Madison Marathon

Posted on May 30, 2010 by djgrieser

Today was the Madison Marathon. Other than a great deal of confusion leading up to the day concerning access on W. Washington (turns out, there wasn’t any), the Marathon had relatively little impact on Grace. Oh, numbers were down, of course, because people couldn’t get to church. And people were late because of the struggle with parking, traffic pattern, and crowds. And there was the noise, of course. But it was a good day. We blessed the new coolers and freezers in the Food Pantry. There were visitors, as well as a few St. Andrew’s folk who couldn’t get there from downtown.

And the epistle reading was appropriate for the occasion:

Since we are justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have obtained access to this grace in which we stand; and we boast in our hope of sharing the glory of God. And not only that, but we also boast in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not disappoint us, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us. (Romans 5:1-5).

A Sermon for Trinity Sunday, 2010

Posted on May 30, 2010 by djgrieser

Trinity Sunday

May 30, 2010

Today is Trinity Sunday. It’s the one day in the church year when our focus is not on the ministry or teaching of Jesus Christ. Instead, our attention is drawn to one of the central doctrines of our faith—the belief that God is Three: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. It is that doctrine which separates us most clearly from our fellow monotheists, Jews and Muslims. The Trinity deserves at least one sermon a year, because of its importance and its complexity.

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Totally random post

Posted on May 26, 2010 by djgrieser

I’ve only lived in Madison for ten months, but I don’t know where Greyhound stops to drop off and pick up passengers. It turns out, almost nobody else does, either. Just before I arrived, the old Badger Bus station was demolished to make way for a new development. At first, Greyhound moved their drop-off to somewhere on Stoughton Road. Fine, but there was no Madison Metro bus access. People either had to walk, or take a cab.

At some point, they moved.

Today, a guy stopped by, looking for bus fare. He had been able to get from Milwaukee here, but needed more to reach his final destination. He told me that the bus driver–the bus driver mind you–didn’t know where he was supposed to drop off Madison passengers. He tried one place which obviously wasn’t correct, so he finally had to call the dispatcher in Milwaukee.

If the bus driver doesn’t know where he’s supposed to go, how is anyone else?

Does anyone in Madison care about this?

Rebels and Traitors

Posted on May 25, 2010 by djgrieser

I just finished reading Lindsey Davis’s Rebels and Traitors. It’s a historical novel set during the English Civil War of the 1640s and 1650s.

I’m a huge fan of her Marcus Didio Falco mystery series, set in the Roman Empire during Vespasian’s reign. They are wonderful reads, funny, engaging and full of historical detail.

Unfortunately, Rebels and Traitors misses on the first two of those. It is full of historical detail, overly full, reading much of the time as academic history, though without the footnotes. Sometimes it seems as though she felt compelled to provide much more detail than was necessary to propel the plot forward. Or perhaps it was that the civil war and the protectorate was the story she wanted to tell, and could think of doing it in no other way than through historical fiction.

Only rarely does the comedic genius she shows in the Falco novels come to light and the characters are almost all wooden, their dialogue stilted.

Still, there are some interesting bits. She attempts to provide as broad a view of the historical canvas as possible, telling the story through the eyes of participants who fought on both sides, and including characters who were Levellers and Ranters as well as the more likely Cavaliers.

Here’s an example, though, where history may be more interesting than fiction.

“What did Jesus do?” by Adam Gopnik

Posted on May 23, 2010 by djgrieser

Gopnik writes a solid summary of the current scholarly consensus (such that there is one) concerning the gospels and the historical Jesus. It’s well worth a read. It’s also quite dense so it bears close attention.The article is here.

I find his assessment of Bart Ehrman especially amusing:

The American scholar Bart Ehrman has been explaining the scholars’ truths for more than a decade now, in a series of sincere, quiet, and successful books. Ehrman is one of those best-selling authors like Richard Dawkins and Robert Ludlum and Peter Mayle, who write the same book over and over—but the basic template is so good that the new version is always worth reading.

But perhaps the most important point Gopnik makes is this:

If one thing seems clear from all the scholarship, though, it’s that Paul’s divine Christ came first, and Jesus the wise rabbi came later. This fixed, steady twoness at the heart of the Christian story can’t be wished away by liberal hope any more than it could be resolved by theological hair-splitting. Its intractability is part of the intoxication of belief. It can be amputated, mystically married, revealed as a fraud, or worshipped as the greatest of mysteries. The two go on, and their twoness is what distinguishes the faith and gives it its discursive dynamism.

