Category: Spirituality (Page 44 of 116)

Fear Not – From the Daily Office – October 27, 2014

October 27, 2014 / eric / 0 Comments

From Ecclesiasticus:

Have you heard something? Let it die with you. Be brave, it will not make you burst!

(From the Daily Office Lectionary – Sirach 19:10 (NRSV) – October 27, 2014)

Ben Sira’s admonition is set in context in a discussion of gossip, but in the United States today it could also apply to the silly, ignorant, unthinking panic that has attended the arrival of the ebola virus in our country.

Today’s morning headlines include news of yet another state adopting rules and regulations requiring a 21-day quarantine for any person arriving from certain west African countries. I don’t know what to make of this nor do I care for the precedent it sets. Incarceration without due process, which is essentially what this is, probably has more chance of spreading than does the virus from which it allegedly is protecting us.

Ben Sira’s advice about gossip – “question a friend” (v. 13) and “question a neighbor” (v. 14); in other words, check it out! – is equally applicable here. Get the facts! Know what you are saying! Know what you are doing!

We are in the midst of an epidemic, but it is not an ebola epidemic. It is an epidemic of mindless, ill-considered panic and prejudice which (continuing another disturbing trend in our society) ignores science and good medical practice. This epidemic is not a medical issue; it is a spiritual problem. It is an epidemic of fear ignoring the constant reassurance of scripture: “Fear not.” (Here’s a website that’s collected a bunch of verse references for this.) As Ben Sira says, “Be brave.”

Have you heard something that made you afraid? Check it out and “let it die with you. Be brave.” Don’t help the panic pandemic to spread.

Please Do Not Feed the Fears

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Father Funston is the rector of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Medina, Ohio.

Elements of Choice – From the Daily Office – October 25, 2014

October 25, 2014 / eric / 0 Comments

From Ecclesiasticus:

He has placed before you fire and water;
stretch out your hand for whichever you choose.
Before each person are life and death,
and whichever one chooses will be given.

(From the Daily Office Lectionary – Sirach 15:16-17 (NRSV) – October 25, 2014)

Fire and water. Life and death. Which is which? Initially, I thought fire was the death symbol, destructive and dangerous, and water, life-giving water, the emblem of life. But last night I watched a crime drama on television in which two people were murdered by drowning, showing water to be the element of death and destruction. So which is which? And how do we know which to choose?

Yesterday, I stood with a small family in an old cemetery and prayed over a casket of ashes. It was a lovely, sunny day, the sort of bright autumn day when you watch children flying kites and forget that the icy cold of winter is soon to come. One of those present was a young girl of 10; she spent the time waiting for the interment to begin by gathering brightly colored leaves and tossing armfuls of them into the air to dance on the breeze. It was a day on which the choice of life or death was not easily seen, a day on which death and life intermingled into the reality that is human existence.

As much as I like the writings of Jesus, Son of Sirach, and I certainly applaud his insistence on human freedom of choice and human responsibility, there are times when his wisdom is too cut-and-dried, too black-and-white, too this-or-that. The truth is there is no choice to be made between fire and water, or between life and death. They are realities to be embraced; subjects of knowledge and understanding to be sought.

Fire and water are two of the four classical Empedoclean and Hermetic elements – earth, air, fire, water – from which all things are made according to the ancients. All are necessary, no choice between them is required. The choice that lies before humankind is whether to understand them or not, whether to harness and husband them in productive ways or to misuse them in harmful ways. I suppose there is some sort of choice to be made between life and death, but it isn’t so simple as Ben Sira makes it seem, for every choice entails some of both because (contrary to the implication of these verses) they are not opposites; they are complements.

The beauty of the Christian faith is in its acceptance of death not as a negation of life but as part of it. One of my favorite pieces of liturgy is from the proper preface to the burial mass: “For to your faithful people, O Lord, life is changed, not ended; and when our mortal body lies in death, there is prepared for us a dwelling place eternal in the heavens.”

There are choices set before us, but very often what we must do is find a way to choose both of the so-called alternatives, to stand in a grave yard on a bright sunny day and commit ashes to the earth while children fly their kites and play with the autumn leaves dancing in the air.

Autumn Leaves Thrown in the Air

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Father Funston is the rector of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Medina, Ohio.

Shut Up! – From the Daily Office – October 24, 2014

October 24, 2014 / eric / 0 Comments

From Ecclesiasticus:

Do not find fault before you investigate; examine first, and then criticize. Do not answer before you listen, and do not interrupt when another is speaking.

