A Roadside Shrine for your day: Endless Streams and Mountains, and the art of Chiura Obata

Regular readers of this space may recall that a week or two ago, a friend pointed out that this blog is to her like a roadside shrine, a place to pause to ponder the Holy, or just a place to rest awhile, or maybe smile. I like that a lot, and I continue to ponder anew how to create a shrine in "virtual" space.

Today, I'd like to offer you another shrine: the art of Chiura Obata (1885-1975), whose paintings of the mountains still inspire many people, including me, with their simplicity, shimmering color and rhythm.

Obata first entered the Sierra Nevada in 1927 and he went back again and again over many decades. His paintings were recently featured in the Ken Burns' series on the national parks, and rightly so.

As someone commented in the documentary, it took an artist born in another place (Japan) to help us see our own place.

Obata was a loyal American, and these mountains were his palate. But in the hysteria following the attack on Pearl Harbor, he was incarcerated in an internment camp with other Japanese-Americans during World War II. In the camp, he taught others to paint. He also painted scenes from the camps, capturing the dust, the wind, and the melancholy. Another day we will feature those paintings.

My favorite poet, Gary Snyder, who spent considerable time in Japan studying as a young adult, chose Obata's art to illustrate his book Mountains and Rivers Without End. The painting at the top of Yosemite Falls, painted in 1930, is on the cover of Snyder's book, which won the Bollingen Prize for poetry in 1997 (his earlier works won a Pulitzer in 1974).

For many years I used the first poem, called "Endless Streams and Mountains," in my Morning Prayer meditation. Here is that poem, with some other paintings by Obata.

May peace and holiness follow your day.

Endless Streams and Mountains

Ch'i Shan Wu Chin

By Gary Snyder

Clearing the mind and sliding in

to that created space,

a web of waters streaming over rocks,

air misty but not raining,

seeing this land from a boat on a lake
or a broad slow river,
coasting by.

The path comes down along a lowland stream
slips behind boulders and leafy hardwoods,reappears in a pine grove,

no farms around, just tidy cottages and shelters,

gateways, rest stops, roofed but unwalled work space,
—a warm damp climate;

a trail of climbing stairsteps forks upstream.

Big ranges lurk behind these rugged little outcrops—

these spits of low ground rocky uplifts
layered pinnacles aslant,

flurries of brushy cliffs receding,
far back and high above, vague peaks.
A man hunched over, sitting on a log
another stands above him, lifts a staff,
a third, with a roll of mats or a lute, looks on;
a bit offshore two people in a boat.

The trail goes far inland,
somewhere back around a bay,
lost in distant foothill slopes
& back again
at a village on the beach, and someone's fishing.

Rider and walker cross a bridgeabove a frothy braided torrent
that descends from a flurry of roofs like flowers
temples tucked between cliffs,
a side trail goes there;

a jumble of cliffs above,
ridge tops edged with bushes,
valley fog below a hazy canyon.

A man with a shoulder load leans into the grade.

Another horse and a hiker,

the trail goes up along cascading streambed

no bridge in sight—comes back through chinquapin or
liquidambars; another group of travelers.
Trail's end at the edge of an inlet
below a heavy set of dark rock hills.
Two moored boats with basket roofing,
a boatman in the bow looks
lost in thought.

Hills beyond rivers, willows in a swamp,
a gentle valley reaching far inland.

The watching boat has floated off the page.

Pam Lamb's inner light

Soon after arriving at St. Paul's a little more than a year ago, I made the acquaintance of Pamela Lamb, a young woman who has overcome many disabilities, and whose inner light shines very bright. She comes to church every Sunday she is able, sits in the front pew in front of the pulpit, and smiles.

Pam has been quite ill recently, and so the St. Paul's community took the occasion last night to give her a party at our community night.

We served her favorite food -- pizza and spaghetti -- and Rector Emeritus David Poist brought a big cake for her, adorned with a single candle symbolizing the light she gives to all of us.

Pam was able to come, and she thoroughly enjoyed the evening.

At her suggestion, we took donations for the American Cancer Society, and

we raised more than $1,000 in her honor last night.

Thanks to one and all, and especially to Pam for this great evening. Here's a few photos taken by Lori.

Permission to laugh, permission to be alone

SHRINE MONT, Virginia -- I've been here at this retreat center the past few days for the annual fall clergy retreat for the Diocese of Virginia. This is the first clergy retreat for me in this diocese, and it is a bit daunting meeting so many new people from so many communities I've never heard of like Casanova and Rixeyville.

Getting here was a bit daunting. I rode with our new associate rector, Ann, and we hit a deer on the I-64, and had to double back to Charlottesville to get another car. We got here late and hungry and glad to be off the road at last.

Now that we are here, we've been treated to several wonderful and gentle talks by a pair of monks from Boston, Curtis Almquist and Geoffrey Tristram, both of the Society of Saint John the Evangelist. They've reminded us that this priestly profession of ours is not about achievement or mastering ministry skills, but about the "stewardship of God's mysteries." They also reminded us to replenish our own spiritual mysteries, to put prayer and families first, and the church third. We can never be reminded enough of that. They also told us that Pope John XXIII had a night prayer that went like this: "It's your church, Lord. I am going to bed."

So after a day of travel, encounters with deer, listening to monks, praying with a room full of priests, deacons and bishops, and vigorous hymn singing (a little too vigorous), I toddled off to my monkish chambers in an old cabin house across from the old Shrine Mont Hotel (in picture).

