I like Advent calendars. I always have. I like having that pretty Nativity scene to look at while, each day, I open another window. Sometimes I even have to hunt for them – that pesky #13 or #17 can get hidden in a shepherd’s cloak or an angel’s wing! I even like the black and white Advent calendar that looks like a winding path, with each day’s suggestion of a helpful spiritual practice. But – and on this first Sunday in Advent I will risk sounding like the Grinch that stole Christmas – Advent is not a time of preparation for Christmas. In our stores, our print and broadcast media, and many of our homes we have begun the “Christmas season.” Actually the big Christmas season, with its insistence that we honor Jesus by maxing out our credit cards, is virtually unique to this country. Even so, unlike the rest of the mad world around us, in the church at least, we have begun the season of Advent. Advent: that slow, reflective time, when the church asks us to pause, be quiet, and turn towards God. And it took me a long time to realize this: Advent is not a preparation for Christmas. Advent is a season with blessings and graces of its own. Advent marks the beginning of a new church year – in our cycle of Eucharistic lections we are now in Year B. As in the other years in the Revised Common Lectionary cycle, in Advent we begin by retelling the old story, a retelling that will occupy us from now through next Pentecost. And on this very first day, as we begin the retelling, by God’s grace we also see glimpses of the end of our story and the hope that we bear as disciples of Jesus.
At its deepest, Advent is a season of reflection, reflection on at least three levels. On the first level, Advent allows us to give voice to our deepest longings for God’s presence in our world. As we hear the laments of the Psalmist and of Isaiah, we can resonate with the pain and longing in their voices. Decrying the invasion of Israel by the Assyrians, the psalmist cries, “Stir up your strength and come to help us. Restore us, O God with great armies, let us see your face….” Similarly, the prophet of Third Isaiah gives voice to his people’s sense of having been abandoned by God, as they return from exile to a ruined Jerusalem. Here too we hear a cry for God’s presence: “O that you would tear open the heavens and come down,” come down so powerfully that even the mountains would feel your presence.
As we look around at our own world, don’t we feel that same sense of longing for God’s presence? “Occupy Wall Street” has bitterly reminded us of the great economic disparities in this country. The failure of the so-called “Super Committee” to reach compromise on the federal budget reflects our deeply partisan political divide. Even worse, Greece, Italy, Ireland, and other western European countries stagger under unmanageable debt loads and struggle to take the unpalatable measures necessary to deal with their debts. In the Middle East, the “Arab Spring” rid the world of dictators in Tunisia, Egypt, and Libya. What forces will rush in to fill these political vacuums remains to be seen. And when we turn to Africa, we just want to weep over the devastation in Somalia, Darfur, Liberia, and Zimbabwe. As you look around our tattered world, what most disturbs you? For me, as I contemplate our crazy quilt of employer-dependent health insurance, with its vast inequities in access to adequate healthcare, I want to weep. And what pulls at your hearts? What in the world, or even in this community, cries out for attention? Advent is a good time to reflect on what most urges us to shout at God, “Stir up your strength and come among us – and fix things!”
But Advent allows us to do more than bewail the injustices, poverty, and conflict of our world. On a second level, Advent also bids us reflect on our hopes for the future, our expectation of God’s future. The psalmist and Isaiah do more than just cry out. Even before crying out, the psalmist reminds God that God is Israel’s shepherd, “leading Joseph like a flock.” Although Israel’s sins perhaps led to the sense of abandonment by God that Isaiah’s people feel, even so the prophet reminds his hearers of the special relationship between God and God’s people, and of God’s love for God’s people: “We are the clay, and you are our potter, we are all the work of your hand…. We are all your people.” As disciples of Jesus, we too are grounded in that assurance of God’s love for God’s people. But we also believe that, just as God broke into our world once, God will break in again to complete the establishment of God’s reign. How and when this will occur we do not know, nor should we waste time speculating on what Jesus himself suggests we cannot know. What we do need to do is reflect on what our own future hopes are. Rather than surrendering to the frenzy of the “Christmas season,” pause and take a few minutes to reflect on your own hopes for the future. What would you like to see happen during your lifetime? What is your vision of God’s reign? When you hear those words, do you think of the peaceable kingdom in which lions and lambs lie down together? Do you think of a “new heaven and a new earth?” of a “new Jerusalem,” of a time and place where there is no more war and death, sickness and poverty? Do you think of the “river of life,” with its trees whose leaves are for the healing of the nations? How do you picture God’s reign? What do you hope for most deeply? Take the gift of Advent and reflect on that hope and offer it to God.