(From the Daily Office Lectionary – Sirach 11:7-8 (NRSV) – October 24, 2014)

I should have taken a course on the Deutero-Canon when I was in seminary! Really! I’m just astounded at the amount of really good advice there is in this one book, The Wisdom of Jesus, Son of Sirach, the Liber Ecclesiasticus. Of course, there’s a lot of nonsense, too. You could build a good sermon on the “prosperity gospel” from some of the stuff here . . . but mostly there’s just good common sense.

Like these two verses. They remind me of things my parents said, things like “Get the facts” and “Shut up and listen” and “Don’t interrupt.” Good advice that people in our society seem to have forgotten.

Have you listened to any of the joint interviews that journalists sometimes try to conduct with representatives of opposing camps? I listened to one not long ago on NPR regarding the anti-abortion legislation passed in Texas that requires a pregnancy clinic’s physicians to have admitting privileges at a hospital within some specified distance. A representative of the so-called “right to lifers” and another from the so-called “pro-choice” side were both miked . . . and you couldn’t hear what either had to say because they were so busy trying to shout over each other. Neither would shut up and let the other get a word in edgewise.

My late brother was an avid sports fan (he writes in an apparent non-sequitur). He would get so wrapped up watching football and basketball games on television that he would forget where he was and who he was with. I recall one family Thanksgiving gathering when we were watching some game (between who in what sport I have no idea). My brother got so excited at one point he yelled at the top of his lungs, “Run, you son of a bitch! Move that fucking ball!” My mother was not pleased.

I do not get that excited about sports. I get that excited about politics. That’s why I don’t discuss it with friends and parishioners. That’s why I don’t attend election night poll-watching parties. I tend to cut loose with exactly the same sort of excited utterance to which my brother was prone while watching football.

When I heard the report on the Texas legislation, I was driving to a clergy conference — wearing a Roman collar. I was by myself, but it was a nice day and the window was down. The conversation (I use the term very loosely) started and soon the talking-over and the shouting-down began. At some point I became so annoyed with the interviewees that I yelled at them (well, at my car radio, actually), “Shut the fuck up!” I hope no pedestrian or passerby heard me.

But if they had, I now know that I could point to the Book of Sirach and assert very affirmatively that it is a biblical injunction. “Shut up!” even, perhaps, the more aggressive phrasing. It’s right there! Right here, in the 11th Chapter of Ecclesiasticus!

So, folks, want to prove to us that you pay attention to scripture? Want us to really believe that you follow its injunctions when you try to enforce them on the whole of society, on our friends and neighbors who don’t share our faith? Then pay attention to Jesus, Son of Sirach.

STFU Please

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Father Funston is the rector of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Medina, Ohio.

Toleration – From the Daily Office – October 23, 2014

October 23, 2014 / eric / 0 Comments

From Ecclesiasticus:

Do not get angry with your neighbor for every injury, and do not resort to acts of insolence.

(From the Daily Office Lectionary – Sirach 10:6 (NRSV) – October 23, 2014)

Today is the feast of St. James of Jerusalem, also called James the Just, also known as the brother of our Lord. He is revered as the advocate of tolerance for Gentile converts (see Acts 15:12-19). Of note is the apparent fact that he was not a follower of his famous brother until after Jesus’ Resurrection; one imagines that getting a visit by a deceased-but-risen relative who claims to be the Son of God would be a hell of a conversion experience.

Anyway, this lesson from ben Sira is not from the lessons for James’ commemoration, but its admonition to patience and toleration for the foibles of one’s neighbors, even those which might cause injury, seems fitting to the day. Unfortunately, fitting or not, patience and toleration are not the trademarks of our age, are they?

We live in an era of social conflict which is, if not created by, supported by the social media we thought would overcome such divergence. Library shelves are filled with science fiction novels in which instant and wide-spread communication was predicted to be the panacea for political confrontation, the mechanism which would foster peace and mutual respect, the technology which would usher in utopia. Those rosy speculations have all turned out to be bullshit, however.

