Category: Worship (Page 39 of 107)

The Midterm Zombie Apocalypse – From the Daily Office – November 5, 2014

November 5, 2014 / eric / 2 Comments

From the Apocalypse of John of Patmos:

The fifth angel poured his bowl on the throne of the beast, and its kingdom was plunged into darkness; people gnawed their tongues in agony, and cursed the God of heaven because of their pains and sores, and they did not repent of their deeds.

(From the Daily Office Lectionary – Revelation 16:10-11 (NRSV) – November 5, 2014)

The Republicans won control of the Senate. Facebook and other social media this morning are rife with Democrats and other self-styled progressives writhing in agonized self-blaming (or furious finger-pointing). You’d think the fifth angel’s bowl was poured out yesterday on the United States and that we’d been plunged into darkness.

Pah!

Last night my Education for Ministry group did a theological reflection on an image from culture. (EfM folks will have a better understanding of what that means. If you aren’t an EfM participant, I can’t really go into the EfM model of theological reflection here: I recommend you find an EfM group in your area and enroll.)

Our image: Zombies. We talked about the old “voodoo” horror movie model of zombie; the George Romero “living dead” movie version; the AMC television program “The Walking Dead” version; and the new Syfy Channel “Z Nation” version. Zombies, apparently, have changed over the years from living people under the spiritual control of an evil voodoo shaman into dead corpses reanimated by a virus which (I didn’t know this because I don’t watch the television programs) infects everyone! So, everyone dies and everyone comes back as a zombie! Now there’s a metaphor for something; I’m not sure what and I’m not sure it’s spiritually edifying, but there it is.

Zombie Attack

Anyway, we had great fun deeply considering the world of zombies then moving from the culture source into the Christian tradition source, the personal position (belief) source, and the personal experience (action) source. When we reached the end of the evening and came to the application exercise – “How will I apply this reflection? What will I now do?” – one of our thoughts was, “Just go home and shoot myself in the head.” Apparently that prevents one’s coming back as a zombie.

I had no idea I would wake this morning to so many liberal friends and colleagues having that same sort of reaction to the midterm election!

Chill out, folks! The world has not been plunged into a zombie-filled darkness filled with creatures gnawing at their tongues and covered with rotting sores.

One party has taken control of the Congress by a narrow margin in the upper house, but it is a party at war with itself. I think it will actually be fun to see if Mr. McConnell (presumably the new majority leader) can control his caucus any better than Mr. Boehner has controlled his. The split between old line Republicans and the new “Tea Party” Republicans may just grow wider and hamstring the legislative branch even more so than it has done for the past four years. Furthermore, even if they unite, the Democrats hold enough votes to defeat things by fillbuster (an old GOP tactic they will now have to contend with on the receiving end) and a Democratic president still holds the veto power. (See this analysis by the UK’s The Guardian newspaper.)

It’s not John’s end of the world! Nor are Zombies flooding the streets.

I hope that something good can come of this. The New York Times this morning editorializes that there might be greater opportunity for compromise than there has been. Personally, I think they’re wrong; I believe we are in for two-years of mind-numbingly pointless political theater. My prayer is that it is not also spirit-numbing!

The “zombies” in John’s vision did not “repent of their deeds.” My hope and prayer is that we, the “zombies” of the 2014 midterm election, whatever our party or political persuasion, will do so. We are where we are (and we would be here if the Democrats had held onto the Senate, by the way) because, as a nation, we have allowed ourselves to be tribalized and polarized. To a certain extent, when it comes to politics, we are all “zombies,” infected by the unrelenting virus of our political positions and unwilling (perhaps by this time unable) to see any positive in the positions of others.

We need to repent and return to the ways of civility, negotiation, compromise, and actually getting the work of society done.

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

Political Rainbow – From the Daily Office – November 4, 2014

November 4, 2014 / eric / 0 Comments

From Ecclesiasticus:

Look at the rainbow, and praise him who made it; it is exceedingly beautiful in its brightness. It encircles the sky with its glorious arc; the hands of the Most High have stretched it out.

(From the Daily Office Lectionary – Sirach 43:11-12 (NRSV) – November 4, 2014)

Today in the US is the midterm election. I live in a decidedly “red” state with very little chance than any state office or congress seat currently held by the GOP will go to another party, partly because the Democrats chose a less-than-stellar gubernatorial candidate, partly because of gerrymandering, and partly because the Republicans simply predominate in most of the rural ad small-town electorate. Nonetheless, I will go to the polls and cast my “progressive” ballot and hope that elsewhere in the country things may be different.