Finally, on a third level, Advent bids us reflect on how to live in this “middle time,” this time between Christ’s first coming and Christ’s glorious return. In our Gospel reading, Jesus says it all: “Beware, keep alert…. Keep awake.” Rather than letting ourselves be dazzled by holiday lights and decorations or deafened by the endless Muzak Christmas carols that assault us in every store, rather than letting us rush straight to the manger, Advent bids us remain alert and awake to the ways in which Christ may be at work in our lives now. The two are not mutually exclusive: the “hope of glory” does not exempt us from present action. Cardinal Cushing often told about the little girl who loved to sit and listen to her grandmother read the story of creation in Genesis. Noticing that the girl seemed unusually attentive, the grandmother asked her what she thought of the Genesis story. “Oh, I love it,” she said, “You never know what God is going to do next.” In Advent, as we acknowledge that God did not finish or exhaust creation in the past, as we long for the perfection of creation and the coming of God’s reign in the future, we too might agree that we “never know what God is going to do next.” As we seek to hear Christ’s voice in the noisy world around us, we sense that God has not abandoned us, and we believe Jesus’ promise that, “I am with you always, to the end of the age.”
In this season of Advent, we reflect on our longing for God, our hopes for the future, and our confidence in God’s help in the present. As a way of deepening our appreciation for the church’s gift to us of Advent, I’d like to urge you to take seriously the suggestions of the Advent Conspiracy.1 Started in 2006 by five pastors, the Advent Conspiracy asks us to revolutionize our observance of Advent through four actions. The first action is to worship fully. We are asked to put down our burdens and regularly lift up a heartfelt song. The second action is to spend less. Certainly our kids love their gifts. But consider this: Americans spend over $450 billion a year every Christmas. Could you buy one fewer gift this year? Could you give instead a gift of service or a photograph or a heartfelt letter of appreciation? Could you give what you save to someone in need? The third action is to give more. During this Advent season, rather than rushing to the stores, perhaps we could give our friends and family a precious gift of time or attention. Do you need to write an old friend a letter? Do you need to sit and hear someone’s story? Finally, the reflection in which we engage in Advent should help us to love all. Can we follow Jesus by loving as he loved? By spending less at Christmas we can join Him in giving resources to those who need help the most. When the Advent Conspiracy first began four churches offered this simple challenge to their congregations. The result raised more than half a million dollars to aid those in need. One fewer gift. One unbelievable gift in the name of Christ.
“Stir up your strength and come to help us.” O God, when you come, may you find us alert, awake, and ready to follow where you lead.
1. For example, see http://ac.wcrossing.org/default.aspx?page=3684
Sunday, November 27, 2011
Sunday, November 20, 2011
When Did We See You Hungry?
Have you ever been to one of the great Gothic cathedrals? Notre Dame or Chartres or Westminster Abbey? If you have, or even if you’ve seen pictures of them, you know that they are literally sermons in glass and stone. In the great cathedrals, every architectural detail, every window, and every sculpture are designed to point us to God and to remind us of God’s mighty works on our behalf. Though not medieval, the great Washington National Cathedral, the cathedral church of the Episcopal Diocese of Washington, is also such a sermon in stone. Episcopal priest Frank Logue tells us that the entire building is designed to point us towards God and to remind us of God’s mighty works.1 As with the medieval cathedrals, the focal point of the national cathedral is the high altar. Behind the high altar the huge reredos depicts Christ in glory surrounded by over one hundred figures. But look closely: closest to the glorified Christ stand who? The great angels? The most exemplary saints? The apostles? The martyrs? None of these. Closest to the glorified Christ, at the very heart of this great cathedral stand six allegorical figures, figures of people who are hungry, thirsty, homeless, naked, sick, and imprisoned. You can’t miss the theme of the sermon: it is they, the poor, the needy, the weak, the victims, whom Christ first embraces in paradise.