Along with the social media has come an increase in “tribalism,” in purity tests for membership in social groups, in litmus tests for political candidates, in raised voices shouting past one another. And the social media technology of algorithms making machine-logical decisions about which messages their human consumers would be fed is pushing the tribes and social groups further apart, raising the volume of the shouting. Some cloud-based calculator is deciding whose voices I hear, whose pictures I see, whose news-feed I read; that coldly logical “thinking machine” is deciding that I only want to hear the voice, see the pictures, and read the news that bolsters my prejudices, and so that’s what I hear, see, and read. Whatever the “other” tribe is hearing, seeing, and reading, I’m not . . . and what I am, they’re not. And so we have no meeting in the middle or anywhere else.

So much for peace and mutual respect, so much for toleration and utopia.

We need to turn off the machines; we need to divorce ourselves from the algorithms; we need to start listening to one another without the filter of calculating machines. We need to be less angry about perceived (often mis-perceived) injury. We need to heed James’ call to toleration.

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Father Funston is the rector of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Medina, Ohio.

Alms? – From the Daily Office – October 22, 2014

October 22, 2014 / eric / 0 Comments

From Ecclesiasticus:

Do not grow weary when you pray; do not neglect to give alms.

(From the Daily Office Lectionary – Sirach 7:10 (NRSV) – October 22, 2014)

“Do not neglect to give alms.” Alms: “charitable donations of money or goods to the poor or needy” says the dictionary with an etymological note saying it comes from an old Greek word, eleemosyne, meaning “pity, mercy.”

The fancy plates of wood or brass or silver passed down the rows of pews on Sunday morning are called “alms basins” by some. (Others call them “offering plates” or, worse, “collection plates.”) But they really aren’t for alms, are they? I know people want to believe that what they turn loose of in church is used for the benefit of the poor, but look at any church budget and ask “How much of this is used for relief of the poor?” The answer will surprise you.

Most of what is given to the church is used for upkeep of the institution. The two largest expenses for most congregations are (1) upkeep of aging, often-remodeled, energy-inefficient, and frequently under-utilized buildings and (2) paying for professional staff, clergy and lay. Is that the way it should be? As one dependent on the church for my paycheck, I benefit from the current arrangement, but I’m not at all sure that the church is managing the alms given by church members properly.

I offer no answer today; I simply raise the question.

Alms Basin

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Father Funston is the rector of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Medina, Ohio.

Friendship – From the Daily Office – October 21, 2014

October 21, 2014 / eric / 0 Comments

From Ecclesiasticus:

When you gain friends, gain them through testing, and do not trust them hastily.

(From the Daily Office Lectionary – Sirach 6:7 (NRSV) – October 21, 2014)

My wife and I don’t like to admit it, but as we each have started our seventh decade on this planet we best do so . . . we have each made really bad decisions about trusting people we believed to be friends. We’ve had confidences betrayed; we’ve lost fairly large amounts of money in what turned out to be . . . if not scams, at least unscrupulous business deals. So ben Sira’s advice rings true.

On the other hand, we’ve had a great six decades, more than half of them together, with some lovely friends, with people we still think of fondly and even occasionally still hear from. Some of those people, if we’d followed this advice, we would never have been allowed closer than the other side of locked bars!

What’s better – to go through life constantly wary and on guard, or to be open to friendship and risk occasionally being hurt? I suppose that’s a question each individual must answer for him- or herself.

Jesus risked friendship. It may have brought him bickering from James and John, betrayal from Judas, denial from Peter, but it also brought him the love of devotion of Mary and Martha and, apparently, countless others.

My wife and I have to admit it; we’ve made some bad decisions about trusting people. I’m afraid we will do so again. But we also have some really great friends. I hope we will continue to make others. We’ve chosen to try and be like Jesus, after all.

truefriends

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Father Funston is the rector of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Medina, Ohio.

A Learning Experience – From the Daily Office – October 20, 2014

October 20, 2014 / eric / 2 Comments

From the Psalter:

Who are they who fear the Lord?
he will teach them the way that they should choose.
They shall dwell in prosperity,
and their offspring shall inherit the land.

(From the Daily Office Lectionary – Psalm 25:11-12 (BCP Version) – October 20, 2014)

When my wife and I decided to join a pilgrimage group and spend several days in the Holy Land this summer several people who had been there before us said, “It will change the way your read Scripture.” That’s turned out to have been true. It also changed the way we read current news.

As I pondered that, I realized that every major life event affects the way we read Scripture, the way we interpret the news. Getting married did so. The births of our children did so. Ordination and ministry as a priest has done so. Every event is a learning experience which colors our view of the world.