When I approached my cabin, I encountered a group of clergy sitting on the porch enjoying each others' company and a wee dram. They invited me to join them. Usually I would, but I was so rung out, so exhausted, I greeted them but told them I really needed to retire, and so I did.

As I readied for sleep, I could hear them laughing and laughing outside my door. Whatever they were saying, I could not hear. But they laughed and laughed and laughed, and truthfully, I enjoyed their laughter. I still don't know them as individuals, but I am certain they work very hard in their parishes, they encounter all of life's joys and tragedies, they probably say "I am sorry" to people more times in a week than most people do in a year. They deserve to laugh, and there are few places the clergy are given permission to cut loose and just laugh and laugh.

And there are also few places where the clergy are given permission to just be alone for awhile. Both can happen right here, only a few feet from each other. Their laughter put me to sleep.

"It's your church, Lord. I am going to bed."

Anglican update: Rowan Williams asked to stand against homophobia

When last we checked in on Anglican Communion politics, Rowan Williams, the archbishop of Canterbury (pictured at right), had suggested a "two track" communion, one inhabited by national churches that adhere to his proposed "Anglican Covenant" and the other track inhabited by those who don't.

The implication has been that the "traditional" national provinces (read those who don't ordain gays or women) will be on the first track, and those who are more inclusive will be on the second track. Since making that suggestion in July, Rowan met with seven American bishops who inquired whether their dioceses could sign onto the covenant, and join the first track, even if the Episcopal Church as a whole did not.

Here is the update: Rowan has replied, politely of course, that while he welcomes support from individual dioceses and parishes, only a national province may decide to sign onto the covenant. In other words, a diocese may not leave its national church. That may seem obvious to most of us, but these days nothing is so obvious.

Rowan also is receiving criticism from his left wing in the Church of England. Dr. Peter Selby, the retired bishop of Worcester (pictured here), recently gave a speech maintaining that Rowan needs to stand up for more than just the preservation of institutions. Selby suggested that the archbishop would better serve the church by devoting his considerable energies to the values of inclusion in our institutions. This story appeared in the British religious journal Ekkelsia earlier this week:

Don't let homophobia set the Anglican agenda, says bishop

Dr Peter Selby, the former Anglican bishop of Worcester, has told a gathering of Christians that anti-gay sentiment should not be setting the tone of discussions about Anglican polity and that the Archbishop of Canterbury has a responsibility to speak up for more than just holding church institutions together.

"If homophobia is contrary to the intentions of those advocating the traditionalist cause", as has often been said, "it has been allowed to provide a good deal of the fuel for the debate, and the Archbishop's personal opposition to homophobia does not exempt him from complicity in the way that energy is being used", Dr Selby told the Inclusive Church residential conference “Word on the Street - reading the Bible inclusively”.

To read the full story, clicking HERE.

Selby's speech is worth reading in its entirety, though it is a bit longish. To read the speech, click HERE. In his conclusion, Selby notes (and this is worth a long quote):

Above all what we need is not to take our eye off the issue, that of the treatment to be accorded to LGBT people and the ways in which they have - over many generations, not just in the last few decades - sought to live lives obedient to the gospel within the cultures in which we all, sexual majorities and minorities alike, seek to do just that. To leave that issue behind in favour of the worthy but secondary issue of how to keep the Anglican Communion together will stunt our discernment - and not keep the Anglican Communion together either. The Archbishop says the enterprise is 'becoming the Church God wants us to be, for the better proclaiming of the liberating gospel of Jesus Christ'; but that means engaging in the search for the truth together, not settling for the stalemate which is what his paper actually advocates.

What is at stake is our faith that God's truth will be discovered. That is, that we shall learn which of the faltering steps we all take in the living of holy lives with our bodies and our passions will form part of the choreography of promise, the one that will prepare us for the marriage supper of the Lamb, where all our human loving will be transformed and celebrated. Towards that vision we look; and nothing less will do.

Meanwhile, the Church of England continues to struggle with whether to ordain women as bishops. Women were allowed into the priesthood in England only recently, and so-called "traditionalists" men clergy are still much resistant. A CofE committee this week called for allowing women to be bishops, but without as much authority in their own dioceses as their men counterparts. To read the full story on this development, click HERE.

In my opinion, Rowan's ambiguity on the issues of inclusion on gays encourages an ambiguous response on women, and vice versa. And while the archbishop regularly criticizes the actions of the Episcopal Church for tearing at the "bonds of affection" through our actions, the bonds will be torn badly should the Church of England decide that women bishops are not fully bishops. A number of my colleagues, myself among them, wonder if it is worth remaining in a club that is so hide-bound, so exclusivist as to be unrecognizable as a loving, caring community that fully embraces all people as fully human.

Finally, those who are new to this blog may want to read the longer commentary I gave on these matters in September. You can read it by clicking HERE.

The Monday Funnies

This is the 500th post on this Fiat Lux blog, and fittingly it comes as the Monday Funnies. That's no joke. But here are a few, sent by Pony Express from the Mother Lode by our buddy Patrick Hill.

Enjoy your Monday. . .

There was a very strict order of monks, and they had a rule that said speaking is permissible only one day a year, one monk at a time.

One day it was this monk's turn, and he stood up at the dinner table and said quietly, "I don't like the mashed potatoes here at all, they're too lumpy." And he sat down.

A year later it was another monk's turn and he stood up and said, "I
rather like the mashed potatoes, I find them very tasty."

The third year came along and it was another monk's turn. He said, "I
want to transfer to another monastery, I can't stand this constant
bickering."