Are you surprised? Were you surprised that Jesus depicted the final judgment as a test of how we treated others, especially of how we treated “the least of these?” Jesus warned us, didn’t he? He told us that when he returned to begin his reign over all creation we would face a test. Not on whether we understood and professed every iota of the Nicene Creed. Not on whether we had read and understood the sermons of John Chrysostom or John Donne. Not on whether we had the most beautiful sanctuaries and vestments. He would test us, Jesus told us, on how real our faith was, on how we had treated those who were poor, sick, hungry, oppressed or in prison, on whether we had actively attended to their needs or ignored them. He would remind us that faith isn’t faith until it’s actualized, until it’s made concrete in the ways that we live our lives. Even if we don’t always know exactly who the beneficiary of our good works is, even if we’re not always sure that those whom we help are part of the “deserving poor,” Jesus would say that when we use our faith to benefit others, we show our love for Jesus himself. Didn’t we already know that? Didn’t the prophets of the Hebrew Scriptures tell us that? And hadn’t the writer of the Letter of James repeated the same message to his hearers when he asked, “What good is it to profess faith without practicing it?” What good is it if you ignore the needs of the naked or the hungry? Hadn’t he also warned us that “without good deeds faith is useless?”
So Jesus’ parable – and the sermon in stone – remind us that whether we like it or not, we will ultimately be accountable to God for how we have lived our lives and how we have used God’s gifts to us. This Sunday, when we recognize and give thanks to God that it is Christ to whom we are accountable rather than to any secular authority, perhaps this is a good time to pause and look at our own lives. How would we do on Jesus’ test? What does your datebook and your checkbook say about you? Are you regular in worship, and does the nourishment you receive in the Eucharist change the rest of your life in any way? Do you pay attention to the needs of only your closest family and friends and ignore the needs of those on the margins of your social circle? Whom do you consider “the least” in your world, and are you concerned about them? Do you look to see Jesus in others, even in “difficult” people, or people you don’t like? Do you look beyond the charitable handout and try to make a difference in the systems of injustice and inequity that trap people in poverty, disease, and disaster? Are you mindful of the needs of our brothers and sisters in other countries?
Jesus’ test isn’t only or even primarily addressed to us as individuals. All the pronouns in the parable are in the second person plural. So Jesus’ questions are also addressed to us corporately, to us here at St. Peter’s as a parish. And the questions are similar. This is a parish with many gifts: physical plant, talented people, resources. How are we using those gifts for the benefit of the community? If we were to lock the doors and all go our separate ways, would anyone miss us? Take a minute and think about it: where are you anxious, restless, to bring the Gospel to the wider community? Where would Jesus want us to go? If money were no object, and we had all the people we needed, what would we as a congregation want to do in the wider community? What tugs at your heart? Do we think we need more money or more people to truly live out our faith? If we have the will to try to befriend the “least of these,” Jesus’ sisters and brothers whom we see around us, might not God provide the resources that we need to do so?
Are you beginning to feel judged and put on the spot? Do you fear the separation of the sheep and the goats depicted in Jesus’ parable? Where’s the good news? My brothers and sisters, here’s the good news. That Jesus holds us accountable for what we do means that our lives have consequences, and it matters to God and to those around us how we live them out. Our lives may be short, our scope of action may be limited, but our lives still have value and meaning. That Jesus also holds us accountable as a parish for how we use God’s gifts means that our life together as a community of faith also has value and meaning. It does – or it should – mean that our being here makes a difference!
Ultimately, we come back to the question we have been wrestling with for the last several weeks, ever since, in the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus began his last sermon in Jerusalem. And that question is, how do we live in this middle time between Jesus’ death and resurrection and the full inauguration of his reign on earth? The answer is both simple and complicated. We heard Jesus himself give the answer to the question: “You must love the Most High God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. That is the greatest and first commandment. The second is like it: You must love your neighbor as yourself.” Love God, love your neighbor: that is how we live in the middle time.
