Author Archives: djgrieser

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About djgrieser

I have been Rector of Grace Episcopal Church in Madison, WI since 2009. I'm passionate about Jesus Christ and about connecting our faith and tradition with 21st century culture. I'm also very active in advocating for our homeless neighbors.

“The Spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness”: Lectionary Reflections for the First Sunday in Lent, Year B

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This week’s gospel reading is remarkably brief. It presents challenges to the preacher, because we have heard much of it in other contexts already in this liturgical year (vss 9-11 was included in the gospel for The Baptism of our Lord and vss 14-15 were included in the reading for the Third Sunday after the Epiphany). The key verses left out of those other readings were 12 and 13, Mark’s account of Jesus’ temptation in the wilderness. Compared to the accounts of the temptation in Matthew and Luke (there is no parallel in John), Mark’s version is astonishingly brief and puzzling.

“And immediately the Spirit drove him into the wilderness.” The word translated here as “drove” is used elsewhere in Mark to describe Jesus’ casting out demons or Satan. Mark also uses it when Jesus throws the moneychangers out of the temple. It’s an active verb, associated with violence and to use it here raises all sorts of questions. What is the gospel writer’s intent? To show that Jesus is utterly subject to the whim of the Spirit? Is Jesus a victim of the Spirit? Should we even capitalize the word “Spirit” assuming it refers to the Holy Spirit? And perhaps most importantly, what is the significance of the sequence: baptism, temptation, and beginning of public ministry?

These two verses (12-13) are full of allusion to a world we don’t inhabit, a world in which evil personified as Satan besets us, wild beasts surround us, and angels tend to our needs. But even if the symbolism is alien, the reality to which those symbols point is the same reality in which we live. We are tempted and struggle with sin and we do find solace in spiritual friendship and support. The terrors of the wilderness may be our despair and fear, our struggle with addictions, unemployment, even loss of faith. Jesus heard those amazing words, “You are my Son, my Beloved.” Those words must have sustained him throughout his trials in the desert, just as the words pronounced at our baptisms, “You are sealed by the Holy Spirit in baptism, and marked as Christ’s own forever,” should sustain us in our own wilderness sojourns.

 

 

 

Listen to him! A Sermon for the Last Sunday after Epiphany

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February 18, 2012

Today is the Last Sunday after Epiphany and always on this Sunday, we hear a version of this story, the Transfiguration. It serves as the final gospel reading in a season when we explore ways in which God is manifest in our world, especially ways in which we experience Jesus Christ. The season begins with the story of Jesus’ baptism, and this year we have heard stories that demonstrate the power of Jesus Christ, his healing of a possessed man, of a leper, and of Simon’s mother. Epiphany is a season when we look for and encounter Jesus Christ in the world around us, sometimes in surprising ways. Continue reading →

Anglican Covenant Roundup

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It seems the Anglican Communion Covenant is losing momentum. Arguments in favor are becoming increasingly shrill and unreasonable. Its popularity in dioceses (in various national churches) is quite low. Given General Synod’s rebuke to Archbishops Williams and Sentamu over women bishops, it would seem not even an appeal to the authority of the Archbishop of Canterbury will be able to sway the Church of England.

Our own General Convention will also be taking it up this summer, and I suspect many of the same arguments used to defend the covenant in England and elsewhere will be marshalled here. But to do  so would only play into the hands of those who see nefarious plots by bishops to consolidate power behind every bush.

Tobias Haller reports that two more English dioceses (Leicester and Salisbury) have voted no. According to his calculations that makes 5 voting in favor, 9 against. (Portsmouth has also voted no).

The eminent historian Diarmaid Macculloch is opposed. Marilyn McCord Adams has joined him as Patron of No Anglican Covenant. Giles Fraser also chimes in on the anti- side.

Peter Doll wrote an essay: doll.  It evoked all sorts of responses. From Jonathan Clatworthy. From Tobias Haller. Tobias again. Lionel Deimel weighed in.

Two CoE bishops demur.

Lenten Resources

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(Updated February 23, new links at the top)

Busted Halo’s online lenten calendar

Lots of resources and links from America

There are a number of wonderful Lenten resources on the internet, including daily reflections. I’ll be updating these from time to time.

