Run and not go weary . . .together

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Rev. Molly F. James, PhD

St. James’s, West Hartford, CT

5th Sunday after Epiphany, February 4, 2024

Isaiah 40:21-31; Mark 1:29-39; Psalm 147:1-12, 21c

May God’s Word be spoken. May God’s Word be heard. May that point us to the living Word who is Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. 

Our reading from Isaiah ends with the lines: “but those who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength, they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.”

They shall run and not be weary? Really? I want to say, Isaiah, are you paying attention? Have you read the news headlines? Have you seen our calendars? Do you know that we still have not figured out what it means to have lived through a pandemic? Can’t you see that we are exhausted? From work, from school, from the stress and strain of all that we are supposed to be doing. Also, it’s February. It’s cold outside and the days are still short. It’s hard to be energetic when we can’t get enough sunshine.

And then I pause. I take a deep breath. I think about what I know of the world in Isaiah’s time. The plagues. The persecutions. The stress and strain of everyday life where you had to walk to get your water and there was no such thing as food security for anyone. Oh. Maybe instead of arguing with Isaiah, I should listen more deeply, because if he can talk about running and not being weary then maybe he really does know something. 

So, how could we keep going and not burn out? What is it that allows us to be capable of more than we think we are? Well, our faith, for sure. And there’s more to it than that. 

A story my brother told me kept coming back to me this week. In high school, he did a number of NOLS wilderness trips in the summers. One of his leaders told a story of leading a group in the tundra of Alaska. The leader was out ahead of the group. He came up over the crest of a hill to discover that he was only yards away from a mother grizzly bear and her cubs. He froze. He stood absolutely stock still. The mother bear rose up on her hind legs and stared. He thought: Well, this is it. Not sure how I can get out of this one. Then she returned to all fours and quietly walked away with her cubs. The leader was stunned. How could that possibly be? And then he turned around and realized that the entire group of 20 people had come up behind him. With their arrival instead of being a lone person far smaller than the bear, he had become something enormous that frightened the bear. 

I have held onto the image of that story for years and years now. Whenever I have had to go into a difficult situation, I have thought about who I am bringing with me. My family, my friends, my mentors, those people in my life who incarnate God’s love for me, whose wisdom has always helped me be grounded - sure of who God is and who I am. 

And if we turn to the Gospel for today, we see that Jesus is not doing his ministry alone either. He is with his disciples. He does his healing ministry with others. He sends them out two by two to minister on his behalf. Jesus takes time for himself, of course, but he does not stay on his own. He knows that success only comes with shared power and authority - with shared ministry. 

Oh. That. Not doing it all alone. Not thinking we are on our own to face this challenge or that crisis. Hmm. Maybe that is what Isaiah meant? We won’t grow weary as long as we stay connected to God and to each other. 

So, my friends, just in case you have been or are ever tempted to go ahead on your own like that NOLS leader, may I remind you that there truly is safety in numbers.  You might think you are just fine out on your own. I might think that too. I often have - usually with poor results. So may I recommend that whatever challenges lie ahead, you do not face them alone. Look around. See? You are surrounded by people who care about you and would drop everything to help. That’s what it means to be community. That’s what it means to be Church. We hold the faith for each other. We incarnate God’s love for you. This community is here. Day after day. Week after week to remind us that we are never alone. And we are beloved of God. Amen. 

Holding the Hope for each other

From Jimmy Fund Walk in Boston

Rev. Molly F. James, PhD

DFMS Noonday Prayer via Zoom

February 16, 2021

Psalm 85:7-13; Jonah 4:1-11;Luke 10:1-12

May God’s Word be spoken. May God’s Word be heard. May that point us to the living Word who is Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. 

I don’t know about you all, but I needed some Jonah this week. I love Jonah. I love Jonah because he is so human. I love Jonah because he gives us permission to be frustrated and angry. He gives us permission to get it wrong. To have our moments where our perspective and priorities can get mixed up. And ultimately, I love Jonah because his story reminds us of God’s abiding grace and faithfulness. It reminds us that the whole thing is bigger than we are, and oh right, it is not all about us. 