St. Teresa of Avila told us, “We cannot be sure if we are loving God … but we can know quite well if we are loving our neighbor.” I’d like to tell you about a community – not an individual, not even a parish, but an entire community – who looked to the margins and discovered the neighbors they were called to love. Not In Our Town: Light in the Darkness is a one-hour documentary, that was shown on public television, about a town coming together to take action after anti-immigrant violence devastated the community.2 In 2008, a series of attacks on Latino residents of Patchogue, New York culminated in the murder of Marcelo Lucero, an Ecuadoran immigrant who had lived in the Long Island village for thirteen years. For the next two years, Mayor Paul Pontieri, Joselo Lucero, the murdered man’s brother, and Patchogue residents wrestled with the underlying causes of the violence. Four months after Marcelo Lucero’s murder, the mayor led the Patchogue Board of Trustees in passing a resolution stating that "thoughtful discourse can only occur in an environment free of hatred and vilification," and that anti-immigrant rhetoric not only harms targeted groups but "our entire social fabric." Joselo urged people to come together so that a tragedy like his brother's death would never happen again. The Suffolk County Police Department assigned two Spanish-speaking officers to Patchogue, one of whom serves as a community relations liaison with the immigrant community. The local library became both a safe place for Latino immigrants, who often felt uneasy in other public places, and a gathering place for those who wanted to continue working for reconciliation. Gradually the “Not in our Town” movement began to spread. Now more than fifty such groups exist all over North America, from Alaska to Florida, from California to Prince Edward Island.
The righteous will ask, “Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry and gave you food, or thirsty and gave you something to drink? And when was it that we saw you a stranger and welcomed you, or naked and gave you clothing? And when was it that we saw you sick or in prison and visited you?” Pray that it may be said of us that when we served his brothers and sisters in need we recognized him in them.
---------------------------
1. Frank Logue pointed out the connection between the National Cathedral figures and this Gospel lection in his article, “The Power of Disturbing Faith,” accessed on November 17, 2011 at http://www.kingofpeace.org/religioncolumn/052110.htm.
2. See http://www.niot.org/lightinthedarkness
Are you surprised? Were you surprised that Jesus depicted the final judgment as a test of how we treated others, especially of how we treated “the least of these?” Jesus warned us, didn’t he? He told us that when he returned to begin his reign over all creation we would face a test. Not on whether we understood and professed every iota of the Nicene Creed. Not on whether we had read and understood the sermons of John Chrysostom or John Donne. Not on whether we had the most beautiful sanctuaries and vestments. He would test us, Jesus told us, on how real our faith was, on how we had treated those who were poor, sick, hungry, oppressed or in prison, on whether we had actively attended to their needs or ignored them. He would remind us that faith isn’t faith until it’s actualized, until it’s made concrete in the ways that we live our lives. Even if we don’t always know exactly who the beneficiary of our good works is, even if we’re not always sure that those whom we help are part of the “deserving poor,” Jesus would say that when we use our faith to benefit others, we show our love for Jesus himself. Didn’t we already know that? Didn’t the prophets of the Hebrew Scriptures tell us that? And hadn’t the writer of the Letter of James repeated the same message to his hearers when he asked, “What good is it to profess faith without practicing it?” What good is it if you ignore the needs of the naked or the hungry? Hadn’t he also warned us that “without good deeds faith is useless?”
So Jesus’ parable – and the sermon in stone – remind us that whether we like it or not, we will ultimately be accountable to God for how we have lived our lives and how we have used God’s gifts to us. This Sunday, when we recognize and give thanks to God that it is Christ to whom we are accountable rather than to any secular authority, perhaps this is a good time to pause and look at our own lives. How would we do on Jesus’ test? What does your datebook and your checkbook say about you? Are you regular in worship, and does the nourishment you receive in the Eucharist change the rest of your life in any way? Do you pay attention to the needs of only your closest family and friends and ignore the needs of those on the margins of your social circle? Whom do you consider “the least” in your world, and are you concerned about them? Do you look to see Jesus in others, even in “difficult” people, or people you don’t like? Do you look beyond the charitable handout and try to make a difference in the systems of injustice and inequity that trap people in poverty, disease, and disaster? Are you mindful of the needs of our brothers and sisters in other countries?
