Adopted

“God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons.”  Galatians 4:4-5

We do not know the name of Saint Paul’s father.  This may strike you as trivial, a trick question for the daily double on Bible Jeopardy, but I think there’s deep theological significance in this important omission.

We know a great deal about Saint Paul, because he intertwines bits of his biography into his teaching.  Scholars can date his missionary journeys down to the month, and he names dozens of his friends and associates scattered around the Mediterranean world.  He tells us that he came from the city of Tarsus, that before he met Jesus he was a member of the Pharisee sect within Judaism.  We know that Saint Paul’s father came from the ancient tribe of Benjamin, and that he was a Roman citizen, a fairly unusual fact for Jew of this time, and a fact on which the drama of his son’s later life turned.

But Saint Paul never names him.  In that respect he is unlike almost every major figure in the Old Testament. 

Ponder: "whatever you are drawn to in following God's will"

"A brother asked a hermit, “Tell me something good that I may do it and live by it.” The hermit said, “God alone knows what is good. But I have heard that one of the hermits asked the great Nesteros, who was a friend of Antony, ‘What good work shall I do?’ and he replied, ‘Surely all works please God equally? Scripture says, Abraham was hospitable and God was with him; Elijah loved quiet and God was with him; David was humble and God was with him.’ So whatever you find you are drawn to in following God’s will, do it and let your heart be at peace."
From the Sayings of the Desert Fathers, qtd. in Stephen Freeman, "Having then Gifts Differing."  (2010)

A Little Bird Told Me

“We hear them telling in our own tongues the mighty works of God."  Acts 2:11

“A little bird told me”—that was one of my grandmother’s favorite phrases.  My grandparents lived a mile down the road from us, and many an evening she and Pap would come over after supper.  She usually brought “guess packages”—paper bags with some crackers or cookies, maybe even a bottle of pop—things my mother rarely bought.  Before we could put in our guesses and win the prize, she wanted a little chat.  Small boys, especially when distracted by the prospect of a cookie, are not very conversational, and she would prompt us a bit: “a little bird told me that someone had two base hits last night.” “A little bird told me that someone threw a fit about taking out the garbage.”

Of course, we all knew well that my mother was the “little bird,” and I probably thought that “little bird” was a special nickname for my mother at first.  But it’s an old saying, though I don’t hear it much anymore.  I have a source of secret knowledge, it means.  You don’t need to know how I learned it, but I know something important about you. 

It’s quite a strange phrase, really—talking birds revealing hidden messages.   Some folklorists attribute it to an ancient tale about King Solomon, and there’s also an obscure Norse legend about a hero who tastes dragon’s blood and can immediately comprehend the speech of the birds—it turns up in the second act of one of Wagner’s operas.  The phrase definitely predates Twitter, though.  Most scholars attribute it to an offhand remark in the Biblical book of Ecclesiastes, which warns against cursing the king in your bedchamber, lest “a bird on the wing report what you say.[1]” 

And with thy Spirit

The substitute priest, so the story goes, was leading the service in an unfamiliar church.  The microphone didn’t seem to be working right, so he paused, looked down toward the contraption and asked, "Is this thing on?"

Hearing no response, he fiddled with the buttons, finally shouting, "Something is wrong with this mic!" In unison, the congregation replies: "And also with you!"

The joke, of course, is based on a truism that regular Sunday worshipers will know well.  If the priest turns to say something to you and you’re not quite sure how to answer, the right response is usually “and also with you”--or maybe, at Saint Francis, “and with thy spirit.”

Right Place, Right Time, Missing the Point

Roger was lounging in the lobby as I checked into the Hotel Sandy, a cheap hostel just down the street from Rome’s Termini Station.  It was nearly suppertime, and he was yawning and stretching, as if he’d just woken up.  I asked him if he knew where to find a good pizza, and in a high-pitched New Zealand accent, he said he knew just the place if he could come with me. 

We were unlikely dining companions: me, an earnest theology student, making my rounds of the shrines and ancient ruins; Roger, an accomplished carouser, wandering from club to club until the break of dawn.  He woke up just in time for supper.  But somehow, it worked.  For five days, every evening we’d meet again in the lobby and head out for pasta, and share what we’d been discovering in the Eternal City.