I especially love our passage for today, where Jonah gets all worked up about the bush. He tethers his emotions and his well-being to the state of the bush. When it is great, he is happy. When it withers, he is angry. That clicked for me this week. I realized I have found myself tethering my emotions to external forces. What are the graphs for CT and NY doing? How’s the vaccine supply? Who has predictions about when we might be able to do this, that, or the other thing in person? What is our government doing to combat injustice? Are the myriad of challenges we face as a nation and a world actually being addressed right now? It is a roller coaster. I am exhausted, and it is not helping my well-being. 

Just like Jonah, I needed a reminder that this whole thing is bigger than me. I needed the reminder that I am not actually in charge. If I tether my well-being to external outcomes, I am going to be stuck on a roller coaster. I don’t want to be stuck on a roller coaster. That sent me looking for a different way of being, and helped me remember the distinction Archbishop Desmond Tutu makes between hope and optimism. It is worth quoting him at length. The Archbishop says:

“Hope is quite different from optimism, which is more superficial and liable to become pessimism when the circumstances change. Hope is something much deeper . . . I say to people that I’m not an optimist, because that, in a sense that depends on feelings more than actual reality. We feel optimistic, or we feel pessimistic. Now hope is different in that it is based not on the ephemerality of feelings but on the firm ground of conviction. I believe with a steadfast faith that there can never be a situation that is utterly, totally hopeless. Hope is deeper and very, very close to unshakeable. It’s in the pit of your tummy. It’s not in your head . . . Resignation and cynicism are easier, more self-soothing postures that do not require the raw vulnerability and tragic risk of hope. To choose hope is to step firmly forward into the howling wind, baring one’s chest to the elements, knowing that, in time the storm will pass.” (Book of Joy, p. 121-2.)

I find that to be a powerful image and distinction. An important reminder to keep ourselves grounded in that which is deeper than circumstances or outcomes. I am also glad that the Archbishop does not end his description there, seeming to imply that to be a person of hope is to be standing alone against the storm.

He goes on to say that “Hope is the antidote to despair . . . Hope is also nurtured by relationship, by community, whether that community is a literal one or one fashioned from the long memory of human striving, whose membership includes Ghandi, King, Mandela, and countless others. Despair turns us inward. Hope sends us into the arms of others.” (Book of Joy, p. 123.)

So if you have had any roller coaster moments this week, or if you feel like Jonah in the coming days, remember the wisdom of the Archbishop, ground yourselves in hope. And on the days where you feel grounded, keep yourself firmly planted so that you may be the arms to receive others. 

There is a very, very long list of why I am grateful for this gathered community and the ways it has sustained me over the course of this year. Perhaps one of the most beautiful gifts you all have given, that we all give each other, is to nurture hope for each other. That is Church at its best, when we can hold the faith for each other, when we can provide sustenance in the midst of spiritual deserts, when we can support and uphold each other. When simply our gathered presence proclaims the beauty of God’s Word, the depth of God’s love and the conviction that the Truth does not change -love and life always triumph -  no matter what the state of the world is. Thank you for that gift, dear friends. Amen. 

Rethinking Independence Day

NYC street

Rev. Molly F. James

DFMS Noonday Prayer via Zoom

July 2, 2020 (Propers for Independence Day)

May God’s Word be spoken. May God’s Word be heard. And may that point us to the living Word who is Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

If any of you are friends with Byron Rushing on Facebook or are members of the big Episcopal groups on Facebook, you know that he makes an annual reminder during this week of the year that we ought to think carefully about how we pray on Independence Day. If you look at the Collect for today, it talks about the founders winning freedom for “us.”

It says, “Lord God Almighty, in whose Name the founders of this country won liberty for themselves and for us, and lit the torch of freedom for nations then unborn: Grant that we and all the people of this land may have grace to maintain our liberties in righteousness and peace; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.  Amen.”