* * *

"Anyone with needs to be prayed over, come forward, to the front at the
altar," the Preacher says.

Leroy gets in line, and when it's his turn, the preacher asks: "Leroy, what
do you want me to pray about for you."

Leroy replies: "Preacher, I need you to pray for my hearing." The preacher
puts one finger in Leroy's ear, and he places the other hand on top of
Leroy's head and prays and prays and prays, he prays a blue streak for
Leroy.

After a few minutes, the Preacher removes his hands, stands back and
asks,"Leroy, how is your hearing now?"

Leroy says, "I don't know, Pastor; it ain't til next Wednesday!"

Cartoon by Dave Walker (and see yesterday's sermon).

The stewardship of our blessings

Today's sermon is from Mark 10: 17-31

Have you ever asked a question you just knew you shouldn’t ask? And when you did, you discovered you just volunteered for something?

I suspect we have all been there.

In this morning’s gospel lesson, I can almost hear Peter slapping his forehead and groaning, “Oh, now what?”

So let us set our scene: Jesus is out on the road, healing, doing miracles, teaching, attracting crowds of all sorts, in other words, doing what he usually does.

A rich man comes and kneels before Jesus. The man is respectful, reverent toward Jesus, and he asks, “Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?”

Jesus tells him to follow the Ten Commandments.

But the rich man is not satisfied with the answer. Anyone could have told him that; he wants to know more.

So Jesus loves him, and gives him an answer: Give all your possessions to the poor and follow me. Do something more with your life than simply amassing riches.

But the rich man, for whatever reason – we aren’t told why – is so bound to his possessions that he goes away grieving. He cannot give away his things.

Then Jesus uses this as a teaching moment to tell his followers they must get rid of their stuff if they want to find the Kingdom of God. And that pushes Peter right over the edge.

“Look,” he says, “we have left everything and followed you.”

What else do you want us to do? We’ve done all that.

Jesus tells Peter: Bring heaven to earth. Bring heaven to earth.

This story appears in the lectionary in the season of harvest, the season when we highlight stewardship, and when churches are trying to raise financial pledges for the new year. And we do need your pledges. I do hope you will provide the financial resources enabling us to carry out our mission in the coming year. We can do nothing without you.

But I’d like to go a little deeper with this story today. Jesus, after all, does not tell the rich man to give everything to the church. He tells him to give his riches to the poor. He tells him to do something with his life, not to buy space in heaven, but to bring heaven to earth.

Jesus tells the rich man to get rid of his earthly possessions that are getting in his way, and in the case of the rich man, it is all of them.

What stuff of yours gets in your way? What possessions block you from seeing the love of God in front of you? Give them away.

Not all possessions are things. Some possessions are the hurts and grievances we carry around with us, or addictions, or relationships that are unhealthy but that we cling to. Have a look at what blocking you, and step out with a little courage to give them away.

But what else would you have us do, Peter asks. We’ve done what you ask, what else should we do? We need to ask that, too.

Bring heaven to earth, Jesus tells Peter. Bring heaven to those places that are lonely and hurting and poor and in pain.

Jesus returns to that theme over and over. In what we call the Lord’s Prayer, Jesus says “thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”

Bring heaven here. The purpose of life is not amassing possessions, or even earning your way into heaven in the sweet beyond. The purpose of life is bringing heaven here now by bringing healing and hope to a hurting world, and using all of our gifts God gives us to make heaven real now.

The world that hurts is outside. The world that hurts is also right here in the pews next to you. The world is not just out there; the world is in here too.

This does bring us full circle to this church. I can’t imagine going through life’s struggles alone. The word church means “the gathering,” and that is who we are. The word “church” doesn’t mean “organized religion.”

Nor does the word “church” mean “the institution,” though in its history, the church often acts as if the needs of the institution are greater than the people in it.

The word “church” means we gather together to hold each other up, to pray together, to support each other when we need it the most, to laugh together, to share and give, and to discover the work God gives us to make real “thy will be done on earth as it is heaven” with people who are not in this gathering.

How do we do that?

This church, this gathering, is the world’s oldest service organization, but it is a good deal more than that. This gathering is here to bless, to bless each other and bless the world around us.
I would like to suggest that in this time of stewardship, we think of this first and foremost as the stewardship of blessings.

We give our blessings by sharing our wealth, by providing as generously as we can for the poor, and by caring for each other.

In a few minutes, we will bless a young child in baptism. And then we will repeat an ancient Christian ritual of “passing the peace,” with a handshake or a wave of the hand. When you do, you will be passing God’s blessing to the person next you.

Our blessing can be as simple as just knowing each other.

Let me suggest that if you don’t know the name of the person next to you, ask, and introduce yourself.

When you “pass the peace” pass your name, too. In a church this size, it is impossible to know everyone, but it is possible to know the person next to you, or in front of you. To know someone is to bless them.

And then maybe help others know you by wearing your nametag. I know that is hard for some of you, but you accept the blessings of others by letting them know you.

Accepting and sharing blessings is at the heart of a life of faith. We have so many blessings to share here. What are yours?

Our gathering is connected by our blessings, connected by our baptism, and connected by the bread and wine of our Holy Communion. Share, give, gather, bless – that is who we are, that is what makes us church. AMEN

Painting of Jesus and the rich man in the Tao Te Ching by Lao Tzu.

