of the event were Wayne Wright of Delaware, Nedi Rivera of Eastern Oregon, Mary Glasspool of Los Angeles, Larry Provenzano of Long Island, Gayle Harris of Massachusetts, Steven Miller of Milwaukee, Mark Beckwith of Newark, David Bailey of Navajoland, Rob Hirschfeld of New Hampshire, Gene Robinson (retired) of New Hampshire, W. Nicholas Knisely of Rhode Island, Dorsey Henderson of Upper South Carolina, Shannon Johnston of Virginia, Douglas Fisher of Western Massachusetts and Porter Taylor of Western North Carolina participated. The Rt. Rev. Dinis S. Sengulane, bishop of Lebombo, Mozambique, in the Anglican Church of Southern Africa, who helped to end the civil war in his country and inspired the collection and conversion of weapons from that war for peaceful purposes, was also a participant.

Before the Stations of the Cross began, the bishops met at St. John’s to discuss pending legislation to reduce gun violence with Stephanie Valencia, principal deputy director of the Office of Public Engagement and Paul Monteiro, an associated director in that office.

Many of the bishops are part of Episcopalians Against Gun Violence, an ad hoc group of bishops, clergy and lay Episcopalians who are working, collectively and individually, to curb gun violence. The group has a Facebook presence and is on Twitter. The hashtag for the Stations of the Cross march was #DCWitness.

Lay people and clergy of all ages came from all over the northeast to attend the Way of
the Cross: Challenging a Culture of Violence march in Washington, D.C. March 25. ENS
photo/Mary Frances Schjonberg

Shortly after the conclusion of the stations, most of the participants gathered in the Montpelier Room of the James Madison Memorial Building that is part of the Library of Congress for brief remarks from church and government leaders to support President Barack Obama’s call for gun reform and the legislative actions pending in Congress.

Bishops Curry and Douglas, and Sengulane of Mozambique, were among the speakers. Others included Connecticut Rep. John Larson, D.C. Rep. Eleanor Holmes Norton and the Rev. Brenda Griton-Mitchell, director of the Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships of the U.S. Department of Education.

Holmes Norton, who was baptized in the Episcopal Church, said, “We in the District of Columbia know the gun lobby more than most,” noting ongoing efforts to prevent the District from enacting tough gun measures.

However, she said, people all over the country are stepping forward to call for laws meant to reduce gun violence “and this time we will not step back.”

Close to 400 people prayerfully walked down Pennsylvania Avenue in a cold and rainy
Washington, D.C. March 25 from the White House to the U.S. Capitol to call for an end
to violence. ENS photo/Mary Frances Schjonberg

Griton-Mitchell, a lawyer and an ordained Baptist minister, said, “I would rather see a sermon than hear one any day.” She insisted that in the Way of the Cross she had indeed seen a sermon.

Sengulane, who celebrated the 38th anniversary of his ordination and consecration as a bishop March 25, said having a gun in the house for protection is like having a poisonous snake for the same reason. There’s no guarantee whom it will bite. A gun is also a “very bad adviser” on how to handle conflict, he said.

The March 25 Stations of the Cross was the latest is a series of actions by Episcopalians across the church who are attempting to eliminate gun violence. Leaders at the denominational level have spoken out as well.

Bishop Suffragan Mary Glasspool of Los Angeles captures video of Diocese of
Massachusetts Bishop Suffragan Gayle Harris leading prayers at one of the Way of the
Cross stations. ENS photo/Mary Frances Schjonberg

In mid-February, Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori, in written testimony to the United States Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights and Human Rights, urged lawmakers to “press for comprehensive and universal background checks for firearm ownership, regardless of where and how a gun is purchased; for bans on the availability to civilians of assault rifles and high-capacity magazines; and for policies designed to better regulate the manufacture of guns.”

Jefferts Schori noted that the Episcopal Church has said continually over more than 40 years “that the role of guns in our society’s culture of violence cannot be ignored.” And, while the church “supports the constitutional right of law-abiding citizens to keep and bear arms,” the presiding bishop said, the church “is clear that federal, state, and local gun laws and enforcement activities should focus their efforts on keeping guns out of the hands of children and those who would use them to commit violent crimes.”

The presiding bishop could not participate in the Stations of the Cross in Washington, D.C. because she was in England for a meeting of the Anglican Communion Standing Committee, which followed the inauguration of Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby. Douglas, who is also a member of the Standing Committee and attended the inauguration, attended the first two days of the meeting before returning to help lead the event.

The 13th and 14th stations on the Way of the Cross were on the wet, muddy lawn of the
U.S. Capitol. ENS photo/Mary Frances Schjonberg

In late February, the church’s Executive Council called on Episcopalians to “repent of our own roles in the glorification and trivialization of violence.” The resolution urges Episcopalians to work toward “comprehensive social responses that seek to stem the cycles of violence that fuel gun crime.”

It also called for making mental-health services available and accessible “without stigma in a variety of settings,” and available to “those who have suffered trauma from exposure to violence or violent environments.”

Resolution A&N004 urged elected officials to make gun trafficking a federal crime and empower law enforcement officials to investigate and prosecute straw purchasers, gun traffickers and their entire criminal networks.”

And it urged Episcopalians to “examine our own cultural attitudes toward violence through efforts in congregations and communities [and] to repent of our own roles in the glorification and trivialization of violence, and to commit ourselves to another way.”

