Paul wrote:
Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will hardship, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? As it is written,
“For your sake we are being killed all day long;
we are accounted as sheep to be slaughtered.”
No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.
(From the Daily Office Lectionary – Romans 8:35-39 – July 10, 2012)
My church, the Episcopal Church meeting in its 77th General Convention, took two incredibly large steps today which, I believe (and hope and pray), will make us conquerors. First, the House of Deputies unanimously passed a resolution to set in motion a process for re-imagining and possibly restructuring the church. Second, the Deputies voted by a 3-to-1 majority (in both the clerical and lay orders) to concur in an action of the House of Bishops adopting a provisional rite for the blessing of the life-long committed relationships of couples of the same sex; the Bishops had approved the rite by a greater than 2-to-1 majority. Although the second action will get (and has already gotten) by far the greater press coverage and will generate the greatest amount of “heat” and public interest, it is the former that is of greater importance. ~ In preaching on this passage, a former mentor of mine often said that the most important potential obstacle included in the “anything else in all creation” that cannot separate us from God in Christ is . . . ourselves. In passing the resolution to re-imagine and restructure the church, the General Convention has said that we will get out of the way; we will get out of the Spirit’s way, we will get out of our own way! ~ There is much work to be done, but it seems to me that the hardest work will be the letting-go and stepping-aside . . . letting go of old ways of doing and being church, letting go of expectations of how it has been done and how it ought to be done, letting go of office and power by those who have governed the church for generations, letting go of the hurt and pain of change . . . stepping aside to allow new leaders to come forward, stepping aside to let the Holy Spirit come in, stepping aside to free the center to be filled with something new and different. ~ I commend and congratulate the bishops, lay deputies, and clergy who made this decision and have the hard work of letting-go and stepping-aside to do. I pray for the new generation of leadership that will lead the re-imagining and restructuring; I hope that I can join them in the effort. And I remind them that “we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.”
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Father Funston is the rector of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Medina, Ohio.
Disclaimer: I adore the Summary of the Law! If there was one thing in the liturgy of the Episcopal Church that just grabbed hold of me and wouldn’t let go when I first encountered it as a high school freshman, it was the Summary of the Law. And if there is one thing that disappoints me about the 1979 American prayer book, it is the removal of the Summary of the Law from the standard Sunday service of Holy Communion. So this is an admittedly biased suggestion. ~ A few days ago I responded here to the Episcopal Presiding Bishop’s proposed budget for the church’s next triennium, noting that she had created it around the Anglican Communion’s five “Marks of Mission.” That’s a good idea. My response suggested that something lacking in the five marks is any specific mention or theological reflection acknowledging that those marks are based in the Gospel of Jesus Christ. A reader took me to task noting that at least the first two imply a Christian basis, and I agreed. But the third, fourth, and fifth do not; I think the church should explicitly say how those marks contribute to the spread of the Gospel. ~ Here’s a simple suggestion for testing the ministries of the church, its structures, its programs, everything it says and does: test them against the Summary of the Law. For example, let’s say the church budgets $500,000 to promote “environmental justice”. Fine, that seems to fit the fifth mark of mission, which is “to strive to safeguard the integrity of creation and sustain and renew the life of the earth.” Next question: In what way does a program to promote “environmental justice” evince the church’s love for the Lord our God with all our heart, and with all our soul, and with all our mind? Or how does it encourage and enable the church’s people to do so? And if it doesn’t . . . let’s move to the second question: In what way does such a program enhance our love of neighbor as self? ~ In parishes, especially as parishes develop vision and mission statements, set goals, and adopt budgets, we are often encouraged to test our programs against our goals. Does this parish activity support the vision, mission, and primary goals of the congregation? If not, can it? And if not, can it! It seems to me the national church could test its budget and programs in the same way, not against some vision committee’s product, but against the vision and mission set by our Founder: the Summary of the Law together with the Great Commission. Unless someone can lay out a simple apologia for a budget item, making it plain how that expenditure gives witness and support to love of God or love or neighbor, or contributes to the making of disciples, that item ought to be challenged. ~ Structure the budget around the five marks of mission, good idea. But test the structures and programs in the budget against the vision and mission of the Founder: love God, love neighbor, make disciples! A summary of the budget ought to pretty well track the Summary of the Law.