Bishop's town hall meeting coming to a church near you (in Virginia)

Our new bishop, Shannon Johnston, is embarking on a series of "town hall meetings" this Fall to hear from the members of our diocese. These meetings are a chance for us to connect with each other as a church that is not just a collection of scattered congregations, but as an episcopal church bound together in unity through our sacraments, our mission and our bishop.

I hope you will attend at least one of these meetings -- Lori and I plan to. You can hear more about this on a short video by Bishop Shannon below:

The town hall schedule is below:

Building a New Vision: Diocese Prepares for Town Hall Meetings This fall's Town Hall Meetings will provide an opportunity for all communicants of the Diocese to take part in a conversation that will help form the Diocese's future ministry priorities. The Rt. Rev. Shannon S. Johnston will host this series of meetings, designed to give parishioners a chance to provide both vision and feedback at the beginning of a new episcopate. The Rt. Rev. David C. Jones and members of the diocesan staff will also be present at all of these meetings. These gatherings will be different from previous years' diocesan leadership gatherings. In addition to hearing from the bishops, attendees will work in small groups to discuss perspectives and goals for the Diocese. These groups will then be invited to submit their feedback and suggestions to the bishops. Bishop Johnston plans to report his findings from these Town Hall Meetings at the 2010 Annual Council in Richmond. In addition to the five meetings scheduled at different times and locations for all members of the Diocese, there will also be two meetings designed for youth (ages 14 and older) and youth ministers. These meetings will have a similar agenda but a slightly different format that will best allow younger voices to be heard. Questions? Contact Emily Cherry regarding the all-Diocese meetings or Anna Moncureregarding the youth meetings. Be on the lookout in next week's e-Communique for bulletin inserts for your church's use. All-Diocese Town Hall Meetings Sat., Oct. 24, Grace, Kilmarnock, 2 p.m. Monday, Nov. 2, Christ Church, Glen Allen, 7 p.m. Sat., Nov. 7, Holy Comforter, Vienna, 10 a.m. Sat., Nov. 21, St. Paul's, Ivy, 10 a.m. Sat., Nov. 21, St. Stephen's, Culpeper, 2 p.m. Youth Town Hall Meetings Sat., Oct. 24, Christ Church, Glen Allen, 10 a.m. Sat., Nov. 7, Holy Comforter, Vienna, 2 p.m.

Our youth group brings love and pies

Our youth group last Sunday baked apple pies and delivered them to places and people who needed the cheer of a pie. Janet Legro, our youth director and associate rector, sent along this email this morning to the youth group and I share it with you...

These are the words I hear from so many people for the apple pies you made and shared last Sunday. Here is a review of where your baking work went:

11 Apple Pies were shared with the people of Midway Manor on Sunday night (while we also enjoyed music from Joy's CHS Quartet - thanks Joy!)

5 Pies were saved a Midway Manor for the Wednesday Bible Study led by Mary Lee Webb from St. Paul's.

6 Pies were delivered to people who have been sick at St. Paul's (see a thank you note below)

One hug apple crisp was shared with the Wednesday Community Night.

Thank you all for your hard work and sharing. It might not seem like a big thing at first - but your pies were an important expression of God's love to many people. Here is a thank you note from one parishioner:

Dear Members of the St. Paul's Youth Group:

What a lovely surprise it was to receive the apple pie -- a real gift of love. You are terrific bakers! The pie is really delicious. And this surprise was a great cheer-up gift for my husband David and me. David has not been able to walk since July 17, when tendons in both his knees ruptured; you should see the huge casts he has on both his legs (soon to come off, we hope). Acts of kindness such as yours are helping us keep our spirits up.

Thank you so much for your care for your fellow St. Paul's parishioners, for using your time and your skill to help others. Your gift will be long remembered.

Around One Table: Exploring Episcopal Identity

Who are we as Episcopalians?

Some of you participated in this in-depth project, an exploration of who we are as a church. Many of us completed surveys or interviews. The report was released last night, along with a provocative six-minute video which you can see on the project's website by clicking HERE.

You can download the full report by clicking HERE.

Where is your altar in the world?

We have 20 people gathering on Wednesday evenings to talk about Barbara Brown Taylor's book, An Altar in the World: A Geography of Faith.

We talked about a lot of things yesterday evening, and we took the time for silence, too.

I asked a couple of questions, and I pose them to you: Where is your altar in the world? Is there a place -- a specific geographic location -- that is sacred for you? A place where you feel the presence of the Holy like no other place? Where is that for you? Do you have more than one?

We heard many stories, and we heard about many wonderful places -- seashores, islands, and back porches; mountains, rivers, lakes and gardens. There are many holy places in this world, many altars for holy people. Where is yours? I'd love to hear about it.

I have many. The one that is much on my mind lately (probably because of the Ken Burns series on national parks) is a ridge near the May Lake high camp at Yosemite. It takes a couple of hours to reach on foot from the Tioga Road, and you best bring a sleeping bag and tent.

The time to go is at dusk, the time of the alpenglow, when the sun is setting and an orange sheen envelopes the mountains to the east across Tuolumne Meadows, Cathedral Peaks, Mount Dana, Mount Ritter and beyond. The Sierra glisten gold for a few minutes, and you can touch the face of God. I've lost track of how many times I've made the climb to that ridge; I took the photo above on a climb four years ago.

I have another altar in the world, and I can reach it every day: the rocker on our front porch in Charlottesville. God is in the meadow right here, in the trees, with the birds, on the porch, in my hands. God is in this place. It enjoy reading Morning Prayer on the porch in the early morning.

Where is the altar in the world for you?

