A retrospective on 2011

Posted on December 31, 2011 by djgrieser

It’s customary for people to look back and assess the past year; hence the top ten lists like those I linked to in an earlier post. Episcopalian bloggers have done something similar with lists of the ten most important stories.

Here’s Elizabeth Kaeton’s take. Here’s another try, from Susan B. Snook.

I’m not going to comment on either one. Around here, of course, the big story was the protests. It was a year of protests, beginning in February and continuing through the summer with Walkerville. This blog saw a huge increase in visitors during the protests and in fact the number of visits has continued to stay at a much higher level than before. More than 21,000 unique visits in 2011. The busiest day was February 22, the day of the interfaith clergy press conference.

I’ve not gone back to reread what I wrote during the height of the protests. One of the reasons I like to blog is that it is a contemporary equivalent of a day book or diary in which I take note of what’s going on in mind and in the world around me at particular moments. I think it will provide a very useful resource in future years as I reflect on my ministry. But it’s also quite raw, caught up in the moment, and therefore probably lacking in perspective.

If there are images that dominate 2011 as I reflect on the past year, in addition to the protests, I would cite the interfaith 9-11 service that we held at Grace, and then Christmas Eve, with two glorious services and an encounter with a very ill homeless man on the sidewalk after the 4:00 service. That encounter became the heart of my sermon at the 10:00 service.

That Christmas Eve experience of worship in the context of the daily ministry in an urban church is the most challenging and rewarding part of Grace’s mission. To worship surrounded by marathoners, or protestors, means that our worship can never be only about ourselves and God, it is also about those around us. Sometimes it’s hard to see the connection and sometimes, as on Ash Wednesday, the connection is clear only to us inside the church.

The experience of 2011 as we became more clear on what Grace’s role in the community should be, has provided a solid foundation for more visible outreach in the community, being a witness to the Good News of Jesus Christ amidst the crowds and noise on Capitol Square.

the state of the film industry

Posted on December 30, 2011 by djgrieser

The LA Times provides a chart: http://motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2011/12/la-times-chart-proves-movies-are-getting-worse-and-worse

I haven’t been paying close attention, which may reflect how busy my life is in other ways; but it also probably is due to the lack of interesting movies and the outrageous prices charged for them. I tried to count the number of movies I actually saw in 2011 and am guessing the total is less than 10.

Roger Ebert offers his perspective on why movie revenues were flat in 2011. By and large, I think he’s right. I saw my first 3D movie this month, Scorsese’s Hugo, and I don’t think it was worth the extra money.

But film retains its power to transform us, and to transport us to a different world and to challenge us to think about life in new ways. I saw Descendants this week and was deeply moved. Perhaps I’ll blog about it in the next day or two.

Thinking about “the “nones”

Posted on December 29, 2011 by djgrieser

I didn’t get around to thinking about Eric Weiner’s op-ed in the New York Times several weeks ago. In it, he discusses the increased numbers of Americans who identify themselves as “non-religious.” Weiner sees the problem as a result of organized religion. God is not fun, he says and goes on to observe that increased polarization in religion as in politics, leaves growing numbers of people marginalized. He cites his own experience:

In my secular, urban and urbane world, God is rarely spoken of, except in mocking, derisive tones. It is acceptable to cite the latest academic study on, say, happiness or, even better, whip out a brain scan, but God? He is for suckers, and Republicans.

I used to be that way, too, until a health scare and the onset of middle age created a crisis of faith, and I ventured to the other side. I quickly discovered that I didn’t fit there, either. I am not a True Believer. I am a rationalist. I believe the Enlightenment was a very good thing, and don’t wish to return to an age of raw superstition.

We Nones may not believe in God, but we hope to one day. We have a dog in this hunt.

I have no doubt that his experience is shared by many. His proposed solution, though, seems misguided, at best:

We need a Steve Jobs of religion. Someone (or ones) who can invent not a new religion but, rather, a new way of being religious. Like Mr. Jobs’s creations, this new way would be straightforward and unencumbered and absolutely intuitive. Most important, it would be highly interactive. I imagine a religious space that celebrates doubt, encourages experimentation and allows one to utter the word God without embarrassment. A religious operating system for the Nones among us. And for all of us.

It’s particularly ironic, given the response to Jobs’ death. It would seem he is already perceived as a spiritual guru, or even a saint.

I wonder whether Weiner actually experienced religious communities that do not deal with “raw superstition.”

