Monthly Archives: November 2013

A Prayer of Giving Thanks

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by Mark Sandlin

Good and gracious God,

There is a tension that comes
with giving thanks.

Even as we recognize
and are grateful for
the blessings in our lives,
we are confronted with
enjoying our abundance
as we recognize the reality
that there are those
who have far too little.

Even as we celebrate a holiday
with roots which reach back
to the beginnings of our nation,
we are confronted with
the reality of
the genocide and slavery
upon which it was found.

We do not forget these things.
We do not celebrate them.
We do not give thanks for them.

In this our tale of Thanksgiving,
they are the terrible storyline
which we must not forget.

Our pride,
our arrogance
and our pursuit of possessions
have constantly stood
alongside of our blessings
as a reminder.

They remind us why we give thanks.

They remind us that life
is sacred and fragile
and that we
are its biggest threats.
They remind us that we do not want
to be those people again,
people who lord over others
and are self-adsorbed and self-important.

They remind us to appreciate
what we do have.

So, we give thanks.

We give thanks for this moment.
We give thanks for the things
that are right about the world
right now,
in this moment.
We give thanks for family and friends.
We give thanks for love and laughter.
We give thanks for grace and good company.

We give thanks for the tension
we find in a day like today
because it provides us the insight
and the motivation
to create better tomorrows.
Not just for ourselves,
not just for our families,
not just for our friends
but for the world.

So, today and everyday,
we give thanks
and we work to create a world
that gives more reasons
for which to be thankful.

Amen.

Madison’s debate about homelessness continues

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You don’t have to go further than Madison.com to see our dysfunction. Mayor Soglin is in the news again for wanting to bring in private security guards to monitor homeless people in the City County building. The article points out some of the problems caused by the regular presence of homeless people in and around the building, and also cites County executive Joe Parisi’s opposition to the proposal. The projected cost is $42,000, money that might be better spent on providing services to those who need them–like showers, rest rooms, and, perhaps even, some housing.

Also today, news finally broke that the County is hoping to purchase a facility on the east side for a permanent day center. I had a chance to tour the facility last month. It needs some renovations, especially additional bathrooms and showers, the location isn’t great, but it has great potential with ample space not only for a day resource center, but also for other agencies that work with homeless people. Unfortunately, the current owners won’t be vacating until spring, and the facility probably won’t open before summer. In the absence of such a facility this winter, homeless people are pretty much forced to seek shelter wherever they can, including the City-County Building.

We’ll see how the dynamics of these two stories play out.

Taxes, clergy, and the state

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Our neighbors down the street at the Freedom From Religion Foundation went next door to the Federal District Court and achieved a ruling that’s been a long time coming: revoking the clergy housing allowance tax exemption. In case you don’t know about this benefit, clergy are able to exclude from taxable income up to the fair market rental value of their housing (that’s in addition to being able to take the mortgage exemption).

There are some pretty good reasons for this exemption. Clergy tend to be mobile (serving roughly  five years in a particular congregation), and traditionally many clergy have lived in housing owned by churches. The tax exemption was intended to equalize the situation for clergy who provided their own housing. Because salaries for clergy tend to be lower than in the secular world, the housing allowance is especially important for clergy serving smaller, rural, or inner city churches. But it is rife for abuse and the regular media reports of the lavish lifestyles led by megachurch pastors (the pastor of a Charlotte megachurch is building a multi-million dollar mansion) make the exemption in its current form hard to defend.

Simply revoking the exemption seems fairly simple, but the implications are significant. For example, will clergy who live in church-owned housing be subject to tax on the value of the housing they receive? What about members of religious orders who live in community and receive little or no salary? Will their room and board be taxable income?

My twitter and facebook feeds have been full of comments about this action and no doubt if allowed to stand, the decision will have an enormous impact on the income of clergy. There are already significant challenges facing smaller churches. In the Episcopal Church, more and more congregations are finding it difficult to fund full-time clergy. The ruling would hurt clergy at the lower end of the income spectrum and it would hurt churches that serve low-income and minority communities. Wealthy churches and their pastors have little to worry about. If a pastor is able to build a million dollar mansion, he can easily pay income tax on it as well.

But there’s a larger issue here, too. I’m sure the FFRF has its eyes on a much bigger prize: churches’ property tax exemption. The situation is rather different because non-profits of all sorts (universities, hospitals, etc) are exempt from paying property taxes as well as churches. If that exemption goes, I’m not sure how a congregation like Grace Church would survive. I shudder to think what our property tax bill might be, certainly in six figures. Our budget can’t sustain that kind of a hit and it’s not like we could sell a building that’s a national landmark.

