New way to support our University of Virginia students

We now have a new way to support our student ministries through the University of Virginia Fund with one-time gifts or on-going contributions. Please promote this with your friends. This is a good way to show support for both UVA and our Canterbury student program. Click HERE to give to our Episcopal Canterbury student ministry.

St. Paul's Lenten reflections

Once again we bring you reflections for each day of Lent written by members and friends of St. Paul's. The first, by poet priest Doug Vest, is posted for Ash Wednesday. Please have a look and come back each day. The link to the reflections is HERE, and you can also click on the colorful cross icon on this page to get there.

My prayer at the Virginia General Assembly

I should have posted this a few days ago. It was my honor and privilege to give the opening prayer at the Virginia General Assembly last Friday, also marking the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday. As some of you know, I was the Chaplain to the California Senate for four years and did this every legislative day. I much enjoyed seeing another legislature in action (or in the opening stages of action), and I am grateful to Delegate David Toscano for inviting me. Below is my prayer, inspired by a blessing written by William Sloane Coffin many years ago.

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Gracious and loving God, as we honor in the next few days the memory of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., we come before you with gratitude for his prophetic life and service, and we give thanks for the opportunity to serve in our own time.

Give us the eyes to see the possibilities others do not see, and the ears to hear the people whose voices are seldom heard.

May our lawmakers risk something big for something good; may they remember that the world is too large for anything but compassion, and too small for anything but cooperation.

May God kindle in our hearts the courage to break down the boundaries that divide us, the wisdom to lift up those who are poor, sick, oppressed and afraid, and the strength to work tirelessly to make real our nation’s promise of equal justice for all.

May our lawmakers build this great commonwealth not just for ourselves but as a beacon to the world for generations to come. In this we pray, AMEN.

Marcus Borg and his passing

We learned tonight that Marcus Borg died this morning. I did not know until now he was ill. His book Meeting Jesus Again for the First Time in the early '90s had a huge impact on me. 

It was my pleasure to be his driver and guide when he led our clergy retreat in the Diocese of Northern California a few years ago. 

Driving around Sacramento, we talked about all sorts of concepts in the New Testament from eschatology to resurrection. He was a relentless scholar and a gentle teacher.

I will reflect more in this space about him in a few days.

His contribution to our understanding of who Jesus really was is enormous. He was controversial, and he evoked strong reactions. He was also willing to entertain other opinions and change his mind. He will be missed. May he rest in peace and rise in glory!

Alcohol, driving, texting and the tragedy in Maryland

Friends,

As you are probably aware, the Suffragan Bishop of Maryland, Heather Cook, has been charged with manslaughter in the death of a bicyclist. This came across my email today from Jim Mathes, the bishop of the Diocese of San Diego, who is also a friend of mine. He says this far better than I can, and so I would ask that you read this:

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Beloved in Christ,

There has been much written about the tragic event in the Diocese of Maryland on December 27. On that day, the bishop suffragan, Heather Cook, while driving and allegedly intoxicated and texting on a mobile device, struck a cyclist, Thomas Palermo. I have been, thus far, able to resist adding to the avalanche of words. However, I have found myself profoundly affected by this horrible event. A husband and father is dead. A bishop is charged, arrested and now in rehab in prison as she awaits trial. A diocese is reeling.

It is abundantly clear that our church will reevaluate its calling processes in light of this event. Bishops and all clergy in our church, and I imagine other denominations, will receive much greater scrutiny. However, I wonder what should be our contemplation. What should be our confession and amendment of life? In particular, I ponder our relationship with the three contributing factors in this matter: motorized vehicles, alcohol, and mobile communication.

As most of you know, I run and walk a fair amount. Over the last couple of weeks, I have been more observant of motorists' driving habits. Most of the time when people come to stop signs, they do not fully stop. Indeed, some people are rather reckless in their haste. Add this to speeding, changing lanes too closely, and other behaviors, and it is remarkable that there are not more injuries and deaths on the highway. Comparisons of gun deaths to automobile deaths are often used to underscore the need for gun control. But the reality is that, in the majority of the U.S., more people die in automobile accidents than because of a gun.* Automobiles can be deadly. We forget when we drive a car that we are propelling thousands of pounds of metal, glass, plastic, and rubber at high speed. The laws of physics will not suspend when we are in a hurry or inattentive. My confession to you is that I have too often put my own schedule and priorities above safety. My amendment of life is to exercise a renewed caution while driving. My highest priority must be to others and to care for myself. 

Thirty-one percent of the automobile fatalities in the U.S. are related to alcohol. In spite of this, and a whole host of other damage done to individuals and families by alcohol abuse, our culture continues to be alcohol-focused in social interactions: beer at ball games, champagne at New Year's, etc. As Episcopalians, we have fully bought into that. Historically, we have tended to differentiate ourselves by our drinking: whenever two or three are gathered together, there is a "fifth." It is time to deeply consider our relationship to alcohol, not in some sort of prudish way, but in a way that strongly asserts moderation and confronts, out of love, behavior that is harmful. My confession to you is that I have been complicit in a culture that promotes alcohol consumption. We are going to reevaluate how, and if, we serve alcohol at diocesan events. In addition, I am going to look into ways that the clergy members of the diocese can practice health and well-being in their alcohol use, including intervening where there are problems.