What I hope most (and pray for) is that at some time in our national political future there will be a rainbow! That there will be an end to the rancorous, uncivil, winner-take-all, scorched-earth, no-compromise politics that has characterized this country for the past two decades, or longer…. When did it start, this deluge of polarization? I think it’s probably always been there at the fringes, but it seems to me it began moving to the center during the Nixon administration, arrived center-stage during the Clinton years, and has simply parked there ever since, the way a weather system can park over an area for days (in this case decades) at a time, bringing wave after wave of torrential downpour.

One of my favorite poems about rain is The Rainy Day by Rabindranath Tagore, who paints a dismal and scary picture of a village in monsoon season:

Sullen clouds are gathering fast
over the black fringe of the forest.
O child, do not go out!
The palm trees in a row by the lake
are smiting their heads
against the dismal sky;
the crows with their dragged wings
are silent on the tamarind branches,
and the eastern bank of the river
is haunted by a deepening gloom.
Our cow is lowing loud, tied at the fence.
O child, wait here till I bring her into the stall.
Men have crowded into the flooded field
to catch the fishes
as they escape from the overflowing ponds;
the rain-water is running in rills
through the narrow lanes like a laughing boy
who has run away from his mother to tease her.
Listen, someone is shouting for the boatman at the ford.
O child, the daylight is dim,
and the crossing at the ferry is closed.
The sky seems to ride fast upon the madly rushing rain;
the water in the river is loud and impatient;
women have hastened home
early from the Ganges
with their filled pitchers.
The evening lamps must be made ready.
O child, do not go out!
The road to the market is desolate,
the lane to the river is slippery.
The wind is roaring and struggling
among the bamboo branches
like a wild beast tangled in a net.

My feeling is that our monsoon of incivility, our rainy season of political polarization has had a similar effect on our national village; our sky is sullen, our roads are desolate, our lanes are slippery, and madly rushing political “rain” has made the river of democracy loud, impatient, and dangerous. My hope and my prayer is that it will end and we will see a rainbow.

My main thought for the day is contrary to Tagore’s, however: “O child, do go out!” Go out and vote!

Rainbow over Farm Landscape

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

Divisive Prayer – From the Daily Office – November 3, 2014

November 3, 2014 / eric / 0 Comments

From Luke’s Gospel:

Jesus said, “Do you think that I have come to bring peace to the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division! From now on, five in one household will be divided, three against two and two against three.”

(From the Daily Office Lectionary – Luke 12:51-52 (NRSV) – November 3, 2014)

Ballot Box This isn’t what we want or expect to hear from “the Prince of Peace,” but here it is! Jesus is not going to let us “make nice” and “all get along.” He insists that we acknowledge and confront the reality of interpersonal conflict, that we admit that even good news can bring division.

Tomorrow America will go through its regular spasm of national political division and pretend that it is otherwise, that what we do on the first Tuesday of November is a demonstration of unity when we all know it is very much the opposite. In these times of what seems to be ever increasing polarization, families are divided over politics, “father against son and son against father, mother against daughter and daughter against mother, mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law and daughter-in-law against mother-in-law.” (v. 53) We make a joke of it and try to laugh it off, but we all know families (perhaps even our own) where there is discord and disagreement over electoral politics.

Here’s an exercise in frustration: using Google (or whatever your favorite search engine may be) look for the words “election day prayer” on the internet. There are many prayers and many of them begin with lovely words asking God’s blessing upon us as “faithful citizens,” as “brothers and sisters,” but then in amongst the glowing words are the red-flags . . . “cries of children unborn,” “evils of abortion,” “sanctity of marriage,” “Christian nation” on the one side, “reproductive rights,” “marriage equality,” “nation of many cultures” on the other. Prayers ostensibly seeking God’s blessing on national unity phrased in the very terms of division and discord.

I may be prejudiced, but I can think of no better prayer for an election than that found in the Episcopal Church’s Book of Common Prayer

Almighty God, to whom we must account for all our powers and privileges: Guide the people of the United States (or of this community) in the election of officials and representatives; that, by faithful administration and wise laws, the rights of all may be protected and our nation be enabled to fulfill your purposes; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. (BCP 1979, page 822)

“Five in one household will be divided, three against two and two against three.” We are divided by politics and when the votes are counted one side or the other will “win,” at least until the next election. Whichever it may be, let us indeed pray that “the rights of all may be protected.” Amen!