Praise whatever you can . . .

I am thinking much about water this week. Where is your refuge? Our friend Karen sent this along. Hope you like it. . .

Walking The Marshland
by Stephen Dunn

It was no place for the faithless,
so I felt a little odd
walking the marshland with my daughters,

Canada geese all around and the blue
herons just standing there;
safe, and the abundance of swans.

The girls liked saying the words,
gosling, egret, whooping crane, and they liked
when I agreed. The casinos were a few miles
to the east.

I liked saying craps and croupier
and sometimes I wanted to be lost
in those bright
windowless ruins. It was April,
the gnats and black flies
weren't out yet.
The mosquitoes hadn't risen
from their stagnant pools to trouble
paradise and to give us
the great right to complain.

I loved these girls. The world
beyond Brigantine
awaited their beauty and beauty
is what others want to own.
I'd keep that
to myself. The obvious
was so sufficient just then.

Sandpiper. Red-wing
Blackbird. "Yes," I said.
But already we were near the end.
Praise refuge,
I thought. Praise whatever you can.

Water under our mountain

We come from Sacramento, which any school child there will tell you is "where two great rivers meet" -- the Sacramento and the American. Compared to the Mississippi or the Ohio or the Tennessee, these rivers are kind of puny. But these two rivers are the life-blood for 35 million people in the nation's most populous state.

The water flows out of the high Sierra Nevada and southern Cascades, from melted snow that in good years packs high in the winter. The water in these rivers is precious in a state where the population resides primarily on arid coastal plains.

Just south of Sacramento, the water is captured in a complicated series of aqueducts, then flows 400 miles south, irrigating the farmlands of the Central Valley along the way before it reaches the massive sprawl of the Los Angeles basin.

Here in Charlottesville, our water comes from deep within the ground. We live in a house in the woods, on a mountainside. We are distant from the city water system; we have a well that taps inside our mountain bringing us water. Compared to where we come from, we live in a rain forest, and in good years, the ground is saturated with water. I think of this every time it rains, and every time I open the tap. I am drinking life-giving water straight from the earth, unfiltered and unfettered by water districts and water meters.

It is no accident that we use water to symbolize the new birth of baptism.

So I am very grateful to Leslie Middleton for providing this poem from Billy Collins. Please have a glass of water, and enjoy...

Water Table

by Billy Collins

It is on dry sunny days like this one that I find myself
thinking about the enormous body of water
that lies under this house,
cool, unseen reservoir,
silent except for the sounds of dripping
and the incalculable shifting
of all the heavy darkness that it holds.

This is the water that our well was dug to sip
and lift to where we live,
water drawn up and falling on our bare shoulders,
water filling the inlets of our mouths,
water in a pot on the stove.

The house is nothing now but a blueprint of pipes,
a network of faucets, nozzles, and spigots,
and even outdoors where light pierces the air
and clouds fly over the canopies of trees,
my thoughts flow underground
trying to imagine the cavernous scene.

Surely it is no pool with a colored ball
floating on the blue surface.
No grotto where a king would have
his guests rowed around in swan-shaped boats.
Between the dark lakes where the dark rivers flow
there is no ferry waiting on the shore of rock
and no man holding a long oar,
ready to take your last coin.
This is the real earth and the real water it contains.

But some nights, I must tell you,
I go down there after everyone has fallen asleep.
I swim back and forth in the echoing blackness.
I sing a love song as well as I can,
lost for a while in the home of the rain.

Painting by Sacramento artist Wayne Thiebaud of the Sacramento River Delta.

The Monday Funnies: Part II

Addendum to the Monday Funnies: This is not exactly the Monday Funnies as usual, as in Monday Funnies jokes.

But it is Monday Fun.

Yesterday we held the "Blessing of the Animals" at St. Paul's in honor of St. Francis's Feast Day. Our guests included two two hamsters, one fish, and assorted dogs and cats, and they brought their people, too.

We had a lot of fun sprinkling everyone with water. Maybe next year someone will bring a

llama?

Here are some photos by Lori of the happy event.

Enjoy your Monday!

The Monday Funnies: Church history made easy

Those of us who went to an Episcopal seminary were required to study church history. A lot of church history. We read many books, wrote scores of papers, read more books, and heard a lot of lectures. Now, if you happened to be at the Church Divinity School of the Pacific in the '90s when Rebecca Lyman was teaching there, it was a treat. But a lot of work. If you were there, you know what I am talking about. Exactly.

Seminarians now have it easy. Here is how they learn it...

Thanks to Kristin Krantz for finding this.

The Feast of Saint Francis: Bless everything and everyone in your path

Today's sermon is from Matthew 11: 25-30

A long, long time ago – nearly 828 years ago to be exact – lived a young man whose inner light reached beyond his own time and into ours.

His name was Giovanni Francesco Bernardone, born in Italy to a wealthy family in the year 1181. His mother was French, his merchant father Italian. He grew up in Assisi, and he is better known to you as Saint Francis of Assisi. Today is his feast day.

Today is also the day I want to talk to you about how giving is at the heart of a life of faith. I can think of no better example than St. Francis to make a few points.

As a young man, Francis was popular with his friends, served in the military, was a prisoner of war for a year, and when freed, he looked forward to a life of ease and wealth. But he fell ill and that brought him face-to-face with sorting out the purpose of his life.

He became a monk, and he lived a life that many of us would consider severely austere. I can make an educated guess that there are few among us here today who would want to live as Francis did.