Early yesterday morning our daughter-in-law gave birth to our first grandchild, a little girl who has been given the name Eirnín Marjory. Her first name is Irish Gaelic (pronounced “EHR-neen”) and means “knowing” or “experienced,” and also “iron” connoting strength of character. Her middle name was my later mother-in-law’s name.

We have yet to meet Eirnín (she and her parents live nearly half-way across the continent from us), but already her being a part of this world is changing the way I read Scripture. Words like “prosperity” and “offspring” have both a broader and a more immediate meaning.

Welcome to the world, little one! You’re sure to be a learning experience over and over again.

Eirnín Marjory

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Father Funston is the rector of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Medina, Ohio.

Frustration – From the Daily Office – October 18, 2014

October 18, 2014 / eric / 0 Comments

From the Gospel of Luke:

“You faithless and perverse generation, how much longer must I be with you and bear with you?”

(From the Daily Office Lectionary – Luke 9:41 (NRSV) – October 18, 2014)

Project Evaluation Review Technique – “PERT” . . . . I learned to do PERT charts in business school. PERT charts diagram the flow of a project through its various tasks and processes, assigning some as “essential” tasks which must be done in a particular order, later tasks depending on earlier tasks to have been accomplished by particular persons, while other tasks “float,” they can be done any time by any team member.

I wonder sometimes if Jesus could have made use of one. What would he have put into the “essential task” boxes and what into the “floating task” boxes and what would have been the flow of activities and to whom would everything be assigned? If Jesus had made use of a PERT chart, I wonder if he would do with it what I eventually did with every one I tried to make for parish ministry . . . throw it away in frustration!

That was the eventual outcome of every parish project PERT chart because inevitably some essential task to be done by a volunteer would not get done; the entire enterprise would grind to a halt and either never be accomplished or only get done if the rector or another paid staff member did what the volunteer had promised to do.

I confess to possibly breaking the Third Commandment on a regular basis. I suppose I could have echoed Jesus’ words of frustration, “You faithless and perverse generation, how much longer must I be with you and bear with you?” However, more often than not, my prayer of weariness is a single word, “Jesus!” I try not to do that, but it just pops out. Stymied and upset, before I even think about it, I let loose, “Jesus!” My hope is that he understands this as a prayer rather than as an curse. (I once had a Jesuit spiritual director who opined that, uttered in exasperation, the ejaculation “O fuck!” may be the most honest of human prayers. I don’t use that one very often.)

In such instances, the PERT chart, now useless, ends up in the circular file cabinet. In fact, I’ve stopped making PERT charts for any project that requires volunteer labor. It’s just a waste of time.

Of course, the church is not a volunteer organization. The apostles were not volunteers – they were called. Christians, likewise, are not volunteers – we are called. “You did not choose me but I chose you.” (Jn 15:16) Jesus, the one who does the calling, probably has more claim to be frustrated that parish clergy like me, who are simply among the called . . . but there it is.

In any event, I hear the frustration in this text and, therefore, I trust that he understands when I utter my prayers of exasperation.

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Father Funston is the rector of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Medina, Ohio.

Clear Instructions – From the Daily Office – October 17, 2014

October 17, 2014 / eric / 0 Comments

From the Gospel of Luke:

Then from the cloud came a voice that said, “This is my Son, my Chosen; listen to him!”

(From the Daily Office Lectionary – Luke 9:35 (NRSV) – October 17, 2014)

You couldn’t get clearer instructions, could you? “Listen to him!” So why don’t people?

I don’t mean people in general, I mean people who call themselves Christian. They pay attention to Leviticus and Deuteronomy. They pay attention to Paul. Why don’t they pay attention to Jesus?

Get their knickers all in a twist, for example, about gay and lesbian people and their relationships when Jesus had nothing at all to say about that — they pay attention to a couple of verses in Leviticus, a couple of verses in the letters of Paul, but do they listen when Jesus says to the woman guilty of adultery, “Neither do I condemn you. Go your way, and from now on do not sin again.” (Jn 8:11) That’s just about the only thing he had to say about anyone’s sexual relationships, “I don’t condemn you.” Why don’t they listen to him and do likewise?

Seems to me that Jesus boiled everything down to something just about as simple as the Father’s admonition. When asked which of the commandments was the greatest, he said: “The first is, ‘Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God, the Lord is one; you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength.’ The second is this, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.” (Mk 12:29-31) My diocese has summarized this on a bumper sticker:

Love God Bumper Sticker

You can’t get clearer instructions, can you? Listen to him!