Living in the age of data phones, email, and texting, and the use of mobile devices while driving, has become a significant safety issue. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention includes texting as one of many actions while driving that is considered "distracted driving." One fifth of all U.S. auto fatalities include distracted driving as a contributing factor. Again, why are we so busy that we must multi-task? What makes us think that what we are doing is more important than our own lives and the lives of those around us? I suggest that our promise to respect the dignity of every human being requires that, when undertaking the great responsibility of moving a car at high speed, we give it our fullest attention. My confession is that I have done things while driving that are distracting to me and thus, dangerous. My amendment of life is to change this behavior. In particular, I need to reevaluate the way I talk on the phone while driving. There is no question that, while lawful, the whole exercise of making and executing phone calls is distracting. As your bishop, I should let voicemail do the work while driving and let driving be my singular work.

This reflection is open-ended for me. I hope it serves as an invitation for conversation within our clergy community, and our wider church community. The Maryland event should change us. Our relationship to Jesus as the one who comes to show us the way, the truth, and the life, is an invitation to change and transformation. That is why I come to you at this time with a posture of personal and inward reflection, confession, and "with God's help" and yours, a life more on the way of Jesus. In this time, we are called to a greater sense of self-awareness and to evaluate our own behavior and congregational practices. Will you join me in this movement?

Please pray for the Palermo family, the Diocese of Maryland, and Bishop Cook. Let us pray for healing, peace and reconciliation.

Peace and gentle days be with you,

The Rt. Rev. James R. Mathes
Bishop 

The passing of Al Martinez, author of "Get the kid his peaches"

Sad to hear today of the death of Al Martinez, the great storyteller of the Los Angeles Times. We've featured his "Get the kid his peaches" story every Christmas Eve on this blog (you can read it once again HERE). May he rest in peace, rise and glory, and his words continue to inspire, amuse and push us from our comfort zones.

Epiphany, the moon, and the stars within

Moonset, Arlington House, Virginia
Photo by The Washington Post

Not all stars are in the sky. Some are within us.

The last few mornings, if you were up early enough, like I was, you would have seen the moon setting on the western horizon. The moon was nearly full, and rose in the east soon after sunset, and the moon gradually rose in the night sky, glowing white above us.

As we slept, the moon arched toward the western sky horizon. Then the moon dimmed to orange as it sank in the western sky, glowing like the sunset of a few hours earlier, but not in a way that blinds us when we look into it.

The moon is a reminder that the brightness of the sun is with us even in the darkness of the night. I’d like to think that is what Epiphany is about – a reminder that the Holy still glows even on these dark, dreary cold winter nights.

You can’t look into the sun without blinding yourself. Sometimes the holy is like that, too. But you can look at the moon all night long if you like. Sometimes these fainter reminders of the holy are easier for us to see, too.

In the Epiphany story from the Gospel of Matthew 2:1-12   we meet once again the magi as they follow the glow of a star to the crib of Jesus. Like watching the moon arching across the sky, they follow this star all night long.

Let me point out a few details you might not have noticed in the story of the magi: The story does not tell us what the star looked like. It must have been a faint star indeed. I doubt it looked like the star streaking across the sky on Hallmark cards. Nowhere in the biblical story does it say anyone other than the magi saw the star. No one else sees it. Not Herod, not anyone in Jerusalem. Only these men, who like the moon, rise from the east.

Maybe the star wasn’t in the sky at all. Maybe the star was glowing inside them. When magi first saw this star, they did not know where they were going, or how the journey would come out. But they followed it anyway.

That is the definition of faith – following a star, going somewhere, and doing something, without being certain of the final destination. The magi were not the first to follow a star, and not the last. We too are called to follow the star glowing inside us.

The wise men – the Magi – follow their star to the infant Jesus. They come to behold and honor the newborn king, and they discover that this king is like no other.

He will grow to become a servant king with no throne, no scepter, no political power. He will wash the feet of his followers, heal the sick, feed the hungry, and share meals with saints and sinners alike.

He will teach, he will pray, he will get frustrated and angry at the greed and narrowness of people. He will ultimately go to the Cross to show us that there is more to life than death – more to life than what we see now.

As he walks among us, Jesus teaches really only one thing – that we should love God, and love each other, as God loves us. We are challenged to do just that, by giving life to God’s shalom and using our hands and feet to bring healing, peace and justice to the world around us. That is the star we are called to follow.

Sometimes we only see the star in the moonlight, but we still can see the star.

“Arise, shine; for your light has come, and the glory of the LORD has risen upon you. For darkness shall cover the earth, and thick darkness the peoples; but the LORD will arise upon you, and his glory will appear over you.” (Isaiah 60:1)

The angels encamped around us this year

Orion Nebula, NASA

“The angel of the LORD encamps around those who fear him, and delivers them.”

– Psalm 34:7

My childhood admission: I used to be afraid of a lot of things. I saw the movie “The Blob” with Steve McQueen about space goo from a meteor that landed on earth and ate everyone, especially kids sitting in movie theaters. The Blob oozed under seats and out of heat ventilators.

For years I thought The Blob might be under my bed. Ok, I really didn’t think that, but just to be safe, I did not let my hand hover below the bed at night.

More seriously, I was also afraid of the concept of infinity. The idea that space goes on and on forever scared the daylights out of me. I can’t explain exactly why, but it did. Still does.

The idea of infinite time also scared me. What came before time? Does time end? If time does end, did existence ever exist? If time doesn’t end, how does that work?

Adding to my fear, in church the preacher used to talk about God living outside of time and God coming at the end of time. How does that work?

Call me a neurotic kid with such strange fears. My parents thought I should be more worried about spelling tests and my “times table.”

Yet, I think some of my childhood fear about infinity and time might be what the biblical admonitions about “fear of the LORD” are getting at. It is tempting to translate the word “fear” into “awe” (of the LORD), and that works one level. But creation is so vast, and the concepts of time, space, infinity, are truly so beyond human comprehension that there must be more to this than awe. Who are we to think we can understand this? Who are we to think we can tame the universe? There is a lot to be afraid of out there.

