The Remembered Past in U.S. History

Below are my "class notes" (essentially a brief description for parents of what we've done in class thus far) for the first quarter of U.S. History. They provide a brief peek into how I teach my course.

Our theme in United States History is "the Remembered Past." Throughout the year we consider not only what happened in the past, but also how we remember past events differently at different times. We began the year with a unit reflecting on the nature and limits of history as a discipline, which culminated in an imaginative exercise in the interpretation of evidence: "A Post-Apocalyptic Historical Archaeologist Reads Two Plays and a Packet." 

Our second unit, which we wrapped up last week, introduced us more concretely to U.S. history through a brief survey of the interactions and relations between European colonists and Native Americans. Along with a unit test, we also had a group debate reflecting upon our unit through the lens of historical memory in public memorials. Students were required to make a case for memorializing one of four opposing figures (assigned, not chosen): John Winthrop, Anne Hutchinson, "King Philip," or the colonial victims of "King Philip's War." In doing so we not only researched individual figures; we also discussed (without resolving the question) whether monuments ought primarily to be reflections of past history or present values. 

We now turn our attention to the Founding Era, where we will consider the intra-colonial debate over independence, read a colonial midwife's diary in order to reflect upon whose stories are worth telling, and evaluate the historical reliability of Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter, the text they are reading in American literature.

Earth & Altar

The clergy at All Saints Anglican -- primarily Fr. Sean McDermott, with yours truly in an assisting role -- have launched a website, Earth & Altar, dedicated to "Catholic Ressourcement for Anglicans." It is specifically intended as corporate formation for the Anglican Province of America, but we hope and expect it will be useful for others as well.

In particular, we've organized the site around parish resources related to Liturgy, Education, Spiritual Direction, and Community. For example, we have essays detailing our parish's Sacred Music and Arts Camp (aka "SMAC," aka our version of VBS), our parish Agape meal, how we do youth and adult education, etc. -- as well as links to resources related to the seven sacraments and other liturgical services. We also link to useful podcasts and blogs, and we are maintaining our own occasional blog as well.

For a helpful introduction, you can listen to and read about the plenary talks given at our diocesan synod by Fr. Sean and me here.

So far, I've contributed a paper on youth ministry at All Saints and written a few short blog posts including one that briefly reflects on the one-year lectionary (with a link to a podcast that goes more in-depth).

Most recently, I wrote an essay that considers avenues of fruitful theological reflection on sexuality beyond the old same-sex-marriage debate. Here's the introduction:

Is there any fruitful ground left for theological debate around sexuality? The answer at first seems a definitive "no." The denominational landscape of American Christianity has been rent asunder in the past half-century, most fundamentally over questions related to same-sex marriage — and rent so definitively that no common ground exists any longer. The warring camps, it seems, share no spaces or institutions in which — or even over which — to argue. Perhaps such ground never really existed anyway. The breakup of jurisdictions and denominations happened more through open power struggles than genuine intellectual dispute. These power struggles continue in some quarters, of course, but the theological question of same-sex marriage — specifically, whether or not the biblical vision of marriage can be modified to include the institution called "same-sex marriage" — seems rather played out. Continuing Anglicans in particular may be tempted to think that affirming the impossibility of same-sex marriage — and women’s ordination — sufficiently clarifies our theology of sexuality. 

As I read Wesley Hill's thoughtful review of Paul Griffiths's latest book, Christian Flesh, however, I was reminded of the various under-explored questions beyond the tired same-sex marriage debate. That debate has arguably obscured the distinctions and boundaries between sexual and non-sexual forms of human intimacy — for instance, the intimacy of a parent and child, between siblings, and among friends. Further, partisans on both sides have typically failed to think deeply enough about the nature of regeneration and redemption in relation to all forms of human sexuality.

Read the rest here.

Just a final note: I posted the essay under the category of "Clery Education," though I do think the questions considered are potentially meaningful for any theologically informed Christian.

Sermon for Trinity X

This past Sunday I preached and celebrated a Deacon's Mass (a Mass of the Presanctified Gifts) at St. Philip's Anglican Church in Blacksburg, covering for the inimitable Fr. Wade Miller. The sermon texts were 1 Corinthians 12:1f, and Luke 19:41f.

The text for the sermon comes from the epistle:

“There are diversities of gifts, but the same Spirit. There are differences of ministries, but the same Lord. And there are diversities of activities, but it is the same God who works all in all.”

St. Paul wrote 1 Corinthians to sort out serious problems in the church at Corinth, problems involving both moral scandal and bad theology. We learn in chapter 7 that the Corinthians had written St. Paul to ask him some questions, but in chapter 11 St. Paul also lets it slip that he has additional sources who have been informing him about the church’s scandals. Our epistle text, then, may be a response to a direct question from Corinth or to things St. Paul’s been hearing from other sources, but in either case, it is clear that the Corinthians are misusing their spiritual gifts.

The problem is not, however, the absence of gifts. Interestingly, St. Paul nowhere doubts the validity of the Corinthians’ spiritual gifts — he affirms them as genuine instantiations of the Holy Spirit’s work. Indeed, the church at Corinth seems full of spiritual gifts and power — but these gifts are being used not for the good of the Church but for self-aggrandizement, and they have created a culture of ingratitude and envy. It is chillingly ironic that spiritual gifts from God become the occasion for the primal Satanic sin of pride — but this is precisely what St. Paul means when he warns in 1 Corinthians 13 that, without love, prophecy becomes a noisy gong and mountain-moving faith amounts to nothing.