Byron rightly reminds us that the Collect seems to just gloss over and skip the fact that when the founders won liberty, there was a huge portion of the population who were still in bondage. The Collect neglects to mention the fact that at the same time those “founders” won their freedom from England, they also decided that every slave in America only counted as ⅗ of a person. That fraction ought to horrify us. There is no way to spin that to make it okay. No way to say, “Well, what they meant was . . .” Think back to your basic math lessons or when you use a measuring cup in cooking. There is no way that ⅗ is equal to one whole. No way whatsoever. 

But actually keeping our focus on condemning our founders for their inadequate actions by our standards is not helpful. It is not helpful, because we cannot go back and rewrite history. And even more so, it is not helpful because it makes it easy for us to focus on the failings of the past, rather than the problems of the present. If we focus on the past, we might even try to pretend that the realities of freedom and liberty have been won, and there is no work for us to do now.

Well, my friends, if any of us who are white had fooled ourselves into thinking that the realities of liberty and freedom that we know so well were indeed universal among American citizens, I don’t know how we could still think that. The events of recent weeks have shown us that the “progress” of the Civil Rights era or the fact that a black man has held the highest office in the land do not mean that our work is done. Not at all. The truth has been laid bare that we have so far to go. We can see how we have failed, and we can see how much work we have ahead of us. 

So what do we do with this reality as we remember Independence Day this year? It is worth noting that Independence Day is not just a secular, national holiday. It is also a Church holiday. 

This is because the founding of this nation and the founding of the Episcopal Church are inextricably linked. As the American Colonies fought and declared independence from Britain, so too did our Church. In fact, many of the democratic principles that govern our own national government - the principle of checks and balances, the principle of elected leadership, the principle that says the average person gets to have a say in how they are governed - are all principles that our also present in the Constitution and rules that govern the Episcopal Church.  Just the way that no one gets to be a Senator or President without a lot of people thinking its a good idea - neither does someone get to be a bishop in the Episcopal Church without a lot of people thinking it is a good idea!  The democratic ideals held sacred by the founders were also enshrined in the governance of the Episcopal Church. 

I wonder if we might find some hope in those principles and ideals. While we who represent the power and privilege of institutions and structures that have perpetuated the realities of white privilege have to repent of the past and chart a new course for the present and the future, that course does not mean condemning all that has come before us. The principles that guide the governance of our Church (and our nation) are holy and good ones. The problem is not with the principles themselves, it is that we have failed to ensure that they are universally applied.

There is a lesson for us in all of this.  Not only are we to hold on to the love of freedom and liberty that lies at the core of this nation and our Church.  We are to hold on to the call - in our history and in our faith - to never weary of doing what is right.  We do not shy away from speaking the Truth or from speaking up and amplifying the voices of those who have spent far too long on the margins of our Church and our society. If we encounter resistance, we do not give up.  We shake the dust off our feet, and we move on.  We keep on trying.  We keep on speaking up until the message is heard. 

Those immortal words about the God given rights of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness were penned 244 years ago, and we know that there are still many places in our Church, in our communities, in our country, and in our world, where the light of liberty does not shine.  Far too many voices have gone unheard by those in power.  We cannot keep silent, and we cannot grow weary.  We are asked to do what is right.  We are asked to stand up for what we believe in - even in the face of any adversity.  We are asked to speak up when we see injustice. We are asked to notice who is not at the table where important decisions are made and how we might change that reality.  This may mean taking political action to work for a cause that is dear to your heart and our faith.  It may mean big and loud actions.  But it may also mean the simple act of not being afraid to speak up when someone makes a comment that is insulting to another person or group.  Being a voice for freedom, for liberty, for justice doesn’t necessarily have to mean speaking to a national audience.  There is great value in remembering and reminding others that we Christians are called to seek and serve Christ in all persons.  The principle of equality that is a part of this nation is also at the heart of our faith. 