This is one of those situations that could hit our pocketbooks and the budgets of our congregations quite hard. Our first response might be anger or concern for our economic well-being. I’m sure some will cite this as another example of the persecution of Christians by our secular culture. I think it’s important that clergy, congregations, denominations, and other religious traditions work together to develop a response to this issue that focuses on creating a just and equitable solution for clergy. As written, the law is the relic of another age and needs to be revised. There are other issues, too. For example, clergy are considered self-employed for tax purposes. But I’m doubtful that in our current political and cultural climate, a more rational law is possible.

The Book of Common Prayer: A Biography

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I’m not going to offer a full review of Alan Jacobs’ fine little book on the BCP. It’s well-written, engaging, and informative. He directed my attention to people and research of which I was unaware, or barely aware. Most importantly, he doesn’t get bogged down in detail which to me is the great bane of every liturgical scholar. It’s a book I’ll recommend to a certain kind of inquirer, someone interested in liturgy, history, and spirituality, and curious about how we got where we are.

Instead, I’d like to point to several points Jacobs makes that I find especially interesting. For one thing, he stresses the importance of scripture to the Book of Common Prayer:

Indeed, one could argue that Cranmer’s chief reason for implementing standard liturgies was to provide a venue in which the Bible could be more widely and more thoroughly known (p. 27)

The important role of scripture in Anglican liturgy should be obvious to anyone who has attended a service conducted according to the BCP rubrics. Whether hearing so much scripture actually contributes to wider and more thorough knowledge of the Bible is another question, especially when the primary opportunity to explain what people have heard, the sermon, is often an exercise in avoidance of scripture.

In his “biography,” Jacobs reminds us of the early battles over the prayer book, its relative insignificance for much of England’s population during the 18th century (and before). It may have been popular among the elite, and Jacob cites Jane Austen in support of that notion, but given what we know about literacy and church attendance in the 18th century, it couldn’t have been widely familiar to everyone. It reached the height of its influence in the nineteenth century, the Victorian Age, even as cultural change was promising to bring that influence to an end. But what was its influence in that age? At the end of his discussion of Anglo-Catholicism, Jacobs writes:

[the Ritualists]… transformed Cranmer’s words into a kind of ambient music, often heard without acknowledgment, received aesthetically but not necessarily with the ear of understanding (p. 147)

Jacobs concludes with an idea he takes from Stewart Brand’s How Buildings Learn. In that books can be adapted to very different cultural contexts and to readers unimagined by the authors, books, Jacobs says, can learn too. He continues:

But a religious book is limited in its ability to learn because it is concerned to teach; and a prayer book especially wants its teaching to be enacted, not just to be absorbed. It cannot live unles we say its words in our voices. It can learn with us, but only if we consent to learn from it. There are relatively few, now, who give that consent to the Book of Common Prayer. Cranmer’s book, and its direct successors will always be acknowledged as historical documents of the first order, and masterpieces of English prose, but this is not what they want or mean to be. Their goal–now as in 1549–is to be living words in the mouths of those who have a living faith (p. 194)

As I was reading, I was reminded again of the role the Book of Common Prayer has played in my own spiritual journey. It was the means of my conversion to Anglicanism and it continues to shape my spirituality and my religious experience. Its language and prayers have become my own. In other words, if Cranmer’s goal in 1549 was to make the Book of Common Prayer “living words in the mouths of those who have a living faith,” it still holds that power. I see that same power in those among who I minister as well. I sometimes think that liturgical reformers and those who would do away with the BCP altogether lack faith in its transformational power and lack faith too, in the power of people to re-appropriate its language and imagery to meet their particular needs and contexts.

Women Bishops … and women priests

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General Synod of the Church of England has just voted overwhelmingly to move forward on ordaining women to the Episcopate. This after the fiasco a year ago when conservatives were able to muster enough votes to prevent it.

Torn Bread is powerful essay from Kaya Oakes that provides some background. An active Roman Catholic laywoman, she recently attended an Episcopal service and ponders the significance of receiving communion from the female priest:

When I took the bread from the female priest, I wondered about the ontological difference. What difference did it make that her hands were female? That the breath she used to push out the sacred words was female? That her female soul had brought God into being in the yeast and wheat? Did she look into my eyes and see a Catholic woman who hears Catholic women suffering because women don’t hand them transformed bread?

She looks at me and she turns to the next person and I chew and swallow. And in that moment I realize believing in transformed bread is not just believing that the person who performs the act is somehow different from the recipient. It is not about the gender of the person who performs the act: it’s about the act. It’s about the recipient. It’s the gift. It’s the food. Whatever church we walk into, whoever says the words that make it shift, we hold out our hands, and we are given bread.

You never know who might walk into the reception area at Grace

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This afternoon, it was people from the United Way looking for a press conference.