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

Stewardship Smiles – From the Daily Office – November 1, 2014

November 1, 2014 / eric / 0 Comments

From Ecclesiasticus:

Be generous when you worship the Lord,
and do not stint the first fruits of your hands.
With every gift show a cheerful face,
and dedicate your tithe with gladness.
Give to the Most High as he has given to you,
and as generously as you can afford.

(From the Daily Office Lectionary – Sirach 35:10-12 (NRSV) – November 1, 2014)

Stewardship Sermon by Jay Sidebotham It’s about to come to an end, the annual appeal to church members everywhere to turn in a card saying how much they plan (hope, anticipate, expect, guess) to give in offerings in the coming year. Clergy everywhere are breathing both a sigh of relief that “stewardship season” is nearly done, while also wondering if there will be enough income to sustain the parish’s budget for another year. Congregational governing boards, treasurers, and budget committees are poring over the books and making plans – in some parishes they are adding new programs and new staff; in most, I suspect, they are trying to cut “fat” out of budgets already cut to the bone. I would guess there are more frowns than smiles being generated in the process of annual church budgeting.

And the Daily Office lectionary gives us this, Ben Sira’s admonition to cheerfulness and gladness in connection with first-fruit offerings and tithes . . . .

In my “Rector’s Reflection” column in our parish newsletter this month, I made note of the annual campaign and its coincidence with Thanksgiving Day:

How exactly do we give thanks to God? Primarily, it is through our songs of praise, our prayers of thanksgiving, our participation in worship. Secondarily, it is through sharing the blessings we have received. Most of us, I’m sure, are familiar with the phrase “time, talent, and treasure.” Those three “buzzwords” have been a staple of annual parish pledge campaigns for decades. They underscore that stewardship (a word we mistakenly often apply only to sharing of wealth) is a life activity, not simply a financial activity. We share all that we have been given, including our time and the talents with which we are blessed, not simply a portion of our income. But this time of year we focus on that financial piece as the church begins the process of budgeting for the next fiscal year. I will be the first to admit that we should do a better job of teaching about whole-life stewardship the entire year ‘round.

Perhaps there would be more smiles and fewer frowns, less stinting and more generous giving if we did less annual fund raising and more year-round stewardship education in the church. Let’s give that try.

In any event, smile . . . whatever this year’s outcome, it’s about to come to an end.

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

Dreams of Samhain – From the Daily Office – October 31, 2014

October 31, 2014 / eric / 1 Comment

From Ecclesiasticus:

The senseless have vain and false hopes,
and dreams give wings to fools.
As one who catches at a shadow and pursues the wind,
so is anyone who believes in dreams.

(From the Daily Office Lectionary – Sirach 34:1-2 (NRSV) – October 31, 2014)

Samhain Illustration The shadows tonight will be full of dreams moving from house to house, door to door, seeking handouts of candy or toys or whatever with a cry of “Trick or Treat!” We hope the wind will stay away, at least until America’s children’s annual celebration of the ancient Celtic feast of Samhain is completed.

As much as I like Ben Sira, I think he is too dismissive of dreams in this passage. He’s right to sound a note of caution against self-delusion (or buying into the fantasies and fallacies of others), but dreams are also the stuff of hope and aspiration. Young Joseph, son of Israel, became overseer of Egypt because of his ability to correctly interpret dreams. Another Joseph received the message that he would be foster-father to the Son of God in a dream. Dreams can be substantial!

So, parting company with Ben Sira, I say, “Believe in your dreams! Chase them!” Yesterday I wrote about using our imaginations and playing with metaphors to better understand the words of Scripture. Following our dreams is a further exercise of imagination. Imagination, as I see it, is our only way forward; without dreams and imagination we have no way to envision the future.

Forty-five years ago, when I was in college, I read a newly published book by Scottish anthropologist Victor Turner entitled The Ritual Process in which the author explored the idea of liminality, the experience of standing on a threshold leaving behind a known, accepted reality and entering into an as-yet-unknown, new reality. (I was reminded of that book this week when I found it cited in the footnotes of another, a text on the use of imagination in biblical exegesis and preaching.) That threshold is the place of shadows and wind; it can be a frightening place. To stand at that threshold demands that we dream and imagine; otherwise, we will never move through it.

Ben Sira is right, dreams give wings, not just to fools, but to everyone. Have the imagination and the courage to take those wings and fly! Fly through the threshold of shadow and wind into the unknown future.

I hope that is what the costumed children, the living dreams wandering the shadows tonight will do.

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

Metaphors – From the Daily Office – October 30, 2014

October 30, 2014 / eric / 0 Comments

From Luke’s Gospel:

Jesus said, “Beware of the yeast of the Pharisees, that is, their hypocrisy.”