So as we celebrate Independence Day, may we honor the principles we have inherited, and commit ourselves to using the gifts we have been given to work toward ensuring that the ideals of freedom and liberty are not limited to the few, but universally applied to all people. May we use our voice and whatever power we have to build a future that realizes God’s dream, God’s kingdom for all.  AMEN. 

Reflecting on St. Augustine

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Rev. Molly F. James, PhD

Feast of St. Augustine, August 29, 2019 

Chapel of Our Lord, Episcopal Church Center

Psalm 87; Hebrews 12:22-29 ; John 14:6-15

May God’s Word be spoken. May God’s Word be heard. May that point us to the living Word who is Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. 

Today is the feast of St. Augustine. I have a complicated relationship with Augustine. Hopefully I am not the only one. I have deep respect for him and find much of his writing to be insightful and thought provoking. I also have some challenges with some of his doctrines. First the good stuff.

Even if you don’t know much about the details of the life of St. Augustine, you probably know much his thought. He is a foundational figure in Western Christianity. We owe him a debt for articulating well so many of the important beliefs and doctrines of our faith tradition. It is from Augustine that we get our understanding that a sacrament is an outward and visible sign of an inward and spiritual grace. He so simply and beautifully articulates the truth of our experience, of our belief that when we gather around this table to share bread and wine there is more going on than baked wheat and fermented grape juice. There is something real, powerful, and meaningful happening here. God is present in a miraculous and tangible way. Along with that Augustine also articulates for us the belief that it is God in the Holy Spirit here that make the bread and the wine into the real presence of Christ. It is not about me as the priest. I am merely the conduit for God’s grace. 

This was particularly important in Augustine’s time, because there was a controversy with the Donatists about whether it was the holiness of people that made the Church holy or whether the Church was holy because it belonged to God. Thankfully, Augustine’s view one out. Neither the holiness of the Church nor the validity of the sacraments depends on us. What a relief. It is not up to us alone. God shows up here in our worship no matter what kind of day we are having. If we are on top of our game and getting everything right, God is here. If we have failed five times before breakfast and really wishing we could just start over, God is here. It is not up to us or how well we are doing at living up to our goals as a follower of Jesus today. 

Augustine’s willingness to own the frailty of being human is one of the things I so appreciate about him. He is aware of how small we humans are in the grand scheme of things and how big God is. There is comfort in that. As Augustine writes at the beginning of his autobiography, Confessions: our hearts are restless until them come to rest in God. We cannot do it all on our own. We will be restless until we put our trust and faith in God. We will be restless until we rest in God. As it says in one of the prayers in the Compline service in the BCP, which asks that “we who are wearied by the changes and chances of this world may rest in your eternal changelessness.” [p. 133]

In his book, Confessions, Augustine tells a story of his teenage years in which he and a group of friends snuck into an orchard and stole a bunch of pears. They stole more than they could possibly eat, not because they were good pears, but simply for the joy of thieving. While most of us probably do not relate to the joy of actually stealing something, we can certainly relate to the way in which we can give into the temptation to do something we know we should not, just because it feels good. Just one more way Augustine owns up to the frailty and challenges of being human. 

My difficulties with Augustine come in the fact that at times he took the frailty of humanity too far. Augustine is known for a strong doctrine of original sin, the belief that we are born sinful. And it is a doctrine which the Church embraced for centuries until the Reformation. This doctrine taken to its extreme ends up promoting a negative view of our bodies, particularly female bodies, and of human intimacy. 

Since Augustine had such a willingness to own up to the reality of human frailty, I am hoping we can chalk that problematic theology about sex and our bodies to his humanity without tossing out all the good stuff in his theology. 

Ultimately, I hope Augustine’s emphasis on the enormity of God, of God’s goodness, God’s grace and the fact that God’s presence and God’s love are with us no matter how virtuous or successful a day we are having. I hope that is the message that you carry with you from our celebration of Augustine today. God’s grace is present in our lives, and we don’t have to do anything to earn it. Thanks be to God. AMEN.