St. Paul reminds these Corinthians that, in an ultimate sense, no Christian is an individual but is rather a member of a Body, animated by a single Spirit, and defined by love. And, as our Collect and Gospel texts indicate, we learn to live this reality out in our lives by becoming, individually and corporately, a house of prayer.

Let’s turn to the Epistle text:

“Now concerning spiritual gifts, brethren, I do not want you to be ignorant.”

There’s an important nuance to the Greek here that gets lost in translation. The noun “gifts” is not actually present in the Greek. The word used is an adjectival noun, pneumatikon, which is literally “spiritual things.” It is not until verse four that St. Paul shifts from pneumatikon (“spiritual things”) to charismata, “gifts.” The root word of charismata is charis — which means grace. With this shift, St. Paul subtly reminds them that these “spiritual things,” which have become for them sources of pride and envy, are not their possession by right or by merit but by grace, as a gift. God’s gifts are only rightly enjoyed when the credit and glory that they bring passes through the recipient to the Divine Source of the gift.

St. Paul also reminds the Corinthians that spirituality per se is not enough, because not all spirits are of God. The Corinthians had been plenty “spiritual” before their conversion:

“You know that you were Gentiles, carried away to these dumb idols, however you were led. Therefore I make known to you that no one speaking by the Spirit of God calls Jesus accursed, and no one can say that Jesus is Lord except by the Holy Spirit.”

Being “carried away” in idolatry is probably a reference to ecstatic experiences in pagan worship. Those spiritual experiences may have been quite real, but they were not of God — and the test is whether a spiritual experience conforms to the Lordship of Jesus Christ. And, whereas in paganism a variety of spiritual experiences would have indicated a diversity of gods, St. Paul notes that the spiritual gifts of God, however diverse, all stem from one Spirit, one Triune God:

“There are diversities of gifts, but the same Spirit. There are differences of ministries, but the same Lord. And there are diversities of activities, but it is the same God who works all in all.”

Christian gifts, ministries, and activities communicate the grace of God to a dying world. In turn, Christians must constantly point the world back to Jesus Christ. In this way, we act as images and icons of Jesus, channels through which God both acts and receives glory and honor.

The Corinthians’s spiritual gifts were real, but they seized the praise stemming from these gifts for themselves. They became not icons of Christ but living idols. And as each Corinthian claimed the Creator’s glory for himself, the unity and complementarity of the Spirit’s work was obscured, and envy arose. Instead of working for the good of the whole and for the glory of God, the Corinthians sought their own glory and poisoned their community. Obviously, this is directly contrary to the very purpose of spiritual gifts!

“But the manifestation of the Spirit is given to each one for the profit of all.”

It is probably best not to try to read too much into the particular list of gifts which follow. In different places in this and other of his epistles, St. Paul varies his lists of spiritual gifts. They appear to be illustrative rather than exhaustive or systematically outlined. St. Paul’s focus in our text is not on the particular gifts themselves but rather the unity of one Spirit animating all of them. The remainder of 1 Corinthians 12 beyond our text describes the Church as Christ’s own Body, with each member of that Body providing a different function; with all functions harmonious, organic, and symbiotic; each crucial to the health and well-being of the whole Body. Every spiritual gift proceeds from “one and the same Spirit” at the Spirit’s discretion and “for the profit of all.”

That the Corinthians were able so to misuse the gifts the Spirit that they became occasions for destructive pride and envy is startling. Something like this Corinthian dynamic seems to be what our Lord had in mind when, in Matthew 7 (verses 21-23, ESV), he warned: “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven. Many will say to Me in that day, ‘Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?’ And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!’”

The antidote for this poisonous and apparently damnable pride is loving attention to the Body of Christ rather than selfish pursuit of our own ends. Our Gospel text teaches us how to do this.

Just as the Corinthians manipulated spiritual gifts for selfish ends, in our Gospel text we find that the Temple — God’s dwelling place with man — has become a “den of thieves.” Literally speaking, Jesus was decrying the profiteering that debased the sacrificial system in his day. But we know something Jesus’ original audience did not. The dwelling place of God with man was no longer the Temple complex in which Jesus stood but rather the very body of Jesus himself (see John 2:21). Moreover, as St. Paul explains throughout 1 Corinthians, Christ has consecrated the Church as his mystical Body, and by extension the very body of every Christian becomes at baptism a temple of the Holy Ghost (1 Cor. 6:19).

The Church fathers, therefore, rightly drew profound and sweeping theological conclusions from Jesus’ cleansing of the Temple. Indeed, the pairing of today’s Epistle and Gospel texts, which dates back to the fourth-century Lectionary of St. Jerome, was predicated on making this connection between the Temple of Luke’s Gospel and the Temple that is the Body of Christ. We must ensure that our Body — the Church corporate and each of our lives individually — does not become a den of thieves. We do so by making our Body instead a house of prayer.