“I don’t know anything about it,” I replied. Over the next few minutes, a larger group assembled, the cameras came, and eventually we all made our way downstairs into the Men’s Drop-In Shelter at Grace.

It turns out the press conference was about three local men’s experiences on the street last week. Pat Schneider provides details about local businessman Tim Metcalfe, Michael Johnson of the Boys and Girls Clubs, and Will Green of the Salvation Army, going undercover to experience what life is like for homeless men in Madison.

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The stories they told are heartwarming evidence of a generous community, with passers-by, restaurant managers, homeless people, and shelter staff acting with generosity and compassion.

One thing I learned this afternoon: current sleeping  capacity at Grace and the two overflow shelters is 140; last night 139 stayed in the three facilities. What will the numbers be when it gets cold?

 

Rector’s Annual Report

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This is the fifth time I have come before you at Annual Meeting to give a report. I wonder whether that is as surprising to you as it is to me. In some respects, it seems like only a few days ago that I first walked through the doors of Grace Church; in other ways, it seems like we’ve been working and worshiping together for a very long time. Grace Church will celebrate the 175th anniversary of its organization as a parish in the coming year, and seen from that perspective, my tenure as rector is barely worth mention in our parish’s history. Historical perspective is always humbling.

In many ways, the past year has been consumed with work around the master plan. Later in today’s meeting, you will receive an update on where we are at—many of you have already had a chance to look at the revised plans for a first phase of renovations. We will also hear about the feasibility study for a Capital Campaign that will take place in the coming weeks. Throughout this process, I have challenged us to view any renovations in light of our mission here on Capitol Square. Even more important, we should be asking how our plans might help people in Madison, our friends, neighbors, and strangers, to connect with God, to encounter the sacred, and to develop and deepen their relationships with Jesus Christ. This is evangelism, even if most Episcopalians think that’s a dirty word. It might seem odd to think about our building as a tool for evangelism, but by opening our doors to the community, we are also opening up the possibility of conversations about God and encounters with God.

Evangelism has to be about more than opening our doors. It begins when we go outside our walls and into the community. When I stand outside on the corner before services, I do it to greet you as you enter; but I also greet those who are walking toward other destinations. On Ash Wednesday, when I offer to put ashes on the foreheads of passers-by, I am inviting them to think about the sacred in the midst of their daily routine, to encounter the divine in the middle of their day, in the middle of their week. I am inviting them to ponder time and eternity. When I walk into a coffee shop and the barrista asks me if I am an Episcopal priest, I invite her to enter into a conversation about where she is now, where she came from, and how her life now might be a place where she experiences the love of God. I cite these examples not in order  to invite you to think about how the encounters you have each day, how your daily routine might be a place where your friends, acquaintances, and coworkers might experience the love and grace of God.

A couple of weeks ago, a parishioner told me about a conversation he’d recently had with a co-worker. He was asked, “So, you’re a pretty smart guy, you’ve got it together, why do you go to church?” And he didn’t know what to say in reply. No doubt some of you could share similar stories; some of you might even say that your co-workers, your friends, don’t know you go to church. Now there are several reasons for this. One is that there are large portions of our culture for which Christianity is meaningless. They have no idea why one might go to church. Even worse, if Christianity does mean anything, it means narrow-mindedness, religious and political conservatives, opponents of LGBT inclusion, gay marriage, and the like. In our context, it’s very difficult to know what to say, how to talk about our faith when we’re not sure how it will be heard or whether we’ll be understood. Let’s work together in the coming year on becoming more open to talking about our faith, more open to asking the hard questions, and inviting others to explore those questions with us.

One of the things that has struck me about Grace’s uniqueness is the presence among us every Sunday of people who are visiting for the first time, or perhaps second or third. Even last week, when many of you stayed away because of the Marathon, there were people at both 8:00 and at 10:00 who were relative, or absolute newcomers. Some Sundays, especially in the summers, I’d guess that up to 20% of our 10:00 attendance are people who are unknown to me. That’s quite remarkable. Now, many of those who visit us are here for a short time—the weekend, a business trip, what have you. Many others are trying us out or have come because there’s something going on in their lives that makes them want to attend services, seeking God. We do a pretty good job welcoming visitors. Some of you have taken responsibility to seek out unfamiliar faces, introduce yourselves, and engage in conversation. What we’re less effective at is bringing visitors into our community. We struggle at incorporating those new people into the body of Christ. In the coming year, I hope to make this a priority for the new vestry and I also encourage you, if this is something that you’re interested in, to contact me about how you might get involved.