Jesus’ test isn’t only or even primarily addressed to us as individuals. All the pronouns in the parable are in the second person plural. So Jesus’ questions are also addressed to us corporately, to us here at St. Peter’s as a parish. And the questions are similar. This is a parish with many gifts: physical plant, talented people, resources. How are we using those gifts for the benefit of the community? If we were to lock the doors and all go our separate ways, would anyone miss us? Take a minute and think about it: where are you anxious, restless, to bring the Gospel to the wider community? Where would Jesus want us to go? If money were no object, and we had all the people we needed, what would we as a congregation want to do in the wider community? What tugs at your heart? Do we think we need more money or more people to truly live out our faith? If we have the will to try to befriend the “least of these,” Jesus’ sisters and brothers whom we see around us, might not God provide the resources that we need to do so?
Are you beginning to feel judged and put on the spot? Do you fear the separation of the sheep and the goats depicted in Jesus’ parable? Where’s the good news? My brothers and sisters, here’s the good news. That Jesus holds us accountable for what we do means that our lives have consequences, and it matters to God and to those around us how we live them out. Our lives may be short, our scope of action may be limited, but our lives still have value and meaning. That Jesus also holds us accountable as a parish for how we use God’s gifts means that our life together as a community of faith also has value and meaning. It does – or it should – mean that our being here makes a difference!
Ultimately, we come back to the question we have been wrestling with for the last several weeks, ever since, in the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus began his last sermon in Jerusalem. And that question is, how do we live in this middle time between Jesus’ death and resurrection and the full inauguration of his reign on earth? The answer is both simple and complicated. We heard Jesus himself give the answer to the question: “You must love the Most High God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. That is the greatest and first commandment. The second is like it: You must love your neighbor as yourself.” Love God, love your neighbor: that is how we live in the middle time.
St. Teresa of Avila told us, “We cannot be sure if we are loving God … but we can know quite well if we are loving our neighbor.” I’d like to tell you about a community – not an individual, not even a parish, but an entire community – who looked to the margins and discovered the neighbors they were called to love. Not In Our Town: Light in the Darkness is a one-hour documentary, that was shown on public television, about a town coming together to take action after anti-immigrant violence devastated the community.2 In 2008, a series of attacks on Latino residents of Patchogue, New York culminated in the murder of Marcelo Lucero, an Ecuadoran immigrant who had lived in the Long Island village for thirteen years. For the next two years, Mayor Paul Pontieri, Joselo Lucero, the murdered man’s brother, and Patchogue residents wrestled with the underlying causes of the violence. Four months after Marcelo Lucero’s murder, the mayor led the Patchogue Board of Trustees in passing a resolution stating that "thoughtful discourse can only occur in an environment free of hatred and vilification," and that anti-immigrant rhetoric not only harms targeted groups but "our entire social fabric." Joselo urged people to come together so that a tragedy like his brother's death would never happen again. The Suffolk County Police Department assigned two Spanish-speaking officers to Patchogue, one of whom serves as a community relations liaison with the immigrant community. The local library became both a safe place for Latino immigrants, who often felt uneasy in other public places, and a gathering place for those who wanted to continue working for reconciliation. Gradually the “Not in our Town” movement began to spread. Now more than fifty such groups exist all over North America, from Alaska to Florida, from California to Prince Edward Island.
The righteous will ask, “Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry and gave you food, or thirsty and gave you something to drink? And when was it that we saw you a stranger and welcomed you, or naked and gave you clothing? And when was it that we saw you sick or in prison and visited you?” Pray that it may be said of us that when we served his brothers and sisters in need we recognized him in them.
---------------------------
1. Frank Logue pointed out the connection between the National Cathedral figures and this Gospel lection in his article, “The Power of Disturbing Faith,” accessed on November 17, 2011 at http://www.kingofpeace.org/religioncolumn/052110.htm.