We cannot know God easily or directly. The Book of Job ends with God bellowing at Job, “Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth? Tell me, if you have understanding.” (Job 38:4). We don’t.

I bring this up as a way of suggesting that we might enter the new year with a measure of humility about our most cherished beliefs and opinions about everything from religion to politics. We are but mortal, made from dust and to dust we shall return. God’s ways are not our ways, and we are living on a finite rock in a tiny corner of the universe. Our conflicts over religion and politics are comparatively trivial. There is so much we don’t know even about ourselves and our planet, let alone the rest of the universe.

We might want to hold lightly to our opinions, listen to each other a little more closely, care for each other a little more deeply, and not be so certain we have this God thing figured out so perfectly. “Fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom,” so the wise rabbi says in Proverbs 1:7.

There is hope in this. The Morning Prayer reading for today begins with Psalm 34 and its prayer for wisdom and peace. Lately I’ve been reading the psalms from the Revised Standard Version of the Bible rather than the psalms tucked into the back of the prayer book. I like RSV version better including Psalm 34, especially this line: “The angel of the LORD encamps around those who fear him, and delivers them.”

May each of us find the angels encamped around us this year, protecting us from evil and from the arrogance of our own certainty. May many blessings light our path. And let’s be careful out there.

By James Richardson, Fiat Lux

Blessing for the new year

Here is a blessing for the new year from our friend Steven Charleston:

There is no harm that can come to you, no matter how frail and fragile you feel, for this passing stream of light is not the measure of all you are, but only the rough canvas on which the colors of your life are forever being painted. You are not encompassed by a clock, marked off into a reality of artificial movements, but designed to be free from such constraints, able to rise up on the wings of your own imagination to see the hands behind the time. Hurt may happen, but it will never last nor have the final word in the sonnet that is your soul, for that wisdom will go on and on, speaking wonders into a future you cannot even name.

Daydreams turning to spring and ... baseball

Well my friends, we are deep into winter now, and a boy's thoughts turn to ... baseball.

I should have posted this awhile back: my commentary for The Sacramento Bee, my former journalistic home, on the San Francisco Giants season just past. That would be the World Series Championship season. So with daydreams turning to spring, here is my piece...

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Giants fan fulfills bucket list baseball season

BY JAMES RICHARDSON

SPECIAL TO THE BEE

11/01/2014 4:00 PM 

 11/03/2014 9:07 AM

Read more here: http://www.sacbee.com/opinion/california-forum/article3497613.html#storylink=cpy

• Story
• Comments

My father took me to my first baseball game at Candlestick Park in 1962. The Giants played the St. Louis Cardinals, and Willie Mays won the game in the 10th inning with a home run. I was 9 years old. I was hooked on Giants baseball for life.

This season I did something that has always been on my bucket list: follow the Giants season game by game, and not just occasionally. This season, I would follow every game. That’s 162 regular season games and, as it turned out, 17 postseason games.

I started by watching the televised spring training games on MLB.TV. By the end of the season, I had watched, or listened to, 105 regular season games, including 10 playoffs and seven World Series games. If I didn’t watch or listen, I read the wrap the next morning in the Northern California newspapers.

My wife, Lori, was a saint for putting up with what became my obsession. She watched many games, and we went to a few. At a family wedding in Wisconsin, I had a game playing on my smartphone. 

In an odd way, it helped that we no longer live in California. We live in Virginia, which, as it happens, is the market territory of the Washington Nationals. There were no blackouts for Giants games here except when the Giants played the Nats, in which case the tickets were about one-third the price of a seat in San Francisco.

At our first Nats game, we found ourselves sitting in a sea of orange and black that stretched from home plate into the left field stands. It seemed we were seated with thousands of diaspora Californians rooting for our ancestral team. Pitcher Jake Peavy signed a baseball for me.

For most games, I could webstream Bay Area TV coverage. But for some games, I listened to the KNBR radio webstream, and that took me back to my boyhood when that is how we “saw” most Giants games. 

Hearing it on the radio tapped my imagination in ways I’ve not experienced in years. No slow motion, no replays – just the artistry of a voice in a booth finding just the right words to describe an enormously complex series of movements on a field. My favorite line, as Marco Scutarowas plodding around third base: “He’s leaking oil.” 

I learned a lot about baseball, how grueling it is and how Bruce Bochy had to manage through slumps, injuries and “buzzard’s luck” as he calls it. We saw new players emerge, in particular Joe Panik, but also saw many veteran players struggle with season-ending injuries – Matt Cain, Angel Pagan, Hector Sanchez, Scutaro. I grew to understand that the baseball season is as much about stamina as it is skill. So is watching.

We saw Tim Lincecum pitch a no-hitter, and then fall into the doldrums. We suffered through the Dan Uggla experiment at second base (batting average with the Giants: .000) and admired Brandon Belt as he came back twice from injuries. 

We were awestruck by Hunter Pence at full throttle every single game he played. My favorite Pence sign, appropriately at a Nationals game, was “Hunter Pence wrote the Declaration of Independence.” I suppose that only in Washington, D.C., would that be meant as an insult. 

And, yes, Madison Bumgarner is an extraordinary pitcher – and an extraordinary hitter with four home runs, two of them grand slams. Yet this team was not about a superhero, but about a bunch of guys who did things very well when it counted. 

But it was more than just about pitching, hitting and scores. Baseball is also about relentless hype and promotion, and endless prognostication by baseball “experts.” Like political writers (of which I once was one), getting it wrong doesn’t stop the experts from churning out more authoritative opinions, usually discarded a few days later.