From ERD (Episcopal Relief and Development)

From the Church of Ireland: A Lenten study on Economic Justice

From Episcopal Credo: my friend Michael Battle’s daily reflections for Lent

The Daily Office for your computer; and for your smartphone: St. Bede’s Breviary

From the Society of St. John the Evangelist:

Lent Madness from Tim Schenk and Scott Gunn. Here’s their description:

The format is straightforward: 32 saints are placed into a tournament-like single elimination bracket. Each pairing remains open for a set period of time and people vote for their favorite saint. 16 saints make it to the Round of the Saintly Sixteen; eight advance to the Round of the Elate Eight; four make it to the Final Four; two to the Championship; and the winner is awarded the coveted Golden Halo. The first round consists of basic biographical information about each of the 32 saints. Things get a bit more interesting in the subsequent rounds as we offer quotes and quirks, explore legends, and even move into the area of saintly kitsch.

What’s Wrong with the Episcopal Church?

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Jim Naughton asked the question over on the Episcopal Cafe. It’s a great question, that deserves careful reflection and response. And since I’m already in despair about the future of the Church, I’ll happily offer my response.

1) Structure and Governance. Now, I don’t think it’s necessarily our structure and governance that are the problem. Rather, I’m at the point where I wonder whether we are so interested in structure and governance that we lose sight of what really matters. This seems to be what’s recently taking place in debates over restructuring the church, and as Tobias Haller points out, the redefinition of “structure and governance” as “mission.” I wonder whether there’s something in the life-cycle of institutions that suggests when an institution begins debating restructuring intensely, it’s near the end of its useful life (see my previous post on GM and the Church).

2) What is our mission? This is an important question and it must be defined from within rather than over against other groups. The Episcopal Cafe recently posted something about an “elevator speech.” Here’s what the bureaucrats communicators want us to say about the Episcopal Church:

“For those looking for more meaning and deepened spirituality, The Episcopal Church offers honest and unconditional acceptance, which removes barriers to Jesus Christ and permits belonging to an authentic church community.”

I can’t imagine anyone hearing this message wanting to attend an Episcopal Church. I can’t imagine anyone who knows nothing about Christianity, wanting to learn more.

This sounds more like a recovery group than the body of Christ to me, and ignores any mention of the brokenness that I think is at the heart of human experience and which is restored by relationship with Jesus Christ.

I experience brokenness in myself, in my relationships with other humans and with God, in my embodied experience as an individual, and in my relationship with the created order. I see brokenness in the world around me and I see the pain and hurt that bring people to the altar where we encounter the broken body of Christ. We leave the table, and the liturgy, restored and empowered for mission.

If we and our churches are places where people can experience God’s grace in word and sacrament, can experience the embrace of Christ’s love, then we’ve got nothing to worry about, and there’s nothing wrong with us. But if all that we have to offer is baptized new-age gobbledygook and battles over structure and governance, we’ve got a similar future to the one awaiting Kodak.

Prophecy and Epiphany: Lectionary Reflections for the Last Sunday after Epiphany

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This week’s readings are here.

Although we’ve not paid close attention, one of the themes of our readings in this Season of Epiphany in year B is the nature of prophecy (both as an institution and as an event). We heard the very different stories of the calls of Samuel and Jonah on the Second and Third Sundays. The young boy Samuel needed help from Eli to discern that God was calling him. Jonah had no doubt that he was called by God, but he ran away from the call and resisted the message that God had given him to deliver. We also heard from Second Isaiah (on the Fourth Sunday after Epiphany), and Elisha’s healing of Naaman yesterday.

Among the stories of particular prophets about whom we heard, were also reflections on the nature of the prophetic office. A couple of weeks ago, the Hebrew Bible reading was Deuteronomy 18:15-20:

The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among your own people; you shall heed such a prophet. This is what you requested of the Lord your God at Horeb on the day of the assembly when you said: ‘If I hear the voice of the Lord my God any more, or ever again see this great fire, I will die.’ Then the Lord replied to me: ‘They are right in what they have said. I will raise up for them a prophet like you from among their own people; I will put my words in the mouth of the prophet, who shall speak to them everything that I command. Anyone who does not heed the words that the prophet shall speak in my name, I myself will hold accountable. But any prophet who speaks in the name of other gods, or who presumes to speak in my name a word that I have not commanded the prophet to speak—that prophet shall die.’