Living prayerfully is the solution. St. John of Damascus defined prayer as the lifting up of the mind to God. This is exactly what the celebrant asks the people to do in the Sursum Corda: “Lift up your hearts.” “We live them up unto the Lord.” This is harder than it sounds. It requires not merely effort but also training and formation. First and foremost, this happens Eucharistically, as we feed on Christ’s sacramental Body and are thereby more fully united to his mystical Body. The common prayer of our liturgy — particularly Holy Communion and the Daily Office — teaches us how to pray as members of a Body. Even when I pray alone in my room, I pray to our Father and not my Father. Holy Eucharist and the Daily Office should be the basic building blocks of every house of prayer, but as we grow in spiritual discipline we should add contemplative, personal prayer, which helps us understand how our membership in Christ relates to each of our particular situations and circumstances.

In these ways, we learn how to consecrate our whole selves to Christ’s service, to bring all our gifts into right relation with our membership in Christ, and to live a filled life of humble love and ceaseless prayer.

“There are diversities of gifts, but the same Spirit. There are differences of ministries, but the same Lord. And there are diversities of activities, but it is the same God who works all in all.”

Teaching American History, Trusting Jesus

This is a "final reflections" email I sent to all my students after the conclusion of the semester. I know at least three (out of 65) actually read it, so I'll call that a teaching victory.

All,

This is the time of year I reflect on my teaching and think about, you know, the stuff I wish I'd done differently. So I'm gonna do that, and you're gonna read it. (Just kidding. You can go ahead and click that little trash can icon up there if you'd like.)

My major concerns always have to do with whether I've really upheld goodness, truth, and beauty for you to pursue. I'm not sure.

And part of the problem is that I simultaneously believe three things that are at least in tension with each other and may in fact be mutually exclusive:

1. The "American experiment in self-government" is rooted in some fundamentally good, true, and beautiful insights that are worth preserving and upholding.
2. Slavery and other forms of exploitation are inextricably interwoven into American history, such that it is hard to argue that there is any part of American history that hasn't been in some way affected.
3. And then a third, sort of out-there one: the Western liberal (using the term broadly) Enlightenment-based ideal of a value-neutral, religious-commitment-free space (on which the American experiment is based) is a lie. There are no religiously neutral spaces; the secular state is not a neutral arbiter of religion but is itself a combatant (and a dominantly successful one) in religious conflict. (See the attached argument from William Cavanaugh--come for the invigorating take on the falsely named "Wars of Religion"; stick around for the part where he compares American government to a mafia protection racket.)

My overriding conviction always is that the Church -- which, as St. Paul repeatedly says, is the Body of Christ -- is the one community that should "relativize" all others. That is, all other loves find their rightful place and expression as they are brought into relation with Jesus Christ. Apart from Jesus, all loves inevitably become disordered, distorted, and destructive. Anything you pursue to give your lives meaning, purpose, and happiness apart from Jesus will eventually crumble into ash.

So your duty as Americans is indeed to love your country, just as you should love your family and friends. The problem is never -- could never be -- too much love. But it can be disordered love. Or it can be hatred or selfishness falsely masked as love. (That's why "love is love" can only mean something if you know what "love" actually is...) So your overriding duty is to find what loving America looks like when it's brought into relation with the fundamental commandment to love Jesus.

And I should say that bringing things into relation with Jesus is not a matter of hard things becoming easy. The whole "God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life" line is true, so long as we remember that that "wonderful plan" might look quite a bit different than the wonderful plan we have for our own lives. Ten of the twelve disciples were martyred, after all.

The Christian life is cross-shaped. Jesus invites you into a real death to self, but it's through that dying to self that you find life -- and that, actually, you find yourself. The Collect for the Monday of Holy Week puts it well:

And that's the promise. You will suffer in this life, one way or another. Walking in the way of the cross means uniting your sufferings to Christ, who will never leave you nor forsake you (Heb. 13:5), so that when you suffer, you do so with hope and even, dare I say, joy (1 Thes. 4:13-18).

Best,

Fr. Perkins

Christ reigns from the tree

[I'll be preaching this brief homily for Morning Prayer this Good Friday in about twenty minutes.]


“Jesus, therefore, knowing all things that should come upon him, went forth, and said unto them, Whom seek ye? They answered him, Jesus of Nazareth. Jesus saith unto them, I am he.”

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This morning’s second lesson is packed with Old Testament allusions. We begin with Jesus crossing “over the brook Cedron.” This is the same river that King David crossed when he fled from his son Absalom’s rebellion in 2 Samuel (15:23). In fact the word translated as “brook” is a specific word for a river that only flowed during winter (the rainy season in Israel), and it’s precisely the same term used in the Greek translation of the account of David’s flight. In that Old Testament story, meanwhile, David’s close advisor Ahithophel betrays him and then eventually hangs himself — one of only two characters in the Bible to do so, the other being Judas Iscariot.

 The account of David’s flight is poignant: “David went up the ascent of the Mount of Olives, weeping as he went, with his head covered and walking barefoot; and all the people who were with him covered their heads and went up, weeping as they went” (2 Sam. 15:30, NRSV). Likewise, our Lord enters into the Garden of Gethsemane, which was an olive grove (Whitacre 425), where, the other Gospels tell us, he endured great agony as he anticipated his impending death (Luke 22:44; Matthew 26:38; Mark 14:34). It is there that he asked his disciples to pray one hour with him, there that they all failed. And it is that grievous hour in that garden that some of you even now reenact as you seek to enter into the suffering of our Lord in some small way.