Mostly, I learned how a bunch of basically humble guys figured out how to play together under enormous pressure and win when by all the odds they should have lost. They looked like they were having fun. Many of the teams they played did not (read Dodgers). Sometimes the Giants lost, and lost badly. Other games they just barely won (like that last game of the World Series). If there is any sport that mirrors daily life, this is it.

To have this season conclude in a 3-2 nail-biter in the seventh game of the World Series is nothing I remotely could have predicted when I started this adventure in March.

Ski season approaches. The television will be off most of the time in my house. If the 49ers make it to the Super Bowl, I’ll check it out. Mostly, I will be awaiting the words: “Pitchers and catchers report.”

James Richardson, a former senior 

writer with The Bee, is an Episcopal priest and the rector of St. Paul’s 

Memorial Church in Charlottesville, Va.

Read more here: http://www.sacbee.com/opinion/california-forum/article3497613.html#storylink=cpy

The greatest Christmas story ever told: Get the kid his peaches

Here again, my friends, is the greatest Christmas story ever told by a great story teller, Al Martinez, formerly of the Oakland Tribune, Los Angeles Times and the Los Angeles Daily News. Al is known as the "Bard of LA" and has won three Pulitzer prizes since he began writing columns in 1952. He wrote his last column on March 30, 2013. 

I run this story every year in Fiat Lux, and it brings a tear to my eye every time.  So here it is, the Greatest Christmas Story Ever Told:

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A Christmas Story

By Al Martinez

IT happened one Christmas Eve a long time ago in a place called Oakland on a newspaper called the Tribune with a city editor named Alfred P. Reck.

I was working swing shift on general assignment, writing the story of a boy who was dying of leukemia and whose greatest wish was for fresh peaches.

It was a story which, in the tradition of 1950s journalism, would be milked for every sob we could squeeze from it, because everyone loved a good cry on Christmas.

We knew how to play a tear-jerker in those days, and I was full of the kinds of passions that could make a sailor weep.

I remember it was about 11 o'clock at night and pouring rain outside when I began putting the piece together for the next day's editions.

Deadline was an hour away, but an hour is a lifetime when you're young and fast and never get tired.

Then the telephone rang.

It was Al Reck calling, as he always did at night, and he'd had a few under his belt.

Reck was a drinking man. With diabetes and epilepsy, hard liquor was about the last thing he ought to be messing with, but you didn't tell Al what he ought to or ought not to do.

He was essentially a gentle man who rarely raised his voice, but you knew he was the city editor, and in those days the city editor was the law and the word in the newsroom.

But there was more than fear and tradition at work for Al.

We respected him immensely, not only for his abilities as a newsman, but for his humanity. Al was sensitive both to our needs and the needs of those whose names and faces appeared in the pages of the Oakland Tribune.

"What's up?" he asked me that Christmas Eve in a voice as soft and slurred as a summer breeze.

He already knew what was up because, during 25 years on the city desk, Reck somehow always knew what was up, but he wanted to hear it from the man handling the story.

I told him about the kid dying of leukemia and about the peaches and about how there simply were no fresh peaches, but it still made a good piece. We had art and a hole waiting on page one.

Al listened for a moment and then said, "How long's he got?"

"Not long," I said. "His doctor says maybe a day or two."

There was a long silence and then Al said, "Get the kid his peaches."

"I've called all over," I said. "None of the produce places in the Bay Area have fresh peaches. They're just plain out of season. It's winter."

"Not everywhere. Call Australia."

"Al," I began to argue, "it's after 11 and I have no idea . . .”

"Call Australia," he said, and then hung up.

If Al said call Australia, I would call Australia.

I don't quite remember whom I telephoned, newspapers maybe and agricultural associations, but I ended up finding fresh peaches and an airline that would fly them to the Bay Area before the end of Christmas Day.

There was only one problem. Customs wouldn't clear them. They were an agricultural product and would be hung up at San Francisco International at least for a day, and possibly forever.

Reck called again. He listened to the problem and told me to telephone the secretary of agriculture and have him clear the peaches when they arrived.

"It's close to midnight," I argued. "His office is closed."

"Take this number down," Reck said. "It's his home. Tell him I told you to call."

It was axiomatic among the admirers of Al Reck that he knew everyone and everyone knew him, from cops on the street to government leaders in their Georgetown estates. No one knew how Al knew them or why, but he did.

I made the call. The secretary said he'd have the peaches cleared when they arrived and give Al Reck his best.

"All right," Reck said on his third and final call to me, "now arrange for one of our photographers to meet the plane and take the peaches over to the boy's house."

He had been drinking steadily throughout the evening and the slurring had become almost impossible to understand.

By then it was a few minutes past midnight, and just a heartbeat and a half to the final deadline.

"Al," I said, "if I don't start writing this now I'll never get the story in the paper."

I won't forget this moment.

"I didn't say get the story," Reck replied gently. "I said get the kid his peaches."

If there is a flash point in our lives to which we can refer later, moments that shape our attitudes and affect our futures, that was mine.

Alfred Pierce Reck had defined for me the importance of what we do, lifting it beyond newsprint and deadline to a level of humanity that transcends job. He understood not only what we did but what we were supposed to do.

I didn't say get the story. I said get the kid his peaches.

The boy got his peaches and the story made the home edition, and I received a lesson in journalism more important than any I've learned since.

I wanted you to know that this Christmas season.

Al Martinez is a former reporter and columnist for The Oakland Tribune, from 1955 to 1971, The Richmond (Calif.) Independent and Los Angeles Times to now. Born in Oakland, he also has written several novels, for television and the movies. This article first appeared in the Los Angeles Times on Dec. 25, 1986.