The fourth night, Roger announced he would be leaving soon, and wanted some advice on what he really needed to see.  His pious Catholic grandmother had suggested Rome, it seems, hoping it might nudge him a bit in the right direction, and he didn’t want to turn up in her parlor entirely empty-handed. 

 He needed to see the Sistine Chapel, I insisted. 

Ponder: "mission is an expression of Pentecost"

"Without the Spirit, God is far away, Christ belongs in the past, the gospel is a dead letter, the church is a mere organisation, mission is turned into propaganda.  But in the Spirit, God is near, the risen Christ is present with us here and now, the Gospel is the power of life, the church signifies Trinitarian communion, mission is an expression of Pentecost."

Ignatios IV, qtd. in Graham Tomlin, "The Prodigal Spirit and Church Growth" in Towards a Theology of Church Growth (2015), 142.

Ponder: a true pneumatologia crucis

"This is the paradox of divine love, a true pneumatologia crucis.  To invoke the Spirit, praying the prayer, 'Come Holy Spirit' is a wonderful, but perhaps also a sombre thing to do.  It is wonderful because it asks God to draw us into the same relationship of love that Jesus had with the Father.  It is sombre because it is asking God to draw us into the same relationship Jesus had with the world, which led him to a cross."

Graham Tomlin, "The Prodigal Spirit and Church Growth," in Towards a Theology of Church Growth (2015), 135.

For Meditation: "let the doors of glory be unlocked"

"Let the gate of light be opened and the doors of glory unlocked and the curtain before the face of the Father be withdrawn, and let the Lamb of God descend and sit on this holy table prepared before me, thy servant.  Let 'Melos' the fearful sword of fire [the Holy Spirit] be sent and appear over this bread and cup to fulfil this offering."

Epiklesis, (Ethiopian) Anaphora of St. Jacob of Serug, qtd. in Brian Spinks, "Do This in Remembrance of Me," (2013) 180.

Ponder: "The Woman gave me, and I did eat"

When the Spirit descended in tongues of fire, it was to make the waiting group into the mystical Body of Christ in a way analogous to that in which the descent of the Spirit upon Mary at her Annunciation had formed the natural body of Christ in her womb. Nevertheless, although the Mystical Body came into being by this new descent of the Spirit, there was not a new incarnation, Christ was not becoming man a second time, he was not assuming a new nature; the human nature which he had taken from his mother, in which he had died for our sins and risen again for our justification, was being made present under a new mode. There are not, strictly speaking, two bodies of Christ, a natural and a mystical, but one body of Christ which is manifested in two forms.

Nor does the story end here, for that part of the Mystical Body which is on earth needs to be continually nourished and sustained, as Christ’s natural body did before its glorification. It is through the Eucharistic Body of the Blessed Sacrament that this takes place. Here again, there is not a new incarnation, but in the Eucharist the human nature which Christ took from his mother is made present in yet another form, a form through which that part of the Mystical Body which is still in via on earth is repeatedly sustained and renewed.

Presence and Power

“You know him, because he abides with you and will be in you.”  St. John 14:17

My late father had a personality that could fill a room.  We come from a family of storytellers, of gregarious men.  But Dad was unusually gifted. He worked for years as a hardware salesman, which helped him learn to feel comfortable relating to many different kinds of people, and finding just the right topic for small talk.  It made me smile to watch what would happen when he walked into a family reunion, a wedding reception or coffee hour after church.  People would immediately walk in his direction, smiles would break out, the room would grow louder and more animated as people began to speak up. 

Some people have this kind of social pull because they have to be center of attention. They dominate conversation and cultivate eccentricities that make them stand out.  But aside from being able to tell a joke really well, there wasn’t much that stood out in the way dad presented himself to others.  He didn’t interrupt or compel, but was genuinely interested in other people.  He was able to draw them toward others, to bring out what was best in people.  You might say that his presence lifted everyone else, that he infused a kind of power into gatherings that made them altogether different than they would be without him. 