John refers to this place of watching simply as “a garden.” He gives the same name to “the place where [Jesus] was crucified” and buried (19:41). Mary of Bethany will even mistake him for the gardener (20:15) — as indeed he is, the New Adam whose death reverses the curse wrought by the first gardener’s fall (1 Cor 15:22; Rom 5:14-18).

This morning’s first lesson provides us with another Old Testament foreshadowing of Christ. The Isaac who is nearly sacrificed and metaphorically brought back from the dead becomes the Christ, who truly dies and then becomes the “firstborn from the dead” (Col 1:18). Indeed, Jesus acts as both Abraham and Isaac, for he willingly offers himself up in obedience to God.

The account of David’s flight from Absalom arouses pity because in it David has become so pitiful — a sad, broken-down old man who must be roused to his own defense by his allies. And Absalom’s rebellion is implicitly presented as the consequence of David’s own sordid history of lust, murder, and parental neglect.


Evening Prayer today will emphasize that Jesus, by contrast, is an innocent sufferer whose suffering expunges the guilt of others. But as our reading from John makes clear, Jesus is not a passive or helpless victim.

Having eluded his opponents’ previous attempts to apprehend him before the appointed hour, Jesus now dictates when, where, and how he will be taken. His enemies come in full military force, but it is Jesus and not they who control the scene. He comes forth and interrogates them: “Whom seek ye?”

They answer “Jesus of Nazareth.” He responds, “I am he.” That last word, “he,” is grammatically implied but unstated in the Greek, so what Jesus has actually said is simply, “I AM.” This declaration of the divine name literally knocks the armed band clean over. They are, it seems, so rattled that Jesus has to prompt them again to say who they’re looking for, and they dumbly repeat the same name. Jesus then orders them — it is an imperative — to let his disciples go. Here and throughout his interactions with Pilate, the superficial powers of this world are belittled and diminished in the presence of true omnipotence.

Good Friday is tragic. Jesus’ death is the result of sin, and as Fr. Glenn recently reminded us, sin is no happy fault. It is grievous. The grim spectacle of our Lord upon the cross should fill us with deep sorrow for our sins which placed him there. And yet, throughout St. John’s Gospel, the cross is Christ’s glorification. The great Anglican theologian E. L. Mascall writes that in his obedience, Christ’s “divine dignity is not diminished but manifested; when he stands before Pilate, it is he, not Pilate, that is the judge; when he is nailed to the Cross, he is reigning from the tree.” As we grieve, therefore, let us also worship and adore our king, for whom the cross is at once torment and triumph.

“Jesus saith unto them, I am he.”

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On Politics and Disgust Sensitivity

Another (modified) excerpt from my Sent folder.

After having read the whole article (on alignment between political positions and "disgust sensitivity"), I do think that Alan Jacobs' point -- that liberalism is taken as the "baseline," and conservatism as the weird outlier that needs explanation -- seems evident from start to finish.

The article would read differently if the starting point was, "How come people with lower disgust sensitivity and less developed taste buds have a 'liberal ethos'?"

McAuliffe acknowledges the dual ways of reading the data towards the end:

If you’re liberal, you may be thinking, So this explains some of the other side’s nativism and hostility to immigration. But it’s just as easy to flip the science on its head and conclude, as conservatives might, that the left is composed of clueless naïfs whose rosy-eyed optimism about human nature—and obliviousness to various dangers—will only lead to trouble.

But the whole article nevertheless suggests a particular read on the data -- which you can see when, a couple paragraphs after that, she emphasizes the fundamental irrationality (or perhaps "sub-rational" operation) of disgust.

And, interestingly enough, it dovetails with a (conservative, anti-abortion) piece I recently revisited that was arguing for the (limited) moral value of gut-level disgust -- that we shouldn't just dismiss our revulsion but consider whether it might have some real meaning.

Sermon for Epiphany II

Last week I preached the sermon for Epiphany II on the beginning of St. Mark's Gospel, climaxing with Jesus' baptism by John. The baptism introduces us to Jesus in Mark, and in this way sets the tone for his entire ministry.

The Eastern Fathers reflect at length upon Christ’s baptism as a potent symbol of the Incarnation in all its paradoxical majesty and mystery. An Orthodox hymn for Epiphany notes that in Jesus’s baptism we see “The River of Joy… baptized in the stream” (The Festal Menaion, 295). The One through whom all water was made and in which all things subsist is himself submerged in muddy Jordan. How can this be?... 

Christ’s baptism is a particular act of humility. St. Matthew’s Gospel dwells on the inversion of Jesus being baptized by John. “I have need to be baptized of thee,” John protests, “and comest thou to me?” (Matt. 3:14). St. Mark’s compact account draws attention not so much to the incongruity between John and Jesus but rather to the startling nature of John’s baptism. John preached “the baptism of repentance for the remission of sins,” and it is this baptism to which Jesus submits, despite having no sins to remit. Thus, in his first act in Mark’s Gospel, Christ explicitly identifies himself with sinners. Later Jesus will describe his impending Passion as “the cup that I drink” and “the baptism with which I am baptized” (Mark 10:38-39, ESV). From the outset, he expresses a freely chosen solidarity with sinners, and this identification of the Sinless Christ with sinful humanity comes to its awful and glorious climax on the cross.