Don’t the words of the priests and elders ring false? “We don’t know.” Matthew doesn’t tell us that they did know, but I think they did, or at least had a pretty good idea. I think they knew (or had a pretty good idea) that John was indeed a prophet, that his message of baptism and repentance was “from heaven” as Jesus puts it here. ~ I don’t think there’s anything wrong with answering “I don’t know” when that is, in fact, the case. I once had a parishioner who (it seemed to me) was constantly asking, “What will happen when we die?” My answer was always, “I don’t know, Martha. I haven’t been there yet. But here’s what our faith teaches . . . .” If the priests and elders truly didn’t know, they could at least have answered in this way: “We don’t know, but this is what we think . . . .” But they didn’t even do that. ~ Jesus constantly calls the religious authorities out for hypocrisy. He plays no favorites, either. Pharisees and Sadducees, priests and scribes, elders and rabbis, Jewish authorities of every sort feel the sting of his condemnation. A lot of books and blogs on the practice of ministry say, “It’s OK to say, ‘I don’t know’.” And it is when that is truly the case; in fact, if you don’t know, it’s better to say so than rely on some hackneyed-and-probably-inappropriate cliche or to make up some BS on the spot. But Jesus here is suggesting that it’s not OK to say “I don’t know” when you do know, or you have a pretty good idea; in that case, it’s rank hypocrisy. 
Our first reading this morning is from a little book from the Apocrypha called The Book of Wisdom. At one time church tradition ascribed authorship to King Solomon, but it is now believed to have been written sometime in the first or second century before Christ by a Greek-speaking Jew of the Diaspora. It is found in the Greek-language version of Jewish scriptures, not in the Hebrew version, and is therefore not considered as canonical scripture by Jews or by Protestants. Roman Catholics and the Eastern Orthodox do accept it, and we Anglicans take a middle course, saying that we read them “for example of life and instruction of manners; but yet [we do] not apply them to establish any doctrine.” (Articles of Religion, Art. VI, BCP 1979, pg. 868). Well, here’s an example of life, then:
The end of June and we’re reading about Jesus’ triumphal entry? OK, whatever . . . . ~ At this time of year and at this particular time in the life of the Episcopal Church (just before the General Convention), my attention is drawn to the last sentence of today’s gospel lesson, the fact that people told one another about Jesus. ~ A couple of days ago, I mentioned a 
Moses “fell on his face.” This is biblical language for expressing great despair and sadness, not the reaction to a leadership confrontation a modern person would expect. Anger? Yes. Hostility? Yes. Yelling and shouting and public protestation of one’s rightness? Yes. Falling prostrate on the ground in desperate sadness? Not so much. ~ It would appear that in the confrontation of Korah and his compatriots, Moses felt personal responsibility. He believe that what had gone wrong with the Hebrews was his fault. He seems to have believed that he himself had created an atmosphere which had led to less-than-perfect delegated administration and justice. ~ Unfortunately a leadership crisis in the Episcopal Church isn’t resulting in similar behavior from the church’s leadership. In recent months the two highest officials of the church (the Presiding Bishop and the President of the House of Deputies) have had a public squabble over when and how one or the other might communicate with other persons in the church (the cause of the dispute was a video the PB made and sent to members of the House of Deputies, apparently without a “heads-up” to the PHoD). More recently, proposals for the church’s budget for the coming triennium have raised concern among many church members. In response to the first criticisms, the Executive Council issued a statement which was wholey inadequate (in my opinion) and failed to take responsibility. Then the PB (apparently distancing herself from the Executive Council of which she is actually a member and the chair) has come out with her own budget proposal. Now one or more members of the council have their backs up, writing blogs and making statements about being stabbed in the back. In all of this, there hasn’t been a lot of “falling on one’s face” going on. ~ The incident described in the Book of Numbers was really all about Korah’s personal grievances, suitably disguised for public consumption. Moses could have fired right back at him. But Moses suspected that his own earlier mistakes might be the cause of Korah’s uprising, that it was his failure which had created a setting in which discontent could germinate and ultimately promote the Levite rebellion. So, in humility, Moses admits accountability. Might a little of Moses’ humility be a good idea for the current crop of spiritual leadership? ~ Several church members recently have written blogs analyzing the budget and the business of the up-coming General Convention. Would that the Episcopal Church’s bishops, Executive Council, Presiding Bishop, deputies to General Convention, et al. would read these and consider their own roll in creating the situation in which the church finds itself. But I’m afraid they are too busy pointing the finger at one another, blind-siding one another, accusing one another of stabs in the back, playing turf wars, and engaging in cat-fights and pissing-contests. ~ We could use a little less of that sort of thing and a lot more falling on faces!