Christmas message from Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori

The altar hanging at an English Advent service was made of midnight blue, with these words across its top: “We thank you that darkness reminds us of light.” Facing all who gathered there to give thanks were images of night creatures – a large moth, an owl, a badger, and a bat – cryptic and somewhat mysterious creatures that can only be encountered in the darkness.

As light ebbs from the days and the skies of fall, many in the Northern Hemisphere associate dark with the spooks and skeletons of secular Hallowe’en celebrations. That English church has reclaimed the connection between creator, creation, and the potential holiness of all that is. It is a fitting reorientation toward the coming of One who has altered those relationships toward new possibilities for healing and redemption.

Advent leads us into darkness and decreasing light. Our bodies slow imperceptibly with shorter days and longer nights, and the merriness and frantic activity around us are often merely signs of eager hunger for light and healing and wholeness.

The Incarnation, the coming of God among us in human flesh, happened in such a quiet and out of the way place that few noticed at first. Yet the impact on human existence has been like a bolt of lightning that continues to grow and generate new life and fire in all who share that hunger. Jesus is among us like a flitting moth – will we notice his presence in the street-sleeper? He pierces the dark like a silent, streaking owl seeking food for hungry and defenseless nestlings. He will overturn this world’s unjust foundations like badgers undermining a crooked wall. Like the bat’s sonar, his call comes to each one uniquely – have we heard his urgent “come and follow”?

God is among us, and within us, and around us, encountering, nudging, loving, transforming the world and its creatures toward the glorious dream the shepherds announced so many years ago, toward the beloved community of prophetic dreams, and the nightwatch that proclaims “all is well, fear not, the Lord is here.”

May Christ be born anew in you this Christmastide. May his light burn in you, and may you labor to spread it in the darkness. The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light, and it is the harbinger of peace for all creation.

The Most Rev. Katharine Jefferts Schori Presiding Bishop and Primate The Episcopal Church

A poem to get us through

I haven't run a poem on Fiat Lux in awhile. Margaret Haupt, one of our Stephen Ministry leaders, sent this, and so I pass it along...

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Kindness
By Naormi Shihab Nye

Before you know what kindness really is
you must lose things,
feel the future dissolve in a moment
like salt in a weakened broth.
What you held in your hand,
what you counted and carefully saved,
all this must go so you know
how desolate the landscape can be
between the regions of kindness.
How you ride and ride
thinking the bus will never stop,
the passengers eating maize and chicken
will stare out the window forever.

Before you learn the tender gravity of kindness,
you must travel where the Indian in a white poncho 
lies dead by the side of the road.
You must see how this could be you,
how he too was someone
who journeyed through the night with plans 
and the simple breath that kept him alive.

Before you know kindness as the deepest thing inside, 
you must know sorrow as the other deepest thing.  
You must wake up with sorrow.
You must speak to it till your voice
catches the thread of all sorrows
and you see the size of the cloth. 

Then it is only kindness that makes sense anymore,
only kindness that ties your shoes
and sends you out into the day to mail letters and 
     purchase bread,
only kindness that raises its head
from the crowd of the world to say
it is I you have been looking for,
and then goes with you every where
like a shadow or a friend.

Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe: Friday is her feast day

Friday is a very big deal in our hemisphere, even here in Charlottesville, though you might not notice.  The Catholic Church if the Incarnation is hosting hundreds of people at pre-dawn Eucharists Friday – early so people can get to work. The first Eucharist is at 2 am.

Let me tell you why Dec. 12 is an important feast day for millions of people. It is a story of dark-skinned peasants resisting the powerful, and the Holy Spirit doing what the Holy Spirit does ...

Nearly 500 years ago, the story goes, an Aztec with a Spanish name – Juan Diego – saw an apparition of the Virgin Mary. 

The local Spanish bishop, Juan de Zumárraga, did not believe him and told him to bring back proof of this vision. Juan Diego came back with his tunic full of flowers – Castilian roses – and the roses were blooming in winter. When Juan Diego poured the roses from his tunic, an image of Mary was imprinted on his tunic. 

That image has become probably the most copied and venerated image of Mary in the world.
Today is her feast day – Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe, la Virgen de Guadalupe – the Virgin of Guadalupe. This day in 1531 marks when an Aztec brought roses to the bishop, and the bishop had to believe him.

Whether you believe in the story, or believe it happened exactly that way, is less important than what she represents primarily to the people of Mexico and elsewhere in Latin America. Her shrine near Mexico City is the most visited Marian shrine in the world.

The Virgin of Guadalupe is sometimes known as the brown virgin – her skin color is that of the indigenous peoples of America. She is the Mary of the poor and the outcasts and those left behind or wiped out as Europeans colonized, industrialized and regimented the Americas. She is the Mary of the lowliest among us who stand up and say "you have it wrong, please listen."

 Even the word “Guadalupe” has roots in native Aztec language, and many believe the image is
filled with Aztec symbols. She is the Mary of hope to the poor of the Americas.

There is another level to this that I would commend to you: The Holy comes to us not just in male imagery (God the Father) but in female imagery. 

The Holy Spirit is like a wind that will blow where she will, and will show her face in ways that speak to people in the depths of their soul, and give them strength and courage when they most need it. The Virgin of Guadalupe does precisely that for so many, and I have met them (and they weren't all Latino).

Although Our Lady of Guadalupe is not on the official Episcopal calendar of saints, she will be celebrated in many Episcopal churches across the country, particularly in the Southwest.

As many of you know, I have a small collection of amazing Guadalupe folk art that I keep on my dresser at home. I have Guadalupe candlesticks, tin and ceramic figurines, santos wood carvings, and a lighted Guadalupe concha (shadow box) on the wall. Nearly all of these items are gifts from friends far and wide, and I cherish each item with thanks for the hands that made them.