Christ's baptism also inaugurates sacramental baptism, and so it reveals not only who Christ is -- but also who we are:

...we should never forget that, in being baptized into Christ’s death, we are also, as St. Paul tells us, “risen with him through the faith of the operation of God, who hath raised him from the dead” (Col. 2:12). We share in his death and in his resurrection, and we indeed partake of his divine life (2 Pet. 1:4). 

At every baptism, the heavens are rent, the Spirit descends, and the voice of God speaks: 

“Thou art my beloved child, in whom I am well pleased.”

You can read (or hear) the whole thing.

Jesus' Baptism, Liturgical Language

A (lightly modified) excerpt from my Sent folder (head nod to Alan Jacobs): 

 In light of my sermon this Sunday, I'm looking at Orthodox liturgy for Epiphany (from The Festal Menaion translated by Kallistos Ware and Mother Mary) and its reflections on Jesus' baptism. Fascinating stuff:

"Make ready, O river Jordan: for behold, Christ our God draws near to be baptized by John, that He may crush with His divinity the invisible heads of the dragons in thy waters."

I have no idea what that really means -- the footnoted reference to Ps. 73:13 proves less than illuminating** -- but it's pretty cool. I sense a Marvel adaptation.

But anyway, in the Preface there's this explanation of the language of their translation, which fits what Martin Thornton says about liturgical language (perspicacious but elevated is the ideal, which, he says, makes Elizabethan English perhaps the perfect liturgical form):

So far as the general style of our translation is concerned, after much experimenting we decided to take as our model the language of the Authorized Version... This, we realize, is a controversial decision. Many of our readers will probably feel that, if the liturgical texts are to come alive for people today, they must be rendered in a more contemporary idiom. To this it must be answered that the Greek used in the canons and hymns that are here translated was never a 'contemporary' or 'spoken' language. The Byzantine hymnographers wrote in a liturgical style that was consciously 'artificial', even though it was never intentionally obscure or unintelligible. As we see it, the language of the Authorized Version is best adapted to convey the spirit of the original liturgical Greek.... For three centuries and more the Authorized Version, and along with it the Anglican Book of Common Prayer, have provided the words with which English-speaking peoples throughout the world have addressed God; and these two books have become a part not only of our literary but of our spiritual inheritance...

Fr. Mark

**Turns out the reference is to Ps. 74:14-15 (in the 1928 Psalter; in the ESV it's 74:13-14): "Thou didst divide the sea through thy power; thou brakest the heads of the dragons in the waters. Thou smotest the heads of leviathan in pieces, and gavest him to be meat for the people of the wilderness."

Double cool.

Advent IV Sermon: On Heaven

Today I preached for Advent IV -- on heaven, heavenly citizenship, and the bodily resurrection:

This heavenly citizenship — which is ours through membership in Christ’s Body, the Church — makes us a “peculiar people” (1 Peter 2:9, KJV). Every rival loyalty must be submitted to the surpassing reality of our incorporation into Christ (Gal. 3:28-29; 1 Cor. 12:13). But this relativizing of other loyalties does not mean their diminishment — quite the opposite! 

We love Jesus not by loving others less but precisely through loving them rightly. Saints Paul and Peter make it abundantly and repeatedly clear that loving your spouse, your children, and your parents, so far from being in conflict with heavenly citizenship, are in the fact the very ways in which we love Jesus. Romans 13 and 1 Peter 3 affirm that part of being a good Christian is being a good earthly citizen. These other loyalties are relativized not by being diminished but by being brought into right relation with our ultimate identity as members of the Church. 

Problems arise not when our love for family or country becomes too great but when our love is disordered. And in this fallen world, these other entities — family, country — can and inevitably will at times demand that they be your primary loyalty, that all things be made subject to them rather than to the Lord Jesus Christ.

Read (or listen to) the whole thing.

The Four Last Things

For Advent this year, the clergy at All Saints are following the medieval tradition of preaching on the Four Last Things (Death, Judgment, Hell, Heaven).

I. Death
I have already posted about Fr. Sean's beautiful sermon on death.

II. Judgment
Fr. Dan's sermon on Judgment is also compelling and worth your time. Some excerpts:

What is our end? Our end is simply wonderful and magnificent: to live in the presence of God forever and ever, world without end; to participate in the very life of God as his adopted children through the holy waters of Baptism; to become fully human; to learn and to grow in God's presence without ceasing forever and ever and ever and ever. 

For all divine judgment is rooted in this very first declaration of God: that his creation is very good. 

God’s judgment of Adam was really ultimately his divine means of grace and salvation for the human race.”

Listen to the whole thing!

III. Hell
And last week, Fr. Gene preached on "Lewis' conception of Hell as a mercy of God," ultimately concluding with the right combination of eschatological hope and epistemological humility:

There may come a time—and I believe Hell exists within the temporal creation—when all those in hell repent and accept the forgiveness freely offered by the Lord Jesus. However, the Church has not been vouchsafed with the revelation that this must come to pass. The possibility exists that the damned will cling to their rebellion forever, no matter how foolish or how horrible it seems. I do believe that it is acceptable to hope for and pray that all come to the beatific vision.