Sermon for the Feast of Pentecost, 2010

Posted on May 23, 2010 by djgrieser

May 23, 2010

Have you got the spirit? Do you feel the Spirit? What’s your reaction when you hear the verses of Acts read on Pentecost, where Luke describes the coming of the Holy Spirit? When I’m in my most cynical mood—one of my character traits I’ve tried to suppress becoming a priest—I get a perverse pleasure from comparing life in a typical Episcopal congregation with Luke’s description of the early Christian community in Acts. Throughout his history of the first generations of Christianity, Luke stresses the amazing things that were accomplished—the spread of the gospel from Jerusalem to Rome, the miracles that leaders performed, the rich prayer life, and the close community. But of all the things Luke mentions about that early community, the biggest difference may lie here, right at the beginning.

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“The Archbishop of Canterbury condemns Henry VIII to hell!”

Posted on May 22, 2010 by djgrieser

Well, not really. He preached a sermon at the Charterhouse, where in 1538, 14 Carthusian monks who refused to submit to Henry’s reforms, most importantly the Act of Supremacy and the dissolution of the monasteries. In 1611, the Charterhouse became the site of an Almshouse, which it remains. In recent years, there has been an annual commemoration of the martyrs’ and an effort to use the event as rapprochement between Catholics and Protestants. Williams’ sermon explores the connection between the suffering of Christ on the cross and the suffering of martyrs. He argues that as long as there is suffering in the world, Christ is in agony as well.

Williams points out that rulers more ruthless than Henry sought to destroy Christianity, but that they have been unsuccessful. The cross stands as a witness to the brutality of evil, but it also is a symbol of God’s ultimate triumph, the triumph of justice.

The money quote:

We treasure with perhaps a particular intensity the martyrdom of the contemplative, because the contemplative who knows how to enter into the silence and stillness of things is, above all, the one who knows how to resist to resist fashion and power, to stand in God while the world turns. In that discovery of stillness lies all our hope of reconciliation, the reconciliation of which John Houghton spoke in this place, this place where we are met to worship, before the community gave its answer to the King’s agents. A reconciliation of which he spoke (as do so many martyrs) on the scaffold, a reconciliation which is not vanquished, defeated, or rendered meaningless by any level of suffering or death. If Henry VIII is saved (an open question perhaps) it will be at the prayers of John Houghton. If any persecutor is saved it is at the prayers of their victim. If humanity is saved, it is by the grace of the cross of Jesus Christ and all those martyrs who have followed in his path.

It’s difficult to face the very human and fallible origins of Anglicanism, in the sixteenth century and in the seventeenth. But as hard as that is, we also need to face the same in our present church. The last two sentences of the quotation above remind us of our complicity in persecution, in every age.

The full sermon is here.

The Edgewater

Posted on May 19, 2010 by djgrieser

This post is directed primarily to residents of Madison, but it might have some wider interest. For over a year, there has been enormous controversy in the city over the redevelopment of the Edgewater hotel. Madison’s city council had an all-night session last night, debating the merits of the proposal and tax-payer financing. There’s more info here.

I’ve not been following the debate in much detail; there seems to have been rather more heat than light in the whole process. But I will make several comments. We live downtown, only a few blocks away from the site in question. There are things about downtown life I love–being able to walk to work, to concerts, and to restaurants. But there are also things I dislike intensely. For example, sleepless nights every weekend because of the drunks who whoop it up after closing time. The city seems not to take any interest in the quality of life in this neighborhood. We are surrounded by students who live in substandard housing, and treat their residences and their neighbors accordingly.

Quite apart from the merits of the proposal, and I’m not at all certain that the Edgewater is situated to attract any guests except those interested in enjoying the delights of UW’s fraternity row, what bothers me is the use of taxpayer money, $16 million, to support a small project with limited impact.

At the same time, I think about this. While the city spends $16 million to support this boutique project, Grace Church hosts a homeless shelter that in the winter serves upwards of 150 guests each night. In 2008, according to Porchlight, Inc’s annual report, the city provided $0 toward supporting the shelter. It’s clear where the city’s values are, and where the city council and the mayor stand on quality of life in Madison.

Disappearing Feet: A Homily for the Feast of the Ascension

Posted on May 14, 2010 by djgrieser

May 13, 2010

I’ve been thinking about the Ascension these past few weeks in preparation for tonight’s Evensong. I keep reflecting on the oddness of the doctrine of the ascension. It may the aspect of the church’s teaching about Jesus Christ with which we have most difficulty in the twenty-first century. It’s not that the Incarnation or Jesus’ death and resurrection are easy to accept. Rather, I think it’s because both Christmas and Easter have enough cultural significance and liturgical drama that we are able to lay aside most of our doubts and questions, at least most of the time.

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