By James Richardson, Fiat Lux

UVA President Teresa Sullivan meets with University chaplains to discuss changing the culture

UVA President Teresa Sullivan
Photo by the Associated Press

“It’s been a semester like no other.”

So began Teresa Sullivan, president of the University of Virginia, at a meeting with 15 University chaplains Tuesday morning. The chaplains, including myself, are part of an umbrella organization called “United Ministries” that include a wide spectrum of Christians, Jews and Muslims.

The chaplains asked to meet with President Sullivan last week in a letter about the current crisis surrounding a culture of sexual assault and alcohol abuse that has been rampant for decades. She responded immediately with an invitation to meet with her.

This has been a semester like no other in recent memory.

Hannah Graham, a second-year student, was abducted early in the semester, and her body was found about a month later. Two other students have died by taking their own life. And then in November, Rolling Stone magazine wrote an article about a student, “Jackie,” and her allegations of being gang raped at a UVA fraternity party.

Rolling Stone has since partially retracted the story. But there has been no let up in the debate over how to change the culture at UVA. It was clear in our meeting that President Sullivan welcomes that debate and is determined to make significant changes not just to UVA’s procedures, but also to UVA’s culture.

“I’ve been on this” since coming to the University in 2010, she said, soon after the beating death of student Yeardley Love at the hands of her student boyfriend.

Regardless of whether Rolling Stone got specific facts right on one incident, she noted, “we have actual survivors we are trying to take care of.”

She said the recent firestorm has surfaced survivors of sexual assaults from decades ago: “A wave of hurting that is hitting us.”

UVA’s counseling services are stretched to the maximum, and she asked for help from the chaplains. 

President Sullivan also discussed a number of ideas about how to stem underage drinking by providing competition to alcohol-soaked fraternity parties. Several chaplains pointed out that their organizations have created alcohol-free parties and events, but have not been well supported by UVA.

She pledged to look into that. She noted that she is working on opening a police substation on the “Corner,” and create a corps of “ambassadors” that will walk around in the neighborhood to help students get home.

The leaders of the fraternities are also engaged with her in working out new agreements with the University. She said she is urging them to “do things boldly, out of the ordinary” that could create a “virtuous cycle,” and could be a model for other colleges and universities struggling with the same issues.

The chaplains offered several ideas, including finding ways to tell the story of sexual abuse survivors that memorializes and keeps their struggle in front of the University community much the way the story of slavery is being told.

The chaplains pledged to cooperate with President Sullivan – and each other – in shifting student culture away from sexual violence and alcohol abuse. She pledged to improve communications with the chaplains and the community.

The chaplains also told President Sullivan that they are holding her in their prayers. She said she has been reading Psalm 27 a great deal lately:

“The LORD is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear? The Lord is the stronghold of my life; of whom shall I be afraid?”

Voices unheard: Black Lives Matter

I want you to see the picture at the right, and I know some of you will not like it. I know some of you believe that this has no place in Church or on a church-related blog. I expect I will hear from you. I hope I do. Let's talk.

I also think we need to be aware that the Church is not an island unto itself. We are very much a part of the world and culture around us. We need to hear voices that we seldom hear -- especially the young and people of color.

This picture is of Kelly Carson, one of our Canterbury undergraduate students who has been very involved in undergraduate-led social justice movements over the past year at the University of Virginia. This picture shows her at the rally led by the UVA Black Student Alliance Wednesday evening after the decision not to indict the police officer in the death of Eric Garner in New York.

The rally started at the Mad Bowl, went through the libraries and several other buildings before going to Carrs Hill. The rally was so loud in Alderman Library that people came in from all the other rooms and floors to see what was going on. The crowd is behind the photographer in this picture. You can learn more at #blacklivesmatter.

In the Tuesday evening discussion this week at our Canterbury student group, our students talked about how the young people leading are leading a new movement are like John the Baptist -- "a voice of one calling in the wilderness."

I also know how hard it is to be a cop. I spent years covering the criminal justice system as a reporter. I've seen the guilty get off and the innocent go to prison. I've spent hours and hours on "ride alongs." I've been shot at, and I helped rescue a wounded California Highway Patrolman in a vicious shoot-out with bank robbers. I very much get it that those who put on a badge don't know if they are coming home at night. I know that cops can do everything right, but in an instant, everything can go very wrong. I've lost three friends who were police officers who were shot to death in the line of duty. Each was a dedicated public servant who did as much off duty to help people as they did on duty. I am thankful every day for cops.

And I also know the system needs to change, that police departments need to work harder at listening to voices seldom heard and connect with their communities. Firepower will not solve our most intractable problems of poverty, race, gangs and drugs.

I don't have public policy solutions for you, and I am not sure the Church is very good at that anyway. But I do believe we have an enormous role in changing the culture, and in being voices of reconciliation, love and courage. If the Church cannot hear the angry and the lost, we have no reason to be.

In the weeks ahead, we need to create a safe forum for conversation and listening, where no one will be demonized for sharing their experiences and opinions. We know how to do that. I hope you will join me in this effort.

Finally, I ran across this quote the other day from the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., who said this in 1968 shortly before he was killed. His words, I believe, still apply:

"It is not enough for me to stand before you tonight and condemn riots. It would be morally irresponsible for me to do that without, at the same time, condemning the contingent, intolerable conditions that exist in our society. These conditions are the things that cause individuals to feel that they have no other alternative than to engage in violent rebellions to get attention. And I must say tonight that a riot is the language of the unheard."