This is the heart of Hebrew prophecy: one who speaks the Word of God to the people. The model is Moses, who was a mediator between Yahweh and the Israelites, who both delivered the law and interpreted it. Earlier in the chapter, it’s made clear what prophecy is not: soothsaying, augury, divination. These are efforts to predict and control the future. But there’s more.  There is also a clear distinction between true and false prophecy: “Whoever speaks in the name of other gods, or who presumes to speak in my name a word I have not commanded them to speak–that prophet shall die.”

This raises the obvious question: How is one to know whether the word a prophet speaks comes from God? The following verses (Deut 18:21-22) ask and answer that question. If whatever is spoken doesn’t come to pass or prove true, then it comes from a false prophet. In other words, wait and see.

In this week’s reading from 2 Kings, we have the wonderful story of Elijah’s departure from earth and the passing of the mantle of prophecy from Elijah to Elisha. Often our focus is on the single prophet, the great hero who, like Elijah and Elisha, performed miracles, and stood alone against the monarchy and the prophets of Ba’al. There are also those solo prophets, Amos, Isaiah, and the like who were opposed by the monarchy and establishment and could rely only on the support of God.

This text shows a more complex institution, the “company of prophets” who seem connected in some way with the solo practitioners and are aware that Elijah is about to pass from the earth. They are curious and involved in the story, even when it’s clear that Elijah sometimes sees them as a nuisance. By the way, Elijah’s itinerary exactly imitates the itinerary of Joshua and the Israelites when they entered the promised land.

All of these readings encourage us to explore the nature of call and the nature of the prophetic message, the relationship of prophetic and other forms of authority. We tend to think of prophets as those who can predict the future, but in the Hebrew tradition, they were primarily interpreters of the law, the Torah, and sought to hold the monarchy and its people to divine standards, to create and maintain just relationships and just communities.

On the other hand, progressive Christians often emphasize the prophetic role of the religious leader or the community without examining the nature of the leader’s or community’s authority. There’s a seductive temptation to perceive oneself as a prophet and to interpret opposition to oneself or one’s message in terms of the opposition of an Israelite king or faithless people to God’s message. Call, authority, and divine message can only be discerned in community, and as Deuteronomy 18 suggests, one ought to approach one’s calling, and one’s message with a certain degree of humility, and uncertainty. I sometimes wonder whether there remains any utility whatever in seeing the church’s role (or that of its leaders) in terms of prophecy.

Why do companies fail–why do churches fail?

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Megan McArdle explores the first question with reference to GM. Here’s her conclusion:

Unfortunately, corporate culture is a sort of black box; from the outside, you can’t see what’s going on. You have to wait to see what emerges.

What we can say is that this time, we’re actually going to find out. GM has fixed basically every other problem that anyone could name: Instead of a $2,000-a-car cost disadvantage due in large part to legacy costs such as wages and retiree benefits, it now has a cost advantage. The eight marques that multi­plied the overhead and muddied the value propositions of its brands have been streamlined to four. The excess dealerships have been closed.

What’s left is culture. After everything, if GM begins losing market share again, we’ll know that it’s beyond saving. To paraphrase the old joke: “How many experts does it take to turn around a big company? Only one—but the company has to really want to change.”

There’s more on change in the Episcopal Church. A video featuring is subtitled “an adaptive moment” is available here.

Tobias Haller offers some insight and perspective on the video. He raises some important questions about mission–what we mean by it and says this:

It seems, therefore, odd to talk, as the presentation does, primarily about the national budget, while ignoring the billions of dollars raised and spent by the parishes — only alluded to in the presentation — when talking about the proportion of money spent on mission. The proportion of our “Gross Episcopal Product” spent on mission is substantial — as we have to include the salaries of the missioners, the maintenance of the places in which we worship, and so on. It is deadly dangerous, and verges on a kind of missionary gnosticism, to forget that the cost of running a parish is a crucial part of its mission. Seek economies, by all means, but let us not say to the foot, I have no need of you!

I’m intrigued by the comparison of the Episcopal Church with GM. We’ve already had comparisons with Kodak, but it seems to me that in the case of the auto industry the parallel is especially apt. The corporate hubris of both and the way in which people are indoctrinated in the corporate culture of each seem similar. And the way in which whenever talk about structure begins, the infighting begins as well. With GM, it was the fighting between management and the UAW; in the Episcopal Church, it’s the conflict between General Convention and the Presiding Bishop, or the House of Deputies and the House of Bishops.