Just after the council meeting, House of Deputies President the Rev. Gay Clark Jennings and Vice President the Hon. Byron Rushing issued a letter to General Convention deputies outlining council’s resolution and saying they hoped the deputies would “help lead the church to fulfill this resolution.”

On March 22, the Episcopal Public Policy Network, based in Washington, D.C., issued a policy alert here suggesting three steps Episcopalians could take to respond to the calls from the church’s leadership to advocate for an end to gun violence.

– The Rev. Mary Frances Schjonberg is an editor/reporter for the Episcopal News Service.

The prayer you won't get to hear for another 200 years

We have entered the long Season After Pentecost (some churches call it the “Trinity Season”). The season is calculated based on where Easter falls each year, itself a calculation based on the first full moon after the equinox (Cartoonist Dave Walker at right can explain this).

What all this means is that there are Sundays and weekdays with assigned biblical readings and prayers from the prayer book that we almost never get to hear.

In fact, the first of these prayers won’t be heard again in church on a Sunday for another 215 years. The next time Easter will be early enough will be March 23, 2228.

This year we begin the Season after Pentecost with the prayer and readings for “Proper 3,” which is church-speak for starting three weeks into the earliest possible date for Pentecost. Had Easter come three weeks earlier (like in 2228) we would have started on the Pentecost readings and prayers three weeks ago. Since we are not going to hear these prayers for a very long time on a Sunday, today I am offering you these prayers that you didn’t get to hear.

And since this coming Sunday is Trinity Sunday, you don’t get to hear the prayer for the Fourth Sunday after Pentecost either. So here are all four Sunday prayers – or “Collects of the Day” that you won’t get to hear:

 + + +

Proper 1    Week of the Sunday closest to May 11

Remember, O Lord, what you have wrought in us and not what we deserve; and, as you have called us to your service, make us worthy of our calling; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

Proper 2    Week of the Sunday closest to May 18

Almighty and merciful God, in your goodness keep us, we pray, from all things that may hurt us, that we, being ready both in mind and body, may accomplish with free hearts those things which belong to your purpose; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

Proper 3    The Sunday closest to May 25

Grant, O Lord, that the course of this world may be peaceably governed by your providence; and that your Church may joyfully serve you in confidence and serenity; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

Proper 4    The Sunday closest to June 1

O God, your never-failing providence sets in order all things both in heaven and earth: Put away from us, we entreat you, all hurtful things, and give us those things which are profitable for us; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

Holy places, Holy mountains

Big Meadow, Shenandoah National Park
Photo by Lori Korleski Richardson

SHENANDOAH NATIONAL PARK – The day was sunny, cool and gorgeous here in Central Virginia.

What better way to spend it than exploring the national park that is at our doorstep?

Lori and I live only 30 minutes from the southern entrance of Shenandoah National Park, which also means we've only seen the southern end of the park.

So Friday, we drove up Highway 29, turned west on Highway 33 and drove a few miles up into the mountains and entered the park roughly in the middle. We then drove north along the spine of the Shenandoah.

Trailhead, Shenandoah National Park
Photo by Lori Korleski Richardson

A few miles in, we went off onto a dirt road to a trailhead, parked, and then hiked into the woods.

Our destination: An Episcopal church long ago abandoned when these mountains were incorporated into a national park.

It is a story not often heard of how those who lived in these mountains were forced to leave to make way for the park; there are still hard feelings among some of the folks who live nearby  and remember their grandparent's pain.

We found the old church about a mile from the trailhead, off on a trail spur. All that is left are the ruins of two stone walls and the wreckage of an old wooden shack that probably served as a vicarage.

The stones of the church were held together by mud. A rusty old sink lay in the dirt near the shack. The roof of the shack had been crushed by falling trees. Nothing looked touched in decades.

Ruins of old Episcopal Church,
Shenandoah National Park
Photo by Lori Korleski Richardson

I tried to imagine the prayers that were said in this place, the vestments the minister must have worn, the old prayerbooks and the wooden pews no longer there.

But that was hard to imagine in the tangle of vines and fallen trees. It was a small chapel, really. It was holy to someone long ago. The stones had absorbed the prayers and maybe still held them. The chapel gave a hint that people once lived in these mountains.

We left everything as we found it, and took no souvenirs. We hiked back up to our car and pushed northward on the two-lane highway.

As mountains go, the Shenandoah are not particularly spectacular. The range is old – very, very old – eroded over tens-of-millions of years.

The Shenandoah peaks are round, the texture of the mountains comes from the trees. The highest peak is a little over 4,000 feet – foothill size by the standards of the Sierra Nevada. The trees continue to dig into the rocky loam, grinding into the bedrock, pushing the mountains lower. The tops of many of the mountains are flat, dominated by gentle meadows.

Trillium flower, Shenandoah National Park
Photo by Lori Korleski Richardson

The splendor of these mountains in not their height, but in their fine details. It is still Spring up here, the dogwoods are blooming. Everywhere we walked were wildflowers – yellow, purple, pink. The delicate leaves of woodruff line the trails. Streams from tiny springs cross under the trails. Life is everywhere.

Mountains are holy places. The ancient Celts called them “thin places,” believing mountains are a little closer to God than the flat places.

I believe the Celts got it right. You don't need to build a church in the mountains to feel the holiness.

By James Richardson, Fiat Lux