By James Richardson, Fiat Lux

Healing the horrors: All are alive

"Now he is the God not of the dead, but of the living; for to him all of them are alive."

Lately we've endured a great deal of horror in Charlottesville: The abduction and murder of a second-year student, Hannah Graham, and then the revelations in Rolling Stone magazine about a sub-culture of rape and alcohol abuse in some of the fraternities. Anyone who has been here for any length of time was not surprised at these revelations. That has set off a firestorm that has not abated. We have preached on this, and posted a great deal on our St. Paul's Facebook page, so I do not propose to repeat any of that here.

We've also suffered a great deal of loss in the parish -- 20 deaths so far this year, an average of nearly every other week. We have a lot of hurting, grieving people right now.

With that backdrop, this morning's Daily Office reading from Luke 20:27-40 struck me in a new way. To set the scene, Jesus is gathered with rabbis who are questioning him about whether a woman who was married and widowed seven times has a husband in heaven.

There are contemporary commentators who seize on this passage as proof that marriage is between a man and a woman. But as I read it, I think that is quite beside the point Jesus makes. He is telling us that marriage is human artifact, a rite, and that in heaven everyone is a child of God. Marriage ceremonies and cultural customs don't mean much in heaven.

But there was something else that struck me this morning, and it isn't about marriage issues. In fact, it is the larger point Jesus makes: "Now he is the God not of the dead, but of the living; for to him all of them are alive."

"...all of them are alive."

All of the trials and horrors will pass away. All who are sick will be healed. This life is but a small slice of the spectrum of life. Those who are hurting will be healed, the grieving will have their tears wiped away. No one will be driven away. For to God, all are alive. No one is dead.

By James Richardson, Fiat Lux

Giving thanks in perilous times

“The year that is drawing towards its close, has been filled with the blessings of fruitful fields and healthful skies.” 

So began the proclamation establishing an annual day of national Thanksgiving. You might think you know the origins of these words, or you might be surprised to find out.

 It is true that the first thanksgiving feast on these shores was done by English settlers, the pilgrims. But they did it only once.

George Washington declared a day of Thanksgiving after the nation won its independence. But it was done only once and only in a few places.

Rather, the origins of an annual day of Thanksgiving came in a particularly horrific chapter of our nation’s history, and in a particularly awful month in that chapter.

 The date the proclamation was signed – Oct. 3, 1863 – was a bare three months after the Battle of Gettysburg, and a mere two weeks after another ferocious battle, at Chickamauga, Tennessee.

The idea for an annual observance of thanks came from Sarah Hale, a widow with five children who was penniless. She caught the attention of the President of the United States who agreed with her. Sarah Hale, by the way, went on to become an advocate for the education of girls and an famous author. You know her best as the author of “Mary had a little lamb.”

 In this, the darkest hours of our national existence, in midst of a terrible civil war that claimed hundreds of thousands of lives, the proclamation she inspired implored the nation to count its blessings, and earnestly asked God to bind our wounds.

That our ancestors would pause to give thanks, in spite of everything they had experienced, was extraordinary. They set a selfless, generous for us. We too live in perilous times. With fires raging in Ferguson, with horrific violence in Iraq and Syria, with religious conflict in Israel-Palestine, and with the recent horrors that have come to light right here at the University of Virginia, it would be easy to slip into despair or slide into willful ignorance.

 We should do neither.

Instead, on this Thanksgiving, I believe it fitting and proper to once again pray for the healing of our nation and world; pray that violence will end everywhere; and pray that we will, with God’s grace, become instruments of healing, reconciliation and justice for all.

Like our ancestors, we must begin by giving thanks for our blessings: the food on our table tonight, the love of family and friends, and the work we are given to do that each of us might make a difference.

And so hear again this proclamation, from the pen of the great man who signed it:

“To these bounties, which are so constantly enjoyed that we are prone to forget the source from which they come, others have been added, which are of so extraordinary a nature, that they cannot fail to penetrate and soften even the heart which is habitually insensible to the ever watchful providence of Almighty God…” 

 “No human counsel hath devised nor hath any mortal hand worked out these great things. They are the gracious gifts of the Most High God, who, while dealing with us in anger for our sins, hath nevertheless remembered mercy. It has seemed to me fit and proper that they should be solemnly, reverently and gratefully acknowledged as with one heart and one voice by the whole American People. 

 “I do therefore invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are at sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next, as a day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens, and I recommend to them that while offering up the ascriptions justly due to Him for such singular deliverances and blessings, they do also, with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience, commend to His tender care all those who have become widows, orphans, mourners or sufferers in the lamentable civil strife in which we are unavoidably engaged, 

 “And fervently implore the interposition of the Almighty Hand to heal the wounds of the nation and to restore it as soon as may be consistent with the Divine purposes to the full enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquility and Union.

 “In testimony whereof, I have hereunto set my hand and caused the Seal of the United States to be affixed.” 

Signed, Abraham Lincoln

Christ the King Sunday: Changing the culture of sexual violence at the University of Virginia

Credit: Rolling Stone magazine

Today is Christ the King Sunday, a day preachers (including me) usually spend time explaining why Jesus, this anti-monarchial Jewish rabbi, is the "king of kings."

The big time hint comes in the gospel lesson from Matthew 25:31-46 when Jesus says he is the one who is hungry, naked, thirsty, and in prison. He is the king who is with those who are in despair and in the low places.

We are in one of those low places now here in Charlottesville. Rolling Stone magazine published this week a lengthy article about the culture of sexual violence at the University of Virginia, and it has sparked a long overdue reaction. We've posted a lot of the statements and reactions on our St. Paul's Facebook page, and I won't post that here. But I want to share with you my sermon from this morning, which is my public statement on this.