 

Doom, Despair, and Agony on Me

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A little bit of excitement around here because for some strange reason a post of mine got picked up by the anti-Episcopal Church faction. I wrote the post out of my longstanding and growing disenchantment with Episcopal Church structures and the profound disconnect between what happens on the national level and life in parishes.

But the same thing is true of the blogosphere, especially when it comes to those most engaged in the conflcts over Anglicanism. I can only assume that there are parishes in which such issues are the focus of vibrant debate and conversation, but in my experience an issue like the relationship of the Episcopal Church to the Anglican Communion rarely rises to a level beyond intellectual curiosity. Many parishes are focused on survival; others are seeking ways to embody the gospel and to share it with their neighbors. Those that are riven by such conflict are very often victims of individuals (lay or clergy) or small groups for whom such things are matters of personal agendas.

The reality is that denominations are becoming less important for the life of Christians in America. Some of that trend may be due to actions taken by those institutions over the decades, but in fact those who would put the blame for decline in the Episcopal Church to its “revisionist” theology are going to have to rethink their arguments now that even the Southern Baptist Convention is beginning to report declining numbers. No one can claim the SBC to have a radical agenda (except for the anti-Calvinists).

No, we are living in a very different culture than the one that existed thirty or fifty, or a hundred years ago. Institutions across the board have lost their power. Individuals make meaning for themselves and are shaped by consumerism. Will Christianity in America go the way of Christianity in Europe? Perhaps, but I have my doubts about that. And even if it does, there is a deep religious yearning at the heart of every human being that can only find its rest in God. If churches can continue to feed souls, they will continue to thrive, no matter what happens to institutional structures.

Which brings me to my last point. One blog labeled me “one of the most vocally revisionist priests” when I was in the Diocese of Upper South Carolina. I will admit to being vocal, then and now, but revisionist? I doubt there are many priests in the Episcopal Church, or indeed in any of the breakaway Anglican groups, who are more thoroughly Augustinian in their theology than I.

 

More on young adults and the church

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Brandon J. O’Brien explores the religious views of 20-somethings in three posts at Out of Ur. Part 1; Part 2; Part 3.

O’Brien was teaching a World Religions course in a community college and gave his students writing assignments that explored their religious commitments, beliefs, and practices. He was sobered by what he read. Among his conclusions:

Very few of my students could identify any way religion might impact their daily lives, specifically their future personal and professional goals. Even the students who consider themselves committed Christians failed to recognize what difference their faith made, say, in their marriages or careers. They could point to superficial things—like wanting to be married in their church, which meant they had to marry a fellow Christian—but couldn’t go much deeper than that.

Skye Jethani read this posts and reflected, producing: Back to (a Theology of) Work We Go….

Interesting reflections on outreach to young adults, beginning with this premise:

Our religious lives, our communion with God and formation as his people, primarily plays out in two spheres of our lives–family and work. Our closest relationships (marriage, children, parents) are where we experience the joys and pains of life most acutely. They are where we practice, or fail to practice, love, patience, forgiveness, kindness, etc. So it would make sense that we utilize family relationships as a key context for discipleship–learning and applying the teachings of Christ.

The church has focused its efforts on the family, leaving vocation and work to the side. What does this mean for young adults who are delaying marriage? That we have nothing to say to what is the primary sphere in which they live and search for meaning:

We have not been trained or conditioned to consider a person’s vocation as a central part of their lives or spiritual formation. It is not a venue most churches value or equip their members for. But work is where most adults (young and old) spend most of their time and what occupies most of their identity. Without the ability to connect faith to either family or work, there is little remaining to engage young adults other than entertaining gatherings or a celebrity in the pulpit.

David Kinnaman of the Barna Group offers six reasons why young people leave the church. An interview with him on NPR.

I’ve got no clue on how to solve the problem, how to reach out to young adults, but it seems to me, that authenticity is key. We’ve got to be able to speak to them in a language they understand and relate to, and offer them relationships that are life-giving and transforming. What strikes me at Grace is that we don’t have trouble attracting young adults to our services. We have some difficulty getting them connected, but very often they do, even when we don’t make it particularly easy. Above all, we have to be open and welcoming, and allow them to set the terms for our relationship, not impose expectations on them.