Yet, if we can go beneath the outward appearances of monkish clothing, monkish haircuts, and monkish food, there is much that Francis can still teach us about waking up to a life of the Spirit through giving of all that we are, and all that we have.

Start with the blessings of prayer. Francis enfolded all that he did by giving it in prayer: simple, everyday prayers while going about ordinary tasks. He took time to notice the gift of life all around him, and he gave thanks for it, and blessed everything in his path.

We can notice our blessings, too, by giving ourselves a gift: the gift of time to notice. In our over-scheduled modern world, that may take a little effort. So start with a gift to yourself, the gift of slowing down, and noticing the presence of God in ordinary things. A friend of mine says his best prayers come when he is washing the dishes.

Where are your best prayers? Give yourself the space and time to find out, and hear the prayers of your heart.

Francis did that by simplifying his life. He got rid of all the stuff that got in his way. He discovered that he had too many possessions, too much clothing, too much of everything. All that stuff had become a heavy yoke, so he cleaned it out. That which got in the way of noticing the blessings, he discarded.

Not all of our possessions are things. Some of our possessions are the hurts, and grudges, and complaints we carry around in our psychic attic. Clean them out, let them go, put them in a box, and like Francis, give them away.

With his yoke lighter, Francis could give his presence to all who came upon him. He understood that his hands and his heart were the hands and heart of God in the world.
Francis did not withdraw from the world; he engaged it at its deepest level, and in those places where the world had its greatest need.

Francis felt himself at one with all of God’s creation, and that gave him the strength to care for those who were sick or outcast. He spread his blessings. He called the Sun his brother, and the moon his sister. No person, no animal, no rock, was beneath his blessing. For Francis, God dwelled everywhere, in the woods, on the road, outside of churches and inside churches, too.
Francis especially had a vision to repair the church, and so, stone by stone, he repaired an abandoned and dilapidated church at Assisi. Others joined him, and together they rebuilt the stone church.

But they discovered something else: that Francis’ vision to repair the church was not just about stonewalls, but was really about repairing the church inside where people dwelled.
The word “church” means “the gathering,” and so Francis and his friends gathered as a community of faith to spread their blessings, bringing healing and hope to all whom they touched.

We, too, are called to repair the Church. We, too, are called to spread our blessings, to repair this building and repair this community. We do that stone by stone, by sharing our abundance and sharing our blessings.

When Jesus today talks of how “my yoke is easy and my burden is light,” that is precisely what he is speaks of.

We can make the yoke easy and the burden light by all of us sharing in the work God has given us, each according to the gifts and abundance each of us is given.

We can make our yoke easy and the burden light by discovering together the delight, the joy, in doing God’s work inside this building and beyond.

For Francis, the only purpose of the church– the buildings and institutional structures – is for spreading the blessings. The purpose of the church is not a balanced budget for the sake of a balanced budget.

Rather, a balanced budget serves as a tool for spreading God’s blessings. Money is not the mission; money serves to carry out the mission.

There is an expression used in church circles that I do not like very much. The expression is “give something back to God.” The underlying assumption of that phrase is that we own something that is ours to “give back.”

Jesus, and St. Francis, present us with a different idea, namely that we don’t own anything. All of that we see, all that we have, is God’s to begin with, on loan to us.

The more I live, the more I am convinced that our purpose on this earth is really quite simple: to share our blessings, using our abundance to build God’s kingdom. In a sense, we are called to give everything back; none of it is ours to keep.

We do that by sharing our blessings in how we live, in our daily work and study; by rearing children, by spending time with friends and family, by giving time for prayer; and by giving our talent and resources to the community and to this church. It all adds up, stone by stone.

Lori and I have been here at St. Paul’s for a little more than a year. I am struck by how much abundance, how many blessings we have here, and how we share those blessings with each other and with the world beyond.

Let me give you a handful of examples:

Last week we heard from our youth group about how they spread their blessings on their mission trips this past summer to the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota, and to Mississippi.

Many of you are involved in our PACEM project for the homeless, or IMPACT working to change public policy, or serving dinners at the Salvation Army.

Many of you make this church a wonderful welcoming place by enriching our worship through music, or in the Altar Guild, or as an usher showing people a seat, or in arranging flowers that remind us of the beauty of God’s creation.

Everyone can give something, because everyone has something to give. No gift is too small. I recall Jesus telling the parable of the poor woman who gives two copper coins. It wasn’t much but it was all she had. She had something to give, and she took a risk knowing that God would provide more for her. She gave of her blessings because she had blessings to give, knowing others were in need.

All manner of people come here, in every condition of life and need. Many are looking for a place to discover or rediscover God, or a place to rear children, or they come because they are sick or lonely. Or they come not quite sure why but they come anyway.

People find what they are looking for only because of your generosity: by your giving of prayer, by your giving of time, by your giving of money – by the giving of your blessings.

In this season of harvest, I ask that you again prayerfully consider how God is calling you to give. I ask that you share the harvest, share your blessings. Prayer, blessings, giving, healing – that was the life of Francis, and that is the life we, too, are called to live. Our yoke is easy and our burden is light. AMEN.

A trip to Appomattox, a reminder of the consequences of war

Lori and I, and our house guest, Tony, took a road trip Friday. We were much in need of a day off, and realizing we have not done much to explore our new surroundings, we set out to rectify that situation.

Our tour guide for the day was Bill Bergen, a member of St. Paul's and an accomplished Civil War historian. We went to Appomattox Court House, the place where Robert E. Lee surrendered to Ulysess S. Grant in April 1865, drawing to a close the most lethal conflict in American history.