+ + +

Last week broke very cold, and not just the temperature outside.

This was among the most challenging, and chilling, weeks I’ve experienced in the nearly seven years since you’ve called me here.

This is not an easy sermon today.

As you may know by now, our community was rocked by a Rolling Stone magazine article detailing a culture of sexual violence and alcohol abuse in fraternities that are only a few yards from this church.

The article is a very tough read, and I had to put it down several times. The details are shocking – horrific – and I cannot comprehend how any human being can treat another human being this way.

Then, later in the week, came news of another student suicide, Peter D’Agostino, the second student to die this way in a semester that was already marked by the murder of Hannah Graham.

Good Lord, enough already.

I must confess I have struggled to find the words to present you this morning in this pulpit. You may rightfully ask, why talk about this at all in church? I’ve asked myself that. My answer is, this parish was founded a century ago with the specific mission of serving and ministering to the students of the University of Virginia. We have an obligation to talk about it. And the gospel today – the Word of God – compels us to talk about this.

So I begin with this gospel lesson from Matthew that maybe captures some of the feelings of helplessness right now in our community:

“I was hungry and you gave me no food, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, I was a stranger and you did not welcome me, naked and you did not give me clothing, sick and in prison and you did not visit me.”

Like you, I have struggled to know how to feed the hungry, welcome the stranger, and protect the most vulnerable among us – especially our kids who come here as students.

All week, there was much conversation among students, faculty and staff, and in the wider community, and among those of us who work here in this church.

University officials have clearly struggled to find their feet, and respond in an appropriate and caring way.

The Charlottesville clergy is also struggling, especially those of us who pastor to our students.

Nearly all of the campus chaplains, of many faith traditions, will gather here at St. Paul’s tomorrow for a special meeting to try to figure this out together.

There are many questions for all of us, and I certainly don’t have all the answers. How do we clothe those who are vulnerable and violated? How do we bring them out of whatever prisons of despair and depression they may dwell? How do we see that justice is done?

And how do we turn our anger into making sure that no young woman will ever be attacked again? How do we declare “No more of this” and make it stick?

The Gospel of Matthew takes us today into a very low place, but then brings us to high place, and reaches beyond despair.

Today is also called by the Church, “Christ the King Sunday,” when the Church proclaims that Jesus is the Lord, the king of all.

Here in this gospel lesson, we find out what kind of king of kings he truly is – the king who goes into the places of hunger, and fear, abuse, violence – prison itself – to heal us – and proclaim no more of this.

If we look, we will see this already happening right here.

Start with the students themselves – they are living beacons of hope, and they have much to teach us if we are open and listening.

On Friday, something extraordinary happened at St. Paul’s. A diverse group of students organized what they called “Turkey-pa-looza.”

They gathered up unused food from the UVA dining halls, brought it here, and then cooked and packaged meals in green bags for needy families in the community. If you go to our website or Facebook page, you will see photos of them in our kitchen.

“For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me.”

I want to give you another example: We are supporting a group of students who are launching “Buddies on Call.”

These students will be stationed in our church late on Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights to escort other students who are trouble and need help getting home.

Meanwhile, student leaders have stood up and demanded to be heard. They have built a website with resources for students, and links to give University officials their wisdom on how to change this culture.

Let me quote from the student letter:

“It is easy to hate, to cast whole communities in doubt, to deny, or to hide. But if we respond to hard times with hard work, if we respond to division with unity, if we respond to efforts to tear us down by building each other up, then we'll look back on this moment as the time we stood up to answer the call.”

And there is something more.

Today we are baptizing a baby, Christian, into God’s One Holy and Apostolic Church.

Christian, you may not have quite thought of this yet, but you and your parents have been waiting since the day of your birth, four months and 14 days ago, for this day to arrive: The day of your baptism.

But God has been waiting since the foundation of the world for this day to arrive. That means this is a way bigger day for God than it is even for you or your parents. The world is never going to be the same again because you are being baptized today – and God rejoices and takes delight in you.

We need you here. We can’t wait to see you baptized, and we can’t wait to see what you will bring into our world.

We pray you will have a long and healthy life. We know you will certainly go your own way on many things, and you probably will put a few gray hairs on your parents’ heads.

But today is yours. Today you will be marked as “Christ’s own forever,” and that is no small claim.

Christ will never let go of you, not ever.

And you are stuck with us, and we welcome you to the deep end of the baptismal pool.

Christian you already have much to teach us. What we do for the least among us we do to Jesus. Help us to figure out how to do that with you.

We can start with our hands outstretched in thanksgiving – and give thanks for the gift of our life, thanks for the people we love, and thanks for the time we are given on this earth to make a difference.

We can show our thanks with our grateful giving, and we can show our thanks with our service to each other.

It is right that we begin every prayer with thanks, and ground our life in the sharing of bread and wine in our Holy Eucharist – words that mean “the Great Thanksgiving.”

God has very ambitious dreams for us – serving our community, serving each other –and here in this place by making our university community not only a vibrant center of learning, but also a safe environment so that everyone who comes here can thrive.

When we care for the most vulnerable among us, we are caring for Jesus himself. In the gospel lesson today, Jesus proclaims that when we care for the most vulnerable, we will see the very face of the Risen Christ in the face of each other.

Those moments are truly holy moments.

One of these moments comes right now, when we baptize Christian. We will renew our baptismal covenant to “seek and serve Christ in all persons, loving your neighbor as yourself” and we will pledge to “strive for justice and peace among all people, and respect the dignity of every human being.”

And then let us go from here to make our promises real in our lives, with our prayers, with our service, with our giving, and with our actions. Welcome to this extraordinary life, Christian. AMEN