Outside our doors is another immense opportunity. The thousands of young adults who make Madison their home, college students, of course, but also grad students, young people who have chosen to make Madison their home because of its opportunities for interesting work, outdoor activities, and vibrant culture. I’ve probably mentioned this age group in every annual report. They weigh heavy on my heart because I believe that Grace can offer young adults a rich spiritual life, opportunities for outreach, and connections with other demographic groups that are rewarding and fulfilling. I’m calling on those of you who share this passion to work with me on developing new opportunities for worship and community that would focus on young adults.

The entire report is available here: Annual Report_2013

Hope among the ruins: A Homily for Proper 28, Year C

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We have an old travel poster from the 30s. It’s an image of Berlin showing that city’s main shopping district, the Kurfürstendamm, looking toward the Kaiser Wilhelm’s Memorial Church. That church was constructed in the 1890s as a memorial to the first ruler of a united Germany, Wilhelm I. The image that appears on my travel poster no longer exists. Largely destroyed during WWII the original church’s tower remains, surrounded by a new church built in the style of modern architecture. Now the church stands as a memorial to all of the victims of WWII and also as a warning of the cost of war. When I was studying and travelling in Germany as a college student in 1979, one could still see visible signs of the destruction of World War II in many places. Occasionally, as with the Gedächtniskirche, the ruins remained as memorial and caution. But in many places, especially in the East, the rubble remained because of the lack of funds to rebuild and the uncertainty of what might replace the old. Continue reading →

On My Reading List: Flannery O’Connor’s Prayer Journal

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Marilynne Robinson’s review in The New York Times Book Review:

It is the religious sensibility reflected in this journal that makes it as eloquent on the subject of creativity as it is on the subject of prayer. O’Connor’s awareness of her gifts gives her a special kind of interest in them. Having concluded one early entry by asking the Lord to help her “with this life that seems so treacherous, so disappointing,” she begins the next entry: “Dear God, tonight it is not disappointing because you have given me a story. Don’t let me ever think, dear God, that I was anything but the instrument for Your story — just like the typewriter was mine.”

Casey N. Cep writes about it for The New Yorker:

The journal reflects a single year in the life of a believer—it includes just under fifty pages of prayers from a lifetime filled with them. It is the attempt of a young writer to reconcile her worldly ambitions with her heavenly understanding. The task she set for herself, to invigorate her dulling faith, was accomplished by the deliberate, contemplative practice of praying in her own words. By refashioning the prayers she inherited and practiced every day at Mass, O’Connor was able to find new language for belief.

Paul Harvey explores it as well:

Flannery O’Connor’s prayer journals provide a beautiful glimpse into a vulnerable soul open to the rigor of life, confident that God would use trials to shape and press her into something more. Those prayers were answered through O’Connor’s life of fighting disease and practicing her craft of writing. Her strong irony did not lead her to doubt that God was with her.

The model of Flannery O’Connor challenges the prevailing ideas of modern life and challenges us to personally assess how we reconcile our own beliefs with our scholarship and use of irony. O’Connor wielded irony as an effective weapon in her writings. Her prayer journals demonstrate her ability to harness the power of irony without allowing it to define her soul. Such an approach today would be threatening to the culture of cheap irony that surrounds us.

James Parker also reflects on her use of irony and her life of prayer:

Where the Word was operational, for O’Connor, it was always disruptive: in its presence, one’s head was supposed to explode. Her short stories, especially, reengineered the Joycean epiphany, the quiet moment of transcendence, as a kind of blunt-force baptismal intervention: her characters are KO’d, dismantled, with a violence that would be absurdist, if the universe were absurd. But the universe is not absurd. “There is an interaction between man and God which to disregard is an act of insolence,” wrote the rabbi and theologian Abraham Joshua Heschel, her contemporary, in The Prophets. “Isolation is a fairy tale.” The upended moment, the breaking-in or breaking-through of a vagrant, unbiddable reality: this is the grace of God and the sign of his love.

Responding to Typhoon Haiyan

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Sean McConnell of Episcopal Relief and Development has this to say:

When Typhoon Haiyan struck, a colleague and I were packing our bags for a visit with our partners in the Philippines. Initially, it wasn’t clear if the typhoon would set things back since the Philippines experience around 20 typhoons a year, and as a result have built a capacity for responding resiliently in their wake. So, we were cautiously on stand-by until it became clear yesterday that our visit might be more hindrance than help. By the time the typhoon hit, I had already posted to Facebook that I was departing for the Philippines, so friends and colleagues naturally reached out to find out how Episcopal Relief & Development would respond. I explained that Episcopal Relief & Development takes the long view on disasters response and recovery.

 

Press releases from ERD are available here.

You can donate to ERD on their website (to designate funds for Typhoon Haiyan, click on the Disaster Response button).