Bill described for us how Grant's army chased Lee's army westward, finally surrounding Lee at this obscure stage coach stop in the rolling piedmont of central Virginia. The final battle was sharp and short, and Lee gave up rather than face certain annihilation.

Grant and Lee met for 90 minutes in a small parlor inside a house in the town of Appomattox Court House. What they said is lost to history, but Grant offered a "parole" to the Confederate soldiers, allowing them to surrender their arms and flags on the promise they would fight no more, and then he let them go home.

Lee accepted, and the next day his army marched into town, unit-by-unit, stacking their guns and shrouding them with flags. It took seven hours to complete the disarmament of the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia.

The Appomattox Chamber of Commerce has long ago ballyhooed their town as the place "where the nation reunited," but it is really much more than that. The nation was reunited not as it had been before. Appomattox is where a terrible war ended, where slavery ended, and where Abraham Lincoln's vision triumphed "that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom -- and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth."

Yet there is a sadness to this place. The sadness is in the graves of soldiers. The sadness is embedded in the historical markers that were attempts, long after the fact, to cast the war as a noble clash of noble principles. As Lincoln more aptly put it, "the prayers of both could not be answered. That of neither has been answered fully."

In fact, the war was a terrible miscalculation of Southern political leaders grossly underestimating their opponents, and a terrible miscalculation by Northern political leaders grossly underestimating the threat that they posed. The overheated political rhetoric of the time had real life consequences. Those who paid the price in blood were common soldiers and common people caught in the path of a horrific war through no fault of their own.

Here is the question for us: Can monuments like Appomattox better serve as reminders to us of the folly of resolving our differences by violence, either through arms or words? Can this terrible war long ago serve as a reminder to us that the overheated rhetoric of our own political conflicts has consequences? Can the ghosts in the soil of Virginia, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Georgia, Missouri, the Carolinas, and across this great land remind us of the cost of a civil war and how we should pledge to never repeat it?

Postscript: My great-great grandfather, George W. Richardson, served in the Union Army in Memphis. He was the white chaplain to a black artillery regiment. He understood well the stakes of the war for his men and for the nation, and this is what he wrote in his journal about the end of the war:

About 4 o’clock in the afternoon of April 4th the news of the surrender of Lee and the fall of Richmond reached Memphis. The city was illuminated and guns were fired and there was wild joy among all the Union men. It meant that the hardships of the field were about at an end. It meant that the soldiers, after an honorable discharge, could return to their families, and to their peaceful occupations. It meant that the thousands of prisoners who had languished in military prisons or in prison pens would at once be liberated, and breathe the air of freedom once more. It meant that the principles for which our nation had contended for four years had at last triumphed, and that America would henceforth be “the land of the free and the home of the brave”. It meant that the four and a half million of men, women and children of African dessent [sic] would have a chance to become intelligent American citizens; and this class were very demonstrative in their joy.

Ken Burns National Parks PBS series and the effort to restore Hetch Hetchy Valley

I've been watching the Ken Burns PBS television series on the national parks, and I am transported through time and space to Yosemite where I've been going since I was very young.

I am old enough to remember the fire fall. As an adult, I've camped on the Valley floor and hiked in the high country, caught trout in Tuolumne Meadows, and stood in the spray of water falls. I've slept under Yosemite skies so clear I could practically touch the Milky Way.

Yet this television series is not an exercise in sentimentality. I am very grateful that Ken Burns highlighted the travesty of a dam in Hetch Hetchy Valley, built in the early 20th century. John Muir called Hetch Hetchy "Little Yosemite," a glacially carved canyon that San Francisco entombed behind a dam for its water supply. It is hard to believe now that a dam could be built in a national park, but it was.

And the dam is still there.

What is even more hard to believe is the

opposition to removing the dam from San Francisco's supposedly green-leaning political leaders, including Sen. Dianne Feinstein, a former mayor, and former mayor Willie Brown. They've opposed even studying whether San Francisco could obtain water from downstream on the Tuolumne River. They are apparently afraid to know the answer.

Our generation has the opportunity to set right this crime against the earth. John Muir saw the dam as an affront against God. "Dam Hetch Hetchy! As well dam for water-tanks the people's cathedrals and churches, for no holier temple has ever been consecrated by the heart of man." Muir once wrote.

There is an organization that has worked tirelessly for years to remove the dam and restore Hetch Hetchy. It is worthy of your support. You can find more information on Restore Hetch Hetchy by clicking HERE. We've been involved with this organization for many years, and it has new and inspired leadership with Mike Marshall.

Awhile back I wrote an opinion piece for the San Francisco Examiner, aimed at the religious community, on this topic. Here it is again:

Why the religious community should care about Hetch Hetchy

By: The Rev. James Richardson Special to The Examiner | 5/8/09 4:14 PM

With the dire threat of climate change and with one-third of the planet’s population lacking safe drinking water, it’s a reasonable question to ask: Why care about a relatively small mountain valley in California?

For those of us in the religious community, it’s especially fair to ask that question given our seemingly stretched resources and the priority extended to alleviating the suffering of the poor. Would we not be better served to spend our resources elsewhere and on some other cause than the effort to restore Hetch Hetchy Valley?

Let me suggest looking at this differently, and I am speaking primarily to my brothers and sisters in the Christian, Jewish, Muslim, Buddhist and other religious communities. It’s a central tenet of faith common to all of our religions that God provides. And God does not provide meagerly, but provides abundantly. God gives us all that we need to heal the sick, bind the wounds of the injured and to care for this planet, our island home.