Before I went on holiday to Canada over the past ten or so days (which is why there hasn’t been one of these meditations since June 10), a parishioner told me that his regular attendance at church the past several months is because of a sermon I preached from which he took the message, “Christians go to church!” I seldom remember my own sermons well enough to know which one or what line someone might be referring to when they tell me something like this, but I’m nearly certain that it wasn’t on this text. However, that would be the message I would preach were this to come up in the Lectionary readings for a public worship service. ~ I suspect that my parishioner was referring to a sermon in which I may have used this old chestnut of an illustration: A member of a certain church, who previously had been attending services regularly, suddenly stopped coming to church. After a few weeks, the pastor decided to visit. The Pastor found the man at home alone, sitting before a blazing fire. Guessing the reason for his Pastor’s visit, the man welcomed him, led him to a comfortable chair near the fireplace and waited. The Pastor made himself at home but said nothing. In the grave silence, he contemplated the dance of the flames around the burning logs. After some minutes, the Pastor took the fire tongs, carefully picked up a brightly burning ember and placed it to one side of the hearth all alone. Then he sat back in his chair, still silent. The host watched all this in quiet contemplation. As the one lone ember’s flame flickered and diminished, there was a momentary glow and then it’s fire was no more. Soon it was cold and lifeless. The Pastor glanced at his watch and realized it was time to leave; he slowly stood up, picked up the cold, dead ember and placed it back in the middle of the fire! Immediately it began to glow once more with the light and warmth of the burning coals around it. As the Pastor reached the door to leave, his host said with a tear running down his cheek, “Thank you so much for your visit and especially for the fiery sermon. I shall be back in church next Sunday.” ~ That’s what the mutual encouragement that Paul describes is all about, keeping the embers of faith burning. As my parishioner said, “Christians go to church!”
I’m very tempted to ask, “O come on, Paul! You really didn’t expect them to remember you after you’d gone, did you?” But, of course, he did! It seems to me that Paul here is very much like modern clergy. I think we all expect to have lasting impact on the places we serve, but the truth is most of us will not. Clergy are transients; in the past half-decade I’ve seen studies variously reporting the average length of a pastorate across denominations as somewhere between three and five years. That’s not much time to make much of an impact. ~ Now, there are exceptions. Every parish seems to have its sainted Father Usedtobehere, that one priest or pastor whom everyone remembers with great affection. He (it’s usually “he” in my denomination because we haven’t had women in the presbyterate long enough yet) was the best at visiting, best at preaching, best at organizing, best at presiding at the altar, best at remembering parishioners’ birthdays, best at whatever. He is remembered as the paragon of ministry even by people who came to the parish after he departed! There’s really no competing with such ghosts. One just has to accept that they are here and will live on in memory long after one has gone . . . and that it is unlikely that most of us will ever enjoy such exalted canonization. ~ However, I’m not suggesting that we clergy adopt the attitude of the Preacher whose writing is also included in today’s lectionary readings: “I considered all that my hands had done and the toil I had spent in doing it, and again, all was vanity and a chasing after wind, and there was nothing to be gained under the sun.” (Eccl. 2:11) As unlikely as it may be that any of us attain the celebrated status of parish patron saint, it is equally likely that we will have an impact (usually through something we think of as mundane or insignificant) on the lives of one or two people, maybe more. Most of us may not be remembered by the whole congregation as the cream of the clergy crop; the majority of the parish may (as Paul complained) quickly desert us. But those few will remember . . . and here’s the rub (as Hamlet might have said) – we don’t know who they will be, nor what action or word of ours may make the difference. We just have to try to do the best we can in any given pastoral situation, in most of which we may feel woefully inadequate, because we never know. ~ That’s what Paul should have remembered; that’s what the Preacher should have remembered; that’s what each clergyperson should remember! 