Read the whole thing.

IV. Heaven
I'll finish with a sermon on Heaven tomorrow.

As my rector wrote, “Now all the pressure is on you to top off the Advent series with an all encompassing, yet specifically attentively and responsibly executed sermon on the four last things while also gently pulling back the veil and exhibiting before our yearning eyes all that the Ancient of Days has prepared for those who love him!”

No pressure.

Advent Reflections on the Blessed Virgin Mary

Below is an excerpt from our family's Advent letter this year. Andrea and I wrote it together.

“…Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb.” - Luke 1:42

As parents we have found much to contemplate in the story of Mary, the mother of Jesus — in particular, her humble embrace of God’s calling and her diligent attentiveness to the work of the Holy Spirit. The angel Gabriel’s visit to Mary signaled the transformation of the world, but for Mary this also implied other, perhaps unwelcome implications — she surely knew she would endure humiliating rumors about Jesus’ paternity. And Mary’s last appearance in the Gospels is to stand at the foot of the cross and watch her son die (Jn. 19:26-27). Wouldn’t most of us take Gabriel’s proclamation as a death sentence? It meant the end of whatever expectations Mary might have had for her life. Yet she accepts her calling as God’s humble servant and embraces her cousin Elizabeth’s proclamation: “Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb!” (Lk. 1:42). Mary sees her place in the divine plan: “For, behold, from henceforth all generations shall call me blessed” (Lk. 1:48b).

Because she knows her true blessedness, she has eyes to see the Spirit at work in her life. Twice St. Luke tells us that Mary “treasured up all these things, pondering them in her heart” (2:19, 51). She treasures her experiences not merely for what they are in themselves but also for what they foreshadow: she sees what God is doing and joyfully anticipates what he will do.

To love and obey God is rarely convenient. It can be easy to see only the inconvenience. It sometimes looks as though there’s no divine plan at all — just a godless world going off the rails. Yet we know and we trust that God is at work in our lives through the Holy Spirit. We know, too, that with the advent of Jesus, God has inaugurated his kingdom. We look forward to the final restoration of all things. This is what Advent is about: remembering what God has already begun in Jesus and living in the light of the world to come.

Blessings this Advent.

A Sermon on Death

For Advent this year, the clergy at All Saints are following the medieval tradition of preaching on the Four Last Things (Death, Judgment, Hell, Heaven). I'll finish with a sermon on Heaven on December 23rd.

Fr. Sean started us off with a beautiful reflection on death this past Sunday:

If we read these two [temple] visits as parables of our own lives, then we are faced with two different responses to the advent of our death. We can be like Simeon, who prepares his life through prayer so that when Jesus comes to him, he recognizes who Jesus is and may die peacefully. Or, we can be fooled by the promises of the world like the masses of the people who can name Jesus, but do not recognize his true mission. Then, our temple is filled with thieves and liars, and we are no longer in communion with God. Jesus Christ is coming, awake your souls and prepare. Prepare your life in the knowledge of your coming death.

The whole thing is worth your time.

"The way of all flesh had crossed paths with the Word made flesh."

Fr. Glenn's sermon yesterday on the widow of Nain was beautiful and powerful. It is worth your time.

Luke makes a point of telling us that this death involved an only-begotten son. The mother was a widow who was now childless. She had no family left and she had become an “orphaned parent.” This passage bristles with emotion. Many people in the town shared in the widow’s grief as they gathered around her in mourning. Such mourning was seen as an act of love by one’s neighbors. This is the sad scene that greeted Jesus as he enters the little village. 

...what is absent from this account is the ever present, ever critical, Pharisee. But for the original audience, his touching of the bier was probably enough to bring back the contrast between Jesus’ love for people and the self-righteousness of those who had nothing to offer but the Law. The righteousness of God is not attained in its pursuit, holiness does not glory in itself — but rather as we follow Jesus in his love for others, the righteousness of God overcomes us.

Read the whole thing.

Collect for Easter Even

GRANT, O Lord, that as we are baptized into the death of thy blessed Son, our Saviour Jesus Christ, so by continual mortifying our corrupt affections we may be buried with him; and that through the grave, and gate of death, we may pass to our joyful resurrection; for his merits, who died, and was buried, and rose again for us, the same thy Son Jesus Christ our Lord, Amen.

"Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example, that ye should follow his steps."

[I am preaching this brief homily today, Good Friday, on the Second Lesson for Evening Prayer.]

“Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example, that ye should follow his steps.”

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The crucifixion of our Lord on Good Friday frees us from sin and death. When we are “baptized into his death,” as St. Paul says (Romans 6:3), we are transformed in our very being. His death accomplishes our regeneration, but it also provides an example for us to follow when we suffer unjustly in our own lives. In our second lesson today, St. Peter pulls together both effects of the cross: we are transferred from death to life, and we are given an example to follow.