True Power and the Test of Ambition

“And the devil said to him, “To you I will give their glory and all this authority; for it has been given over to me, and I give it to anyone I please.  If you, then, will worship me, it will all be yours.  St. Luke 4:6-7

 “If anything unites America in this fractious moment,” says the New York Times’ David Brooks in a recent column, it is a widespread sentiment that power is somewhere other than where you are.”[1]  “The Republican establishment thinks the grass roots have the power,” he continues, “but the grass roots think the reverse. The unions think the corporations have the power but the corporations think the start-ups do. Regulators think Wall Street has the power but Wall Street thinks the regulators do.”  He goes on to cite a recent Pew study which asked Americans, “Would you say your side has been winning or losing more?” Sixty-four percent of us, majorities of both parties, believe our side has been losing more.

People respond to this feeling of powerlessness, Brooks says, with “pointless acts of self-destruction.”  When we believe we have no power, compromise is suspicious.  If we believe we have no power, utopian dreams seem the only possible escape.  If we have no power, we must get behind the one who promises to “start winning again,” no matter what real abilities he might have to keep his promise.   This sense of powerlessness, Brooks says, is very dangerous in a political system like ours, which attempts to draw together a deeply diverse society through common citizenship and shared institutions. 

Ponder: "the binding is love"

"All of us here need a body that is mutually supportive, that loves one another, that stoops to lift the fallen and kneels to bind the wounds of the injured. Without each other we are deeply weakened, because we have a mission that is only sustainable when we conform to the image of Christ, which is first to love one another. The idea is often put forward that truth and unity are in conflict, or in tension. That is not true. Disunity presents to the world an untrue image of Jesus Christ. Lack of truth corrodes and destroys unity. They are bound together, but the binding is love. In a world of war, of rapid communications, of instant hearing and misunderstanding where the response is only hatred and separation, the Holy Spirit whose creative and sustaining gifting of the church is done in diversity, demands that diversity of history, culture, gift, vision be expressed in a unity of love. That is what a Spirit filled church looks like."

Archbishop Justin Welby, Archbishop's Address to the Primates' Meeting, 11 Jan. 2016.

For Meditation: Fire and Spirit

In Your Bread there is hidden the Spirit who is not consumed, in Your Wine there dwells the fire that is not drunk: the Spirit is in Your Bread, the Fire in Your Wine--a manifest wonder, that our lips have received.  

To the angels who are spiritual Abraham brought food for the body, and they ate.  The new miracle is that our mighty Lord has given to bodily man fire and Spirit to eat and to drink. 

See, Fire and Spirit are in the womb of her who bore you, see, Fire and Spirit are in the river in which you were baptized.  Fire and Spirit are in our baptismal font, in the Bread and Cup are Fire and Holy Spirit.

Ephrem the Syrian, qtd. in Bryan Spinks, Do This In Remembrance of Me.  (2013), 80. 

Commentary: Four Books of Contemporary Liturgical Theology

From The Living Church, Sept 20, 2015

Within Christ’s sadly fractured body, it has been some consolation for the past few generations that at least the liturgists could sing from the same hymnal.  The convictions and priorities of the Liturgical Movement have reshaped the Sunday gatherings of most Christians across the Western world, drawing us together through the use of shared texts, calendars and lectionaries, as well as a common emphasis on active lay participation. 

The Second Vatican Council’s liturgical reforms reclaimed the centrality of baptism, simplified ceremonial and symbolism and exalted early Christian liturgies as a model for contemporary use.  The Roman Catholic Church’s revised liturgies, which debuted fifty years ago decisively shaped a wave of new liturgical resources throughout mainline Protestantism, including the Episcopal Church’s Book of Common Prayer (1979).  With perhaps the sole exception of biblical studies among the other theological disciplines, liturgical scholars have been educated together and continued in dialogue across confessional borders, working together to institute change within their respective church bodies. 

But that longstanding consensus is clearly beginning to fray.  The grand promises about reformed liturgy’s capacity to reenergize Christian mission and catechesis have worn thin in the advancing days of secularism.  Historical scholarship has undermined earlier confidence about unified patterns of liturgy within the early Church.  Texts, music, and aesthetic idioms that were exciting and innovative 50 years ago now largely seem banal and gauche.   Roman Catholicism’s most recent liturgical developments have been oriented toward reclaiming Latinity, while mainline Protestants have consistently pushed the envelope in the direction of inclusivity, stressing pastoral concerns.  Evangelicalism’s relative growth has popularized casual and emotive forms of worship untouched by the Liturgical Movement’s influence.  