Here’s another take on the same question, from an unlikely source, The Mennonite Weekly Review (hat/tip to Brian McLaren).

Lauren Sessions Stepp writes about the growing trend of young adult evangelicals leaving church which she attributes to this:

I’m not surprised. These young dropouts value the sense of community their churches provide but are tired of being told how they should live their lives. They don’t appreciate being condemned for living with a partner, straight or gay, outside of marriage or opting for abortion to terminate an unplanned pregnancy.

Cathy Grossman at USA Today, covers the story as well, profiling the apathetic or “so whats?” as she calls them. She quotes several conservative religious leaders who see the rise in religious apathy as a disaster for Christians. And other scholars see the rise in non-identification as a significant trend.

But I wonder if that’s the case. Certainly there has been a collapse in institutional religion in the last decade, but does the decline in membership actually reflect a decline in religious interest or affiliation. I wonder how many of those regular churchgoers of a previous generation had rich spiritual lives. How many of them went because of custom, or duty, or civic obligation? The difference may be attributable in part that there are no social consequences for non-attendance at religious services as there might have been fifty years ago.

top tens

Posted on December 29, 2011 by djgrieser

The War over Christmas (Historians’ edition)

Posted on December 27, 2011 by djgrieser

Giles Fraser, late of St. Paul’s Cathedral, had a radio program on the BBC on Christmas Day in which he argued that:

Following his battlefield conversion, Constantine established Christianity as the official religion of Rome, and he decided that Christ’s birth should become a major focus of the Christian year.

The broadcast is available here. But for a better historical perspective, try Andrew McGowan’s piece in Biblical Archaeology Review. It’s much better history, and much better nuanced, making clear that it wasn’t until the mid-4th century that December 25 became the accepted date for Christmas, and pointing out that there was considerable speculation about Jesus’ birth as early as the gospels, and increasing in the second century. He even goes a long way toward debunking the myth that December 25 was deliberately chosen to counteract pagan rites.

And the Word became flesh and tented among us–Further Reflections on John 1

Posted on December 27, 2011 by djgrieser

I’ve been thinking about John 1 and the image of the tent or tabernacle. The Greek verb that is translated as “dwelt” in “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us” derives from the word for tent. In the Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible, the Septuagint, the same word is used for tabernacle, the place in which God was present during the Hebrews’ sojourn in the wilderness.

It’s a rich image, evocative of the temporary nature of the flesh in which the Incarnate Word resided and also because of the resonance with the Hebrew Bible, the author of John’s gospel was making a revolutionary statement about God’s presence in the world.

I thought about the image of “tent” earlier last week as I reflected on Paul’s words in II Corinthians while preparing a funeral homily. Paul uses “tent” to refer the flesh:

For we know that if the earthly tent we live in is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. ²For in this tent we groan, longing to be clothed with our heavenly dwelling—

We tend not to think of flesh or body in these terms, perhaps because “tent” no longer has a ubiquitous presence in our culture. Tents are for camping, not for living, or dwelling.

Still, there is one way in which that image might take on new power in the contemporary context. One alternative translation is: “And he set up his tent in our midst.” Jim Keane, SJ, sees in this idea a parallel with the Occupy movements.

And the Word became flesh: A Sermon for Christmas Day, 2011

Posted on December 25, 2011 by djgrieser

“In the beginning was the Word, and the word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being.”

What do we celebrate at Christmas? Of course, the answer is obvious, even trite—the birth of Jesus Christ, the Savior of the World. But what do we celebrate at Christmas, what does the birth of Christ mean? Last night we heard the familiar story from Luke’s gospel. We know it well. The images are fixed in our memories, down to the marrow of our bones, the crude stable, the angels, the shepherds. Indeed, so familiar to us is the story that sometimes it becomes difficult to hear it afresh. Luke’s nativity story is as comfortable to us as our favorite pajamas or sweater, as familiar to us as the back of our hand.

Today we heard another gospel, a different gospel, but it too is familiar to us. Its words and images flow over us, surround us. Their beauty and brilliance have been dimmed as well by our repeated hearing of them. What new thing can we say about Christmas? What new or renewed faith, what transformation can come about in the midst of such old familiar stories and words?