Restoring Hetch Hetchy would be a spectacular declaration that we believe in God’s abundance, that we take seriously our calling to be faithful stewards of all God gives us. If we have just enough faith to restore one wounded valley, we can move other mountains — we can reverse global warming, we can clean the watersheds and bring safe water and food to every corner of the Earth. God provides everything we need to fully heal our planet. Do we really believe that?

As pressing as large-scale issues like global warming are, we ignore at our peril the smaller-scale issues of environmental restoration. It would be doubly tragic to fail in our efforts at the large issues while also failing to restore the jewels of our planet, like Hetch Hetchy. I believe God calls us to do both.

Restoring Hetch Hetchy also is about how human beings touch the sacred. We are not the first generation to experience God in the wilderness. The ancient Celts called the mountains and river valleys “thin places,” and Yosemite is certainly one of those amazing thin places.

John Muir’s Celtic spiritual roots were on full display when he fought San Francisco’s proposal to dam Hetch Hetchy Valley. For the great naturalist, damming the valley was not only an attack on nature, but an attack on God.

“These temple destroyers, devotees of ravaging commercialism, seem to have a perfect contempt for Nature, and, instead of lifting their eyes to the God of the mountains, lift them to the Almighty Dollar,” Muir wrote in 1912. “As well dam for water-tanks the people’s cathedrals and churches, for no holier temple has ever been consecrated by the heart of man.”

The Rev. James Richardson is an Episcopal priest and the former Chaplain of the California state Senate.

Photos show Hetch Hetchy Valley before the dam, and now.

Bishop Shannon Johnston today takes over as Bishop of the Diocese of Virginia

Today marks the first day that The Rt. Rev. Shannon Johnston is the Bishop of the Diocese of Virginia, and also marks the first day of Bishop Peter Lee's retirement. Congratulations to both.

For those unfamiliar with how the Episcopal Church elects bishops, Johnston was elected at a diocesan convention a little over two years ago. The electors were clergy and lay representatives of the 180 congregations in the diocese. He was then confirmed by the standing committees representing all 110 dioceses in the Episcopal Church.

Since his election, and ordination as a bishop, Johnston has been serving as "bishop coadjutor," basically as an understudy to Peter Lee until his retirement. Bishop Shannon now becomes fully the diocesan bishop, and his first official visit to St. Paul's will be March 14, 2010.

Bishop Shannon recently gave an interview to Richmond Magazine:

Q. Are there needs or areas that you are particularly passionate about?
A. Yes, I have several things. One is adolescents. It’s such an unsettled period for them that we tend to sort of let them do what they want to do, and we just try to control it and keep it within certain bounds. I think we should take advantage of that unsettled time and that very energetic time and that very questioning time, and that’s exactly the time when the church ought to be encouraging their questioning and their exploring. I’d like to see adolescents in spiritual direction. I’m going to emphasize spiritual direction for the whole diocese, not just for clergy, not just for adults, but also for adolescents. Spiritual direction can be the most up-building, confidence-bolstering aspect of Christian life that I know. So that’s one thing certainly.

I want to take advantage of our diversity in this diocese. Diversity sometimes can strain you at the seams, but in Virginia, our history is that our diversity is the very thing that holds us together. So I’m sad to see that sometimes it can strain us and pull us apart. I want to find a way that it becomes what holds us together again and that we can grow stronger out of that. I think that’s exactly the way the world going forward is going to understand when they see us with not only Latino congregations but Korean and Vietnamese and any number of ethnicities that we have. I think people will understand what that means.

And I am frankly interested in reclaiming the word “Christian.” Because I’m very distressed that in political reporting and in television shows, when the word “Christian” is used, it is often used in such a small and constraining way and it has very little to do with what is the overwhelming majority of the Christian church across the world. The word “Christian” is often used in a way that talks about what people are against, and I want the word to be seen more in terms of what Christians are for. That it’s not seen in the negative but is seen in something that is very open.

To read the full interview, click HERE.

Thanks to Bill Bergen for bringing this to my attention.

An Altar in the World: Our book circle at St. Paul's

On Wednesday evening, 15 people met in the library at St. Paul's to begin a book circle on Barbara Brown Taylor's An Altar in the World: A Geography of Faith.

It was my privilege to join them, and it will be my privilege to travel with them through this astounding book over the next few weeks.

We shared a little of our own stories, and we tried to answer, as best we could, the question Taylor poses in her book: "What saves your life now?" We heard some wonderful answers.

If you can join us on Wednesday evenings, we would love to have you. Or perhaps you can join us on this blog in reading this astounding book and offering us your blessing by sharing your thoughts and wisdom.

Here is Taylor's description of what she is trying to do in the book, and I think it a gem:

If you have run out of breath yourself -- or out of faith -- then this book is for you. Since it is a field guide and not a curriculum, you may start where you like and end where you like. I have no idea what you will see when you look at your life -- but if you are tired of arguing about religion, tired of reading about spirituality, tired of talk-talk-talking about things that matter without doing a single thing that matters yourself, then the pages that follow are dedicated to you. My hope is that reading them will help you see the red X under your feet. To put it another way, my hope is that reading them will help you recognize some of the altars in this world -- ordinary-looking places where human beings have met and may continue to meet up with the divine More that they sometimes call God.

Photo of Cathedral Peak, Yosemite, by Evan Russel, Ansel Adams Gallery, Yosemite