The latter half of our text is explicitly directed to slaves—more specifically, household servants—but there are textual indications that St. Peter intended his advice to apply to all Christians as servants in the household of God. St. Peter calls upon these slaves—who, in context, seem to have pagan masters—to endure unjust suffering patiently, a teaching that was no doubt hard to swallow. But for St. Peter, patiently enduring is not about abstract morality but is, rather, part and parcel of a Christian’s obligation to imitate Jesus. Our text dramatically shifts from the mundane, grim particulars of the Christian slave's daily life to the transcendent reality of Christ's suffering. Why is the Christian slave—and, by implication, every Christian—called to endure unjust suffering? “Because,” St. Peter writes, “Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example, that ye should follow his steps.” As St. Augustine comments, “Christ taught you to suffer, and he did so by suffering himself.”

In the last few verses of our text, St. Peter draws heavily from the famous “suffering servant” passage of Isaiah 52-53, which is our first lesson today. As God’s suffering servant, Jesus “did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth.” Despite this, he in “his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree.” Note the tangible fleshiness of Jesus' sacrificial suffering—the cross is not simply an abstract spiritual battle between good and evil. It is physical, bodily torture. The language of “the tree” draws us back to the Old Testament. We learn in Deuteronomy that a man hanged on a tree for a crime “is cursed by God” (Deut. 21:21-23). The innocent sufferer Jesus is killed like a common criminal under a divine curse.

This profound theological reality undergirds St. Peter’s difficult instruction for day-to-day life. The household servants to whom he writes may be suffering unjustly, but they are, in a larger sense, not innocent of sin. The implication is clear: if he who was in the fullest sense innocent responded in this way, you who are not ought also so to do. “When he was reviled, [he] reviled not again; when he suffered, he threatened not; but committed himself to him that judgeth righteously.” Amidst the reviling of persecutors, Jesus' gaze was ever heavenward. This too should be our response to suffering.

At the end of our text, St. Peter points out that Jesus’ death is more than just a good example for us to follow—because his death is what transforms us. Unlike the suffering of saints and martyrs, Jesus’ death is what actually enables us to follow his example. Christ died “that we, being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness.” In this particular passage, St. Peter is less concerned with the eternal status of our salvation than he is with the earthly practicalities of right living before God. As one translation puts it, Jesus “bore our wrongdoings” so that “we, having abandoned wrongdoing, might live for doing what is right” (Elliott, Anchor Bible, 523).

Christ’s suffering on Good Friday gives us an example to follow—and it empowers us to follow him. 

 As the beautiful Collect for the Monday before Easter puts it,

“ALMIGHTY God, whose most dear Son went not up to joy but first he suffered pain, and entered not into glory before he was crucified; Mercifully grant that we, walking in the way of the cross, may find it none other than the way of life and peace; through the same thy Son Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.”

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"Take now thy son, thine only son Isaac, whom thou lovest"

[I preached this short homily last year on the First Lesson for Morning Prayer on Good Friday--the difficult story of Abraham and Isaac in Genesis 22.]

“And he said, Take now thy son, thine only son Isaac, whom thou lovest, and get thee into the land of Moriah; and offer him there for a burnt offering.”

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This story is rich with layers of meaning and symbol. Abraham provides us with a model of great faith. As one commenter notes, his faithful response has enabled many to accept the “incomprehensible, unendurable and contradictory and to reflect upon it” (Clemens Thoma). In this story we also find a prefiguration of Jesus as the sacrificial lamb, sacrificed for us on Good Friday. And as the writer of Hebrews notes, Isaac is figuratively brought back from the dead—a foreshadowing of Easter Sunday. On Good Friday our primary focus will rightly be on the sacrificial suffering of Jesus and on our own penitential and sorrowful response. But in light of this passage I would like to reflect briefly on one other symbolic layer of the story—Abraham as the father sacrificing his “only son.”

At first glance, the description of Isaac seems an error—Abraham had in fact two sons, Isaac and Ishmael. In the translation of Hebrew scholar Robert Alter, God tells Abraham, “Take, pray, your son, your only one, whom you love, Isaac.”

Alter comments, “The Hebrew syntactic chain [the order of the words] is exquisitely forged to carry a dramatic burden, and the sundry attempts of English translators from the King James Version to the present to rearrange it are misguided.” Alter then quotes from a medieval rabbi’s imaginative rendering of the scene: God says, ‘ “Your son.” [Abraham] said to Him, “I have two sons.” [God] said to him, “Your only one.” [Abraham] said, “This one is an only one to his mother and this one is an only one to his mother.” He said to him, “Whom you love.” He said to him, “I love both of them.” He said to him, “Isaac.” ’

Your son, your only one, whom you love, Isaac. These brief phrases reveal the unbearable weight of “God’s terrible imperative” to sacrifice his beloved son, the child of the promise.

God’s incomprehensible demand reminds me of the parable of the wicked tenants from Mark 12. In that parable, a distant landlord sends a servant to collect rent from tenants who instead beat the poor man. Jesus says, “And he sent another, and him they killed. And so with many others: some they beat, and some they killed. He had still one other, a beloved son. Finally he sent him to them, saying, ‘They will respect my son.’ ” Guess what: they don’t. I remember reading that not too long ago and immediately thinking, “What a very stupid landlord!” Of course, a moment’s reflection reveals that the landlord symbolizes God our Father who sent his Son into the world to be killed. So too does Abraham in our story prefigure the Father who will not withhold his Son.