In fact, that’s one of the problems with rituals. Human beings are by nature, ritualistic. Ritual takes us out of ourselves and out of our daily lives. Ritual draws us in, brings us into the presence of eternity. We like things to stay the same. We are comfortable with routine. We think things have always worked this way, that, for example, Christmas has always been celebrated in the way we do it today. Of course, that’s not true. We know approximately when Christians began celebrating the incarnation of Christ—it was probably in the fourth century. We know by whom and when the first crèche—the first nativity scene—was erected: by St. Francis of Assisi in the thirteenth century. We know that Christmas was not celebrated in colonial New England, that Santa Claus came on the scene in the mid-19^th century, that “White Christmas” and “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer” date from the 1940s. We know all this, but when somebody messes with it, we get mad. All of that accumulated tradition combines to make Christmas an evocative and powerful event.

Yet all that familiarity, all the ritual does something else, too. It prevents us from encountering the gospel anew, it keeps us from hearing the words of Luke or of John with open hearts and minds, open to the possibility that Christmas, besides being the “most wonderful time of the year,” that Christmas might transform us, and transform the world.

“In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being.” The profound and mysterious hymn with which the Gospel of John begins makes some extravagant claims about Christ. What is proclaimed in these words is that Christ, the Word, has been present in the world since creation, indeed that the Word was itself the creative process through which the world, and we, were created.

There’s something of an irony here. At Christmas we celebrate the birth of Christ, the coming of Christ into the world, but John begins by asserting that Christ has been present in the world from the very beginning of creation. The problem, of course, is that we don’t get it. We don’t recognize Christ’s presence among us, in us.

In the beginning was the Word… There are few texts of scripture on which Christians have thought and reflected than the opening verses of John’s gospel. The English translation captures only a small portion of all that lies in the Greek word logos that connotes as well, reason, natural law, the order of the universe. And behind the Greek lies the Hebrew concept of wisdom—the idea expressed in the Old Testament that it was through wisdom that God created the universe.

These rich words convey to us something of the faith of the early Christians who confessed them and sang them in worship, but the profundity of what they confessed elude our grasp. What might it mean for our faith not just to confess, but to believe that in creation in this world around us, we see the presence of God, we detect Christ?

We live in a world that loves to compartmentalize and to criticize. We tie things up into neat packages—this is science, that is religion. This is my faith, there is the rest of my life. This is Christmas, that, well, that is the rest of the year. We tie things up in neat packages, even though life resists such neat categorization. We want things neat and tidy, but life is messy. On Christmas, we want to hear the old familiar story, to sing the carols, to go home and have a nice Christmas dinner, exchange presents, and tomorrow wake up, and get back to business as usual.

What we don’t want, not really, is to encounter Christ. Oh yes, we love the baby in the manger, we love the story of Mary and Joseph, of shepherds and angels, we love the warm fuzzy feelings that Christmas is so good at providing. We want Christ on our terms, not on God’s terms.

John’s gospel reminds us that Christmas is not just about all of that. John proclaims to us loudly and powerfully that the Christ who was born in Bethlehem is the Incarnate Word, present in all the universe, present in all our words, present in us.

Christ comes to us, of course, as the little baby in a manger in Bethlehem. But our faith also proclaims that Christ is present all around us, even when we fail to recognize Him. Christ is here, in this place as we worship. We encounter Christ as we gather around the altar and share in the Eucharist. Christ is present, too, in the poor, the homeless, the destitute. May the spirit of Christmas infect us and transform us, that we see Christ in all that we do, in everyone we meet, in our neighbor, and yes, in our enemy, too. Amen.

A broken world, a broken body–Bethlehem: A sermon for Christmas Eve, 2011

Posted on December 25, 2011 by djgrieser

My next-door neighbor loves decorating for Christmas. Last year, he was out in the middle of a snow storm in the dark, stringing up lights. This year, he began earlier, the weekend after Thanksgiving. But he didn’t stop then. He has continued to fill the trees and shrubs in front of his house with strands of light. Some of them are tasteful, like the wreath and garland bedecked with white lights over his garage door. Others are less so. Among the latter, a dozen or so red-lit candy canes that appeared last weekend. He is exuberant in his decoration. His joy for the season is on display for all to see, every night. Continue reading →

No room at the inn, Madison style

Posted on December 24, 2011 by djgrieser

As we were leaving church this evening after the early service, we encountered a homeless man, lying in a fetal position, on the sidewalk in front of the church. Released from the hospital a couple of hours earlier, cops had dropped him off here because of the men’s shelter. Unfortunately, he couldn’t walk the twenty yards to the shelter entrance and shelter staff were not going to come out to help him. We called 911 and EMT’s transported him back to the hospital but as they left, they told me that he would probably be back on the street in an hour or so.