(From the Daily Office Lectionary – Luke 12:1 (NRSV) – October 30, 2014)

Metaphors I often wonder what (if any) thought went into the construction of various lectionaries, particularly the Daily Office lectionary of the Episcopal Church. Are the sometimes strange, sometimes enlightening, often puzzling juxtapositions of texts planned or simply fortuitous?

Today Jesus uses yeast as a metaphor for what he considers to be the corrupt teachings of the Pharisees. Meanwhile, over in the Old Testament department (actually the Apocrypha department these past several days) we have a note from Ben Sira about wine; although he admonishes his reader not to get intoxicated and quarrelsome, he praises wine in moderation saying:

Wine is very life to human beings
if taken in moderation.
What is life to one who is without wine?
It has been created to make people happy.
Wine drunk at the proper time and in moderation
is rejoicing of heart and gladness of soul.
(Sirach 31:27-18)

Yeast, of course, is necessary for the creation of this good wine. In fact, wine makers are often very protective of their particular yeast strains. (Once when I was in college, my roommates and I decided to brew some beer. One of my roommates had a friend who worked for a very famous maker of California champagne – yes, I know, it’s just sparkling wine if not made in France – and was able to obtain – illegally, I admit – a quantity their proprietary champagne yeast. We thought that we’d be super-cool making beer with champagne yeast, that our beer would be magnificent; we weren’t and it wasn’t. But I did learn about proprietary wine yeast.)

So the metaphor of yeast is, like all metaphors, an ambiguous one, as is the metaphor of wine which is also used as a symbol of teaching in the Bible (consider Jesus’ parable of new wine and old wineskins). While Jesus uses yeast here to represent to corrupt teachings of the Pharisees, and Paul will later use it as a symbol of sin and malice (I Cor 5:7-8), Jesus also uses leaven as parabolic of the kingdom of heaven (Mt 13:33; Lk 13:21). Metaphorical ambiguity is the name of the game!

And as a game is how metaphors should be approached. I tell my Education for Ministry students to play with metaphors. Look around the room, pick an object (just on my desk this morning there are a pair of eyeglasses, a stapler, a coffee mug, and a concert ticket, for example). Now say, “The kingdom of God is like [that object]” or “Beware the [object] of the Pharisees,” and begin to explore what that might mean: “The kingdom of God is like a concert ticket” – “Beware the eyeglasses of the Pharisees.” Play with that.

Whoever put together the Daily Office lectionary probably had no intention to link “bad” yeast with “good” wine, but using our theological imagination to play with the metaphors, we can do so. I think we should: we should explore and have fun with biblical metaphors and, in the process, learn something.

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

A Third Tongue – From the Daily Office – October 29, 2014

October 29, 2014 / eric / 0 Comments

From Ecclesiasticus:

Slander has shaken many,
and scattered them from nation to nation;
it has destroyed strong cities,
and overturned the houses of the great.
Slander has driven virtuous women from their homes,
and deprived them of the fruit of their toil.
Those who pay heed to slander will not find rest,
nor will they settle down in peace.

(From the Daily Office Lectionary – Sirach 28:14-16 (NRSV) – October 29, 2014)

In law school I learned that slander is the spoken form of defamation; defamation in print is called libel. I doubt the translators of Ben Sira were making any such fine distinction; Ben Sira certainly does not. The Greek original reads, Glossa trite, meaning “a third tongue.” The British Greek scholar G.T. Emery translates this text not as “slander” but as “unrestrained talk of a third party,” which carries no particular suggestion of falsehood or defamation; gossip could be the subject, as well. In any event, our current preferred translation suggests some element of prevarication.

Which brings me to political advertising and clergy relocation . . . .

I don’t know if it’s still the case but several years ago, right after the Roman Catholic Church’s troubles with pedophilia and child sexual abuse perpetrated by clergy became big news, it became mandatory for Episcopal Church clergy seeking new callings to be background checked. One company in particular seemed to corner the market on these reviews and were used by nearly every diocese of the church; maybe they had a contract with the national hierarchy (I really don’t know). The covers of their reports had a box, a big red-flag check box, labeled something like “has been accused of sexual misconduct.” If that box was checked, it was unlikely the clergy person’s file would even be opened or looked at for a new position; their file would be tossed into the rejection stack without even a cursory review.

Note that the big red-flag check box’s label didn’t say “proven” or “shown” or “convicted” or anything of that nature, just “accused.” One unrestrained, possibly even untrue flap of “a third tongue” and one’s service as clergy was essentially done. I knew people who fell victim to slander of that sort. Accusations of misconduct are serious and should be looked into, but accusations are simply that – unproved assertions – and until proven they should be treated with great care.