2. See http://www.niot.org/lightinthedarkness
Sunday, November 6, 2011
A Great Multitude Which No Man Could Number
The deep blue sea sparkled and the bright sunlight dazzled his eyes as day after endless day John of Ephesus stared out of his makeshift home on the island of Patmos. The government of the Roman emperor Domitian had exiled him here, because, as a forceful leader of a fledgling Christian community, the government considered him a dangerous agitator. Patmos wasn’t exactly a barren rock – there were a Roman garrison and imperial temple here – and a few members of his community had been able to come with John. Like so many of the Hebrew prophets, whose writings he knew so well, John had always been something of a visionary. He had had dreams and visions of God, Jesus, heaven, and even of the end times, when God’s victory would be complete. Now, about sixty years after Jesus’ triumph on the Cross, as John stared out into the sea and sun, he began to collect and organize his visions. As he began to write them down on long scrolls, he also had new visions, and he came to an even deeper understanding of God’s promises and purposes. Sometime after his release from Patmos, in the late ‘90s, he made his scrolls known not only to the Christian community in Ephesus, but also to all the other churches in Asia Minor. The scrolls containing John’s visions came to be known as the Apocalypse of John, or Revelation, from the first word of the very first scroll.
From the very beginning, Revelation was considered a strange book. It was only included in the New Testament canon in 397, and that was despite questions about its character, symbolism, and authorship. In the 16th century, Martin Luther initially considered it to be "neither apostolic nor prophetic," and he said that "Christ is neither taught nor known in it,” though he did retract this view in later life. In the same century, John Calvin considered the book canonical, yet he declined to write a commentary on it. To this day, Revelation is the only New Testament book not read in the Divine Liturgy of the Eastern Orthodox Church, though it is included in Catholic and Protestant liturgies.
Why is Revelation such a strange and difficult book? The first reason may be that it is addressed to people experiencing a socio-political context unfamiliar to most Americans, that of severe oppression and martyrdom. It offers a strong critique of the source of that oppression, i.e., the Roman Empire, and warns people to follow God’s ways instead. “Salvation belongs to our God, who is seated on the throne and to the Lamb, not to Caesar,” shout the multitude. In addition, Revelation contains all sorts of violent, disruptive, and frightening images, and its narrative thread is difficult to follow. Even more than the Gospels, it offers contradictory statements on the nature of God, and on who is saved. What makes it even more suspect is that it depicts one person’s visionary experiences rather than the historical record preserved by those who first interacted with Jesus. No wonder most of us shy away from it!
Yet Revelation has much to offer us. Indeed, some seminarians have spent an entire semester chasing down its Old Testament allusions and fleshing out its many themes. We do have to be careful not to try to apply the book of Revelation to the contemporary church or to current events. With that caveat, this morning I want to pull out just one thread. Many passages and much of the imagery of Revelation seem black and white. Reflecting Christians’ unremitting struggle with the Roman government, which is symbolized by Babylon, the text seems to make it crystal clear, who is the oppressor and who is the victim, who is saved and who is damned. Even so, underneath all those seemingly black and white allusions, Revelation also strongly suggests that the Lamb has triumphed over evil and death, and that, consequently, all will ultimately be saved.
We hear that suggestion clearly in this morning’s passage. In the first eight verses of this chapter, which we did not hear, John has witnessed the salvation of the 144,000, i.e., the representatives of all the twelve tribes of Israel. Now he has turned around, and suddenly he beholds, “a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb….” The vision echoes those of the prophet Isaiah and the message is clear: no longer is salvation available only to God’s initially chosen people, now all people have access to God’s love. As one scholar reminds us, though the imagery and mood of Revelation is often dark and somber, John continues to offer us “the God whose victory does not depend on ours, who loves us when we do not love him or ourselves, who believes in us when we do not believe in him or ourselves, who saves us when we do not believe that we need saving or are worth saving.”1 God’s judgment has been spoken from the Cross, and, ultimately, all people are both judged by the Cross and included in its saving power.
And here’s the even better news: you and I are included in the salvation wrought by God and the Lamb! All of us here, past, present, and yet to come, are included in God’s salvation. Is that an odd proclamation for All Saints Day? The observation of this day began in the ancient church, when martyrs like those whom Revelation mentions were remembered and praised. Gradually, Christians included in that number all whose lives in the faith were especially heroic or exemplary. Many of these heroic Christians are included among the official list of “saints” maintained by the Roman Catholic Church, and many more are included in our Holy Women, Holy Men. However, finally we have come to realize that the “saints” we commemorate today include all baptized Christians. Indeed, this is exactly the way most of our New Testament writings understand who the “saints” are. Paul, for example, regularly refers to the “saints” in the Christian communities to whom he writes.