What are we to make of this God, our Father?

Romans 8 gives us an answer. “What shall we then say to these things?… He that spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things? … Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? As it is written, For thy sake we are killed all the day long; we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter. Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us. For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

As we consider the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross, as we reflect on our sins for which he suffered and on our own terrible need for this Savior, let us also reflect upon the immeasurable love of the Father.

“He that spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things.”

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Sermon for Lent V

I preached for Lent V this past Sunday.

...while Jesus’ life story discloses God’s relation to creation, that relation is only understood by first grasping what went before. Our Lord’s narrative recapitulates Israel’s narrative. First, Jesus relives Israel’s wilderness wandering, and he reverses Adam’s failure by defeating the Tempter. Next, Jesus reveals his superiority to Moses by miraculously feeding the multitude. The Old Testament lesson for Morning Prayer this past Thursday recounted Pharaoh’s attempt to execute all male Hebrew babies—which foreshadows Herod’s attempt to kill Jesus by murdering all male babies around Bethlehem. But before Herod could lay hand on Jesus, the Holy Family took flight to Egypt, which reminds us of Israel’s sojourn there. 

This week’s gospel reading culminates in a startling claim: “Before Abraham was, I AM” (John 8:58). “I AM,” of course, refers to the Hebrew YHWH, the sacred name of the Lord God, who first bestowed upon himself that title in Exodus 3—tomorrow morning’s Old Testament lesson. 

These are the echoes of the Old Testament in just a few of our Lenten readings.... I’d urge all of you to revisit the felt-board stories of Sunday School. Be attentive to the Old Testament lessons in Morning and Evening Prayer. Because knowing Jesus means knowing his story, and his story is the story of Israel.

Read the rest here.

Dignity Doesn't Defeat Death

"Nothing Grandma did and nothing we do could overcome death. She faced death — and death took her."

Hour of Our Death just published a second article of mine--or, really, the second installment of two pieces taken from a larger essay I wrote for The Imaginative Conservative.

Read it here.

Read the first piece here.

An Advent Letter

Someone recently reminded me of the beautiful Advent letter my wife wrote for our family. Although we're now exiting Epiphany, I thought I'd share it anyway. In any case, Lent and Advent echo one other: seasons of both penance and hopeful expectation.

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Advent 2017

Dear friends and family,

The rhythm of this winter season is a welcome shift from the rest of the year. It feels like these short, dark days were especially made for reflection, prayer, wonder, and worship. And there is much for which we pray, wonder, and worship as we reflect upon this year.

We thank God for the life of our daughter, Greta Joyce, born August 10. Greta is doted on by an ever-loving, ever-present big sister who always wants to give just one more kiss or “bear hug.” Ruthie is two-and-a-half and currently loves reading, the cooing and gurgling sounds of “baby sis” (that send her into fits of laughter), and the phrase “no, I can’t!” (by which she means “no, I won’t!”). Greta, four months old, is sweet and good-natured. She has a smile that wrinkles her nose and makes her bright blue eyes sparkle. Parenting continues to be a wondrous and challenging experience—teaching us more about ourselves, each other, and about God than we ever imagined we could learn (grace upon grace)!

Mark continues to juggle the responsibilities of teaching and the pursuit of an online MA in Religion. Lord willing, he will be ordained to the diaconate in summer/fall 2018 with another year of classes to follow. The demands of this season have been so great that we don’t often spend time looking ahead to “what’s next.” It’s exciting to begin to talk, dream, and pray more about our next steps. We value your prayers as we continue to entrust ourselves to the Lord for a life in service to His body, the Church.

As we enter this Advent season, I (Andrea) have been reminded of the question in Ecclesiastes, “Is there anything of which it may be said, ‘See, this is new’?” (1:10). At any moment in our lives we can look around us and see things that dishearten, discourage, and frighten. The past year has certainly provided many examples—both locally and across the globe—of the darkness of “this present evil age” (Galatians 1:4). But, this is nothing new. “That which has been is what will be, that which is done is what will be done, and there is nothing new under the sun” (Eccl. 1:9). This is why the angelic proclamations surrounding our Lord’s birth are so earth-shattering and even frightening. They announce something entirely new, something long hoped for: salvation from this present age and the promise of an age to come. The incarnation upends “that which has been.” During these dark days of winter we rejoice that in the child Jesus all things are made new—and for his return we wait, hopeful and expectant, longing for creation to be fully healed, restored, and perfected.

Blessings this Advent,
Andrea and Mark

“And the angel said unto them, ‘Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord.’” - Luke 2:10-11

"You're Not Pregnant, Right?"

A newish website called Hour of Our Death: A Memento Mori Initiative published a short remembrance of my grandmother today titled, "You're Not Pregnant Right?"

Hour of Our Death is edited by David Mills, an editor (formerly of First Things and Touchstone), writer, and former professor at Trinity School for Ministry. I've never met David but have appreciated his writing from afar for years, so it's a privilege to be published by him.

The article published today is taken from the larger piece I wrote for The Imaginative Conservative a few years ago, a piece in which I quoted David Mills reflections on his father's death.

Anyway, this is the picture they chose to accompany the piece:



It took me a while to figure out why, but then I got a good laugh.

You can read it here.