The same is true of political advertisements. Elections in our country have become a farce (in my humble opinion) because of political advertisements run without regard to truth or verification. Anonymous groups run overwhelmingly negative ads making suggestions about “the other side” which may or may not be grounded in fact. They are like great big red-flag check boxes labeled “is accused of inflammatory nonsense we don’t ever have to prove,” and that’s enough to sway the electorate.

Is this any way to run a church? Is this any way to run a country? Ben Sira would suggest otherwise – our “great houses” are apt to fall if we continue to do so. Possibly they have already fallen and we just haven’t noticed.

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

Roots of Wisdom – From the Daily Office – October 28, 2012

October 28, 2014 / eric / 0 Comments

From Ecclesiasticus:

Wisdom praises herself, and tells of her glory in the midst of her people. * * * “I took root in an honored people, in the portion of the Lord, his heritage.”

(From the Daily Office Lectionary – Sirach 24:1 & 12 (NRSV) – October 28, 2014)

Taproot According to Ben Sira, personified Wisdom is rooted in Jerusalem; at the command of the Creator, she has take up residence in Zion among the Chosen People. These days I have a hard time seeing anything which can be counted as “wisdom” coming out of the modern government of that land, and I could write hundreds, even thousands, of words about what I believe to be the foolishness of the criminal injustice being perpetrated on the Palestinian people by that government. But I won’t. Not today. Today, my thoughts run to the question of rootedness, to the metaphor of sustenance drawn from a particular place, to the spatial and cultural peculiarity of wisdom, and to what happens when one leaves a particular place and takes up residence in another.

Consider this mundane example: Recently I visited Palestine and Israel on pilgrimage to various Christian holy sites. With a group of fellow pilgrims, I traveled by motor coach. At every stop our hosts reminded us, and eventually we began to remind each other, to take hats, water bottles, and cameras. Obviously the third was because we were tourists as well as pilgrims, but the first two were matters not merely of comfort but of survival. A hat to protect oneself from the sun, a bottle of water to rehydrate in an extremely arid place, there was wisdom in these admonitions. Having grown up in the desert, I also felt myself re-rooted in a familiar past.

But now I live in Ohio, a place of much more temperate climate most of the time, a place of rivers, lakes, ponds, and (to a desert rat) high humidity, a place where trees and shade abound. Protection from the sun, hats and water bottles, are not a necessity. Here, at various times of the year, a different wisdom prevails – sometimes it’s a reminder to put on heavy coat against cold and wind and lake-effect snow; at others, it’s the need for bug repellant.

I recently read an article about long-distance hiking and the need to plan ahead and to cache supplies, to place resources of particular types in safe but accessible locations along one’s route. The word resource caught my attention: to source again, is that not what it means when used as a verb. Like wisdom and her metaphorical roots, we stop and put out our “roots” and take what is needed in each place, in each culture; we are “re-sourced,” no longer drawing sustenance from the original place where our “roots” were sunk, taking in a new sort of nourishment in this different place.

In one place, hats and water bottles are wise; in another they are completely unnecessary and expending the effort to carry them is folly. In one place, heavy coats are needed; in another, they are useless. In one place, something to keep away the mosquitoes; in another, no mosquitoes. Wisdom in one place is folly in another. We must put down our “roots” to discover which it is.

Is biblical wisdom culturally dependent? Because Lady Wisdom was “established in Zion” and rooted in Jerusalem, is she not relevant in another place? Or can she be “re-sourced,” transplanted and re-invigorated in a new land? Is there a deeper source of wisdom common to all places into which her tap-root reaches? Is that deeper source available to us regardless of culture and place? I believe there is and perhaps the folly of our time is that we transplant and re-source ourselves too often to access it; we draw only from the superficial wisdom of differing places and fail to tap into the deeper strata of common wisdom.

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

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.

Category: Worship (Page 39 of 107)

The Midterm Zombie Apocalypse – From the Daily Office – November 5, 2014

Political Rainbow – From the Daily Office – November 4, 2014

Divisive Prayer – From the Daily Office – November 3, 2014

Stewardship Smiles – From the Daily Office – November 1, 2014

Dreams of Samhain – From the Daily Office – October 31, 2014

Metaphors – From the Daily Office – October 30, 2014

A Third Tongue – From the Daily Office – October 29, 2014

Roots of Wisdom – From the Daily Office – October 28, 2012

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

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

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