From Paul’s time right through to ours, the saints, that multitude whom no one could count, include all baptized people. That uncountable multitude includes the members of the Body of Christ in all places, and in all times, past, present, and yet to come. It includes not only Teresa of Avila, the Curé D’Ars, and Mother Ruth. That multitude also includes all the less exemplary Christians, Renaissance popes, Spanish inquisitors, Henry VIII, and all those who grieved God through their vanity, anger, pride, lust, greed or any other sin. When we are honest with ourselves, we know that we too are among the unworthy saints. Even so, worthy or unworthy, no one escapes God’s saving embrace. You can probably all say John 3:16 from memory (“For God so loved the world….”). But the next verse is equally important: “Indeed God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.”
Every time we liturgically remember one of the more exemplary saints, we pray a collect associated with that person. It’s instructive to look at those collects, for they almost all follow the same pattern. After thanking God for the life and witness of that person, the collects pray that we might follow their good examples and ourselves witness to God’s goodness and love. If today were not All Saints Day and Sunday, we would be privileged to remember William Temple, a former archbishop of Canterbury with a passion for social justice, who died on this day in 1944. Here is the collect for his day, November 6: “O God of light and love, you illumined your Church through the witness of your servant William Temple: Inspire us, we pray, by his teaching and example, that we may rejoice with courage, confidence and faith in the Word made flesh, and may be led to establish that city which has justice for its foundation and love for its law; through Jesus Christ, the light of the world, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen.”
As we give thanks for the life of William Temple and all those whom we remember this day, here are our tasks for this day and this week. First, sometime today, take a moment to reflect on who has been an exemplary saint or person in your life in the past, or who is an exemplary saint for you now. Pray for that person and thank God for that person’s witness. Ask God to help you be more like that person. If that person is still alive, call him or her or write a note of thanksgiving. Second, pray that you might be an exemplary saint for someone else. To whom and in what way does your life witness to God’s great love in Christ? Who might be touched by your witness? And, finally, rejoice that, as we welcome four more people into the blessed company of all the saints, we know that we are not only surrounded by a great cloud of witnesses, but that we ourselves are a part of that “great multitude which no man could number.” Thanks be to God!
1. M. Eugene Boring, Revelation, Interpretation (Louisville: John Knox, 1989), 228, quoted by Wilfrid J. Harrington, O.P. Revelation, (Collegeville, MN: The Liturgical Press, 1993), 231.
From the very beginning, Revelation was considered a strange book. It was only included in the New Testament canon in 397, and that was despite questions about its character, symbolism, and authorship. In the 16th century, Martin Luther initially considered it to be "neither apostolic nor prophetic," and he said that "Christ is neither taught nor known in it,” though he did retract this view in later life. In the same century, John Calvin considered the book canonical, yet he declined to write a commentary on it. To this day, Revelation is the only New Testament book not read in the Divine Liturgy of the Eastern Orthodox Church, though it is included in Catholic and Protestant liturgies.
Why is Revelation such a strange and difficult book? The first reason may be that it is addressed to people experiencing a socio-political context unfamiliar to most Americans, that of severe oppression and martyrdom. It offers a strong critique of the source of that oppression, i.e., the Roman Empire, and warns people to follow God’s ways instead. “Salvation belongs to our God, who is seated on the throne and to the Lamb, not to Caesar,” shout the multitude. In addition, Revelation contains all sorts of violent, disruptive, and frightening images, and its narrative thread is difficult to follow. Even more than the Gospels, it offers contradictory statements on the nature of God, and on who is saved. What makes it even more suspect is that it depicts one person’s visionary experiences rather than the historical record preserved by those who first interacted with Jesus. No wonder most of us shy away from it!
Yet Revelation has much to offer us. Indeed, some seminarians have spent an entire semester chasing down its Old Testament allusions and fleshing out its many themes. We do have to be careful not to try to apply the book of Revelation to the contemporary church or to current events. With that caveat, this morning I want to pull out just one thread. Many passages and much of the imagery of Revelation seem black and white. Reflecting Christians’ unremitting struggle with the Roman government, which is symbolized by Babylon, the text seems to make it crystal clear, who is the oppressor and who is the victim, who is saved and who is damned. Even so, underneath all those seemingly black and white allusions, Revelation also strongly suggests that the Lamb has triumphed over evil and death, and that, consequently, all will ultimately be saved.