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Father Funston is the rector of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Medina, Ohio.

Leftist? Rightist? – From the Daily Office – October 16, 2014

October 16, 2014 / eric / 0 Comments

From the Gospel of Luke:

If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will save it. What does it profit them if they gain the whole world, but lose or forfeit themselves? Those who are ashamed of me and of my words, of them the Son of Man will be ashamed when he comes in his glory and the glory of the Father and of the holy angels.

(From the Daily Office Lectionary – Luke 9:23-26 (NRSV) – October 16, 2014)

So ….

I left off writing these things publicly, but found that not writing them put a crimp in my spiritual life. I write them for my own spiritual well-being and if they are of assistance to anyone else that’s all well and good, too. I thought I was stressing out under the self-imposed pressure of writing one everyday, but I think now the stress was from trying to be “gentle” with my words so as not to offend anyone. However, since I now realize that I am writing them for myself, I don’t need to worry about that. If someone reads what I have to say and is offended by it, they can choose not to read another thing I write. That’s their responsibility, not mine. (Frankly, I think that’s part and parcel of the attitude demonstrated by Jesus in the last sentence of this selection. “I say what I say. If it resonates, follow me. If not, we part company.”)

OK . . . introductory remarks done with . . . this morning someone in an internet discussion group did the drama-queen leaving act. “TEC [the stupid current trendy abbreviation for the Episcopal Church] and this group have veered too far left, so I’m leaving.” You could hear the door slam as they left (and picture them standing outside with their ear pressed to it listening for the reaction).

What do people mean when they apply the terms “Left” or “Right” to the church? Do people even know what those terms mean, period?

These terms are political terms translated into British and American politics from the French Revolution of 1789 during which members of the National Assembly divided themselves by where they sat in the chamber, supporters of the king to the president’s right, supporters of the revolution to his left. They were first introduced into British politics in the 1930s to label politicians according to their position on the Spanish Civil War — those who supported Franco’s Nationalists were “the Right,” those who supported the Republicans were “the Left.” From Britain, these terms made their way into American political discourse, but what they actually mean in the political arena today is pretty muddled.

Which means, of course, that when they are applied to the church they basically mean nothing! Or, rather, they mean “the church is doing that with which I disagree.” For example, when someone opens the distribution of Holy Communion to the non-baptized (something I disagree with, by the way), is that a “Leftist” or a “Rightist” thing to do? I don’t really know; I suspect that, depending on what one thinks those terms mean, one can construct an argument for the application of either one.

What a ridiculous waste of time!

When judging a church denomination, parish, diocese, organization, ministry, whatever . . . isn’t the question not whether it is “Leftist” or “Rightist” but whether it embodies and follows the gospel? Whether it and those people who claim membership or activity within it have denied themselves and taken up their cross and followed Jesus? And when we make that discernment, exercise that judgment, aren’t we called to do so with the greatest possible amount of charity, allowing the possibility that others may perceive the gospel mandate differently from ourselves? “Faith, hope, and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is love.” (1 Cor. 13;13) That’s neither “Leftist” nor “Rightist” in my thinking.

Here’s my final thought on this subject . . . OK, it’s not my final thought; I’ll probably have more to say or write at some other time . . . but for now, it’s the concluding bit of what I’m writing today.

Any time I am tempted to label someone else in the church or some church group or some theological or ministerial activity, to say “That’s Leftist” or “That’s Rightist,” I remind myself of the question asked by one of America’s best popular theologians, the late cartoonist Charles Schultz speaking through the character of Snoopy:

You Might Be Wrong

Keeping that in mind, my hope is that Christ will not be ashamed of me.

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Father Funston is the rector of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Medina, Ohio.

Category: Spirituality (Page 44 of 116)

Fear Not – From the Daily Office – October 27, 2014

Elements of Choice – From the Daily Office – October 25, 2014

Shut Up! – From the Daily Office – October 24, 2014

Toleration – From the Daily Office – October 23, 2014

Alms? – From the Daily Office – October 22, 2014

Friendship – From the Daily Office – October 21, 2014

A Learning Experience – From the Daily Office – October 20, 2014

Frustration – From the Daily Office – October 18, 2014

Clear Instructions – From the Daily Office – October 17, 2014

Leftist? Rightist? – From the Daily Office – October 16, 2014

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