"Holy Ghost, Come Down!": A Sermon for Pentecost

“I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh.”  Acts 2:17

The story is told of a travelling evangelist who made the circuit of little Southern towns a few generations ago.  A dramatic preacher, he knew just how to bring the crowd to their knees.  His great method was to call out, at the height of his sermon, “Holy Ghost, come down.”  He had conveniently stationed a little boy up in the rafters with a dove in a cage, and at that signal, the boy would open the cage, and the dove would flutter down upon the assembled congregation.  

Well, the preacher had made the customary arrangements one sweltering Sunday evening in June, and when he had his crowd just where he wanted them, he shouted out, “Holy Ghost, come down.”  There was silence.  Again, “Holy Ghost, come down.”  The preacher cleared his throat and glanced nervously toward the ceiling, and—“Holy Ghost, come down.”  Finally, a little voice chimed from the balcony, “The yaller cat done ‘et the Holy Ghost.  Shall I throw the yaller cat down?”

While He Was Blessing Them--A Sermon for Ascension Day

“While he was blessing them, he withdrew from them and was carried up into heaven”St. Luke 24:51
In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.
            We remember last looks.  The last time we see an old friend in the hospital before his death, smiling faintly, ready to face what comes next.  Our mother’s tears as we waved away that car from the college dormitory parking lot on the first day of freshman orientation.  The triumph of a retiring athlete or musician, scanning the crowd one final time with joy and gratitude.  The last look tells us so much.  It reveals the heart, brings to life what is most important in the relationship we share.  Often it points to what lies ahead.
It is so too in the mystery we celebrate today: our Lord’s glorious ascension.  “While he was blessing them,” Saint Luke tells us, “he withdrew from them and was carried up to heaven.”  The last look for Jesus’ disciples, that parting vision that would be fixed forever in their mind was of their Master, his arms lifted confidently, pouring out on them his blessing, the assurance of His love.  It’s just this that the great painting over our Altar depicts: Christ in strength and glory, lifting up His precious hands to bestow once and for all His blessing on all who love Him.

For Meditation: The Peculiar Properties of Love

Quoted from St. Francis de Sales in my morning reading, Hughson's With Christ in God:

"These gifts (the sevenfold gifts of the Spirit) are not only inseperable from charity, but they may be called its peculiar properties.  The gift of wisdom is nothing more than love which has discovered by experience how sweet the Lord is.  Understanding is a love which attentively considers the truths of faith, to penetrate the depths of their sweetness, and to fathom the abyss of the divinity, descending afterwards from the knowledge of the Creator to that of His creatures.  The gift of knowledge is a love which we apply to the knowledge of ourselves and creatures, as conducive to the knowledge of the Almighty, and tending to impart a correct idea of the homage due to Him, by the consideration of His perfection and our extreme misery.  The gift of counsel is a species of love by which we vigilantly seek the best means of serving God perfectly.  The gift of fortitude is also the strength which love communicates for the execution of whatever has been suggested by the gift of counsel.  Piety is likewise love which alleviates suffering and labour by inspiring a filial affection, and a joy in performing such actions as are pleasing to our heavenly Father.  Finally, the gift of fear is evidently love, since it urges us to avoid all that is displeasing to God" (310-311).

For Meditation: "It cannot be attuned and untuned at once"

From my morning reading, Hughson's With Christ in God.

"In sin, man casts out grace, deadens his own ear until God's voice sounds fainter and fainter, and comes seldomer, and at last there follows the stillness of death.  It is heard no more.  God leaves the soul, and it is dead.  Every wilful sin is a part of this deadening of the soul.  Ye cannot wilfully refuse to hear in one way or at one time, and hear at another.  Ye cannot stop your ears to part of God's message, hear and not hear at will.  The soul is a beautiful instrument, attuned by the hand of God, and breathed in by His Holy Spirit.  It cannot be attuned and untuned at once.  It cannot yield at once the harmony of heaven and the jarring discords of the world."  Edward Pusey, 208.