We hear that suggestion clearly in this morning’s passage. In the first eight verses of this chapter, which we did not hear, John has witnessed the salvation of the 144,000, i.e., the representatives of all the twelve tribes of Israel. Now he has turned around, and suddenly he beholds, “a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb….” The vision echoes those of the prophet Isaiah and the message is clear: no longer is salvation available only to God’s initially chosen people, now all people have access to God’s love. As one scholar reminds us, though the imagery and mood of Revelation is often dark and somber, John continues to offer us “the God whose victory does not depend on ours, who loves us when we do not love him or ourselves, who believes in us when we do not believe in him or ourselves, who saves us when we do not believe that we need saving or are worth saving.”1 God’s judgment has been spoken from the Cross, and, ultimately, all people are both judged by the Cross and included in its saving power.
And here’s the even better news: you and I are included in the salvation wrought by God and the Lamb! All of us here, past, present, and yet to come, are included in God’s salvation. Is that an odd proclamation for All Saints Day? The observation of this day began in the ancient church, when martyrs like those whom Revelation mentions were remembered and praised. Gradually, Christians included in that number all whose lives in the faith were especially heroic or exemplary. Many of these heroic Christians are included among the official list of “saints” maintained by the Roman Catholic Church, and many more are included in our Holy Women, Holy Men. However, finally we have come to realize that the “saints” we commemorate today include all baptized Christians. Indeed, this is exactly the way most of our New Testament writings understand who the “saints” are. Paul, for example, regularly refers to the “saints” in the Christian communities to whom he writes.
From Paul’s time right through to ours, the saints, that multitude whom no one could count, include all baptized people. That uncountable multitude includes the members of the Body of Christ in all places, and in all times, past, present, and yet to come. It includes not only Teresa of Avila, the Curé D’Ars, and Mother Ruth. That multitude also includes all the less exemplary Christians, Renaissance popes, Spanish inquisitors, Henry VIII, and all those who grieved God through their vanity, anger, pride, lust, greed or any other sin. When we are honest with ourselves, we know that we too are among the unworthy saints. Even so, worthy or unworthy, no one escapes God’s saving embrace. You can probably all say John 3:16 from memory (“For God so loved the world….”). But the next verse is equally important: “Indeed God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.”
Every time we liturgically remember one of the more exemplary saints, we pray a collect associated with that person. It’s instructive to look at those collects, for they almost all follow the same pattern. After thanking God for the life and witness of that person, the collects pray that we might follow their good examples and ourselves witness to God’s goodness and love. If today were not All Saints Day and Sunday, we would be privileged to remember William Temple, a former archbishop of Canterbury with a passion for social justice, who died on this day in 1944. Here is the collect for his day, November 6: “O God of light and love, you illumined your Church through the witness of your servant William Temple: Inspire us, we pray, by his teaching and example, that we may rejoice with courage, confidence and faith in the Word made flesh, and may be led to establish that city which has justice for its foundation and love for its law; through Jesus Christ, the light of the world, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen.”
As we give thanks for the life of William Temple and all those whom we remember this day, here are our tasks for this day and this week. First, sometime today, take a moment to reflect on who has been an exemplary saint or person in your life in the past, or who is an exemplary saint for you now. Pray for that person and thank God for that person’s witness. Ask God to help you be more like that person. If that person is still alive, call him or her or write a note of thanksgiving. Second, pray that you might be an exemplary saint for someone else. To whom and in what way does your life witness to God’s great love in Christ? Who might be touched by your witness? And, finally, rejoice that, as we welcome four more people into the blessed company of all the saints, we know that we are not only surrounded by a great cloud of witnesses, but that we ourselves are a part of that “great multitude which no man could number.” Thanks be to God!
1. M. Eugene Boring, Revelation, Interpretation (Louisville: John Knox, 1989), 228, quoted by Wilfrid J. Harrington, O.P. Revelation, (Collegeville, MN: The Liturgical Press, 1993), 231.
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