He’s not the first person discharged from a hospital to end up at the shelter later the same day. It happens regularly.

The fault in this does not lie with the hospital, or the police, or the shelter staff. The fault lies with all of us, with a society that turns its back on the most vulnerable.

Occupy Trinity Church, Part III

Posted on December 22, 2011 by djgrieser

The debate goes on and on. Apparently the actions by #OWS over the weekend, the interventions by Bishop Sisk and Presiding Bishop Jefforts Schori, and the arrest of Bishop Packard have aroused passions. One only need read the comments thread on Jim Naughton’s Episcopal Cafe article to see that things have gotten interesting.

Naughton referred to “An extremely insightful essay” written by Tom Beaudoin at America in which he ponders the theological meaning of private property when it comes to churches:

I think we have a very important theological matter before us when Occupy, through its religious-leader allies, is saying to Trinity Wall Street: We in Occupy — as a multifaith, interreligious, spiritually pluralistic movement that is also and equally a nonreligious, secular movement — can better meet your mission as a Christian church in this particular time, and this particular place, with negligible negative financial impact (Trinity is a verywealthy community), and with a rare and time-sensitive influence, by using this particular private property to host the next stage of Occupy Wall Street, and let’s meet to talk about the liability issues and any other concerns you have, let’s have that dialogue starting immediately, but in principle we have a substantial theological point worthy of your consideration.

The presumption in this theological claim, which I think is correct, is that no Christian church is – on the very terms of its theological existence – permitted to fall back on the mere invocation of “private property” without also a theological conversation about the spiritual significance of what that concept means and how it is being used.

There are several interesting issues in this statement. The first has to do with how “private property” relates to the property of an Episcopal parish, which as we all know to well by now, is held in trust by the parish for the diocese, and by the diocese for the national church. It may be different in Trinity’s case because of its unique history with an immense land grant coming from Queen Anne in 1715. Nonetheless, even here there is a question of “who owns the property.”

But aside from that question, there is the question of “private property” itself and that is probably what Beaudoin is getting at. I used to enjoy telling my students that “God is not a capitalist.” No matter how hard conservative Christians try to spin scripture, to derive capitalism, or even the notion of private property from Hebrew or Christian scriptures takes considerable finesse and exegetical hijinks. In Hebrew Scripture, in fact, there is no sense of private property at all. The land is owned by Yahweh, distributed to the people, given a sabbatical every seventh year, and in the fiftieth year, the Jubilee, whatever land was alienated from its original inhabitants, for debt or sale, or whatever, is returned to its original occupants.

But the question is not what private property may or may not have meant in scripture. Beaudoin is challenging the use of “private property” as Trinity’s defense against the use of its property by #OWS. And here I think he is doing some theological legerdemain. For in fact, what he is arguing is not that #OWS is challenging Trinity’s claim to private property, but rather their mission. Read this carefully:

We in Occupy — as a multifaith, interreligious, spiritually pluralistic movement that is also and equally a nonreligious, secular movement — can better meet your mission as a Christian church in this particular time, and this particular place,

In other words #OWS, or Beaudoin’s articulation of it, is not challenging Trinity’s defense of its private property, but of its mission. And this is a different thing. I haven’t read Trinity’s mission statement, and I don’t think that matters much. Trinity has enormous wealth and has done enormous good across the world with that wealth. My guess is that all of those in #OWS would be supportive of Trinity’s work in Africa and elsewhere. But it also has a mission to its particular context and that is Wall Street. Among its members and among its lay leadership are people from all walks of life, including investment bankers and CEOs of banks and financial firms, yes, the 1%.

There is a great deal of discussion about how Jesus would respond to #OWS. Well, in fact, the gospels are quite clear. Jesus ate with tax collectors and sinners, and tax collectors were probably the first-century equivalent of the 1%.

My hackles are raised whenever anyone, someone on the outside, whether lay or clergy, attempts to define the mission of a congregation, church, or even denomination. It is the height of arrogance to do so. Mission should be contextual and reflect the life of the congregation. It may be appropriate to ask questions about that mission, to invite an expansion of that mission, but to say that an outside group “can better meet your mission” is nothing more than hubris.

Preaching Grace on the Square

Scripture, Tradition, Theology, Random Thoughts from Capitol Square in Madison, WI

Monthly Archives: December 2011