January 27, 2021

Compassion cannot happen from a guarded, invulnerable distance. It sends us to come alongside people who find themselves isolated, separated, segregated, demonized, otherized, and relegated to the margins of peace, justice, and hope. – Gregg Louis Taylor, Here Now With You, p. 38

In many instances Jesus showed compassion to any number of people: lepers, demoniacs, tax collectors, prostitutes, disabled, maimed, women, foreigners. Very rarely do we see Jesus performing miracles from a distance. The vast majority of the time Jesus performs healing miracles alongside those in need, sometimes touching those who were untouchable.

And even when not performing miracles, he spends time alongside people outside the boundary of the accepted norm. Think about the woman at the well, the woman caught in adultery, the sinful woman who washed his feet, the tax collector at whose house he ate, the tax collector he called to discipleship, and others.

Walking the way of Jesus compels us to offer compassion – and not just compassion from a distance, but compassion next to those in need. Compassion compels us to walk next to, sit beside, and eat with those who have been relegated to the margins.

This also entails a great deal of risk. Compassion isn't simply a feel good emotion that lets us pin a gold star on our shirt. True compassion is risky. It's risky to hang out at the REACH shelter. It's risky to stop and be a non-anxious and visible presence when a black man has been pulled over by multiple white police officers. It's risky to engage in a conversation with a homeless person on the street. It's risky to pull from your own resources to help those with limited resources.

The Church is a place that provides and offers compassion. It is also a place of risk.

May we be a people of compassion. May we be a people willing to take risks in the name of Jesus.

Blessings,

January 20, 2021

Football officiating and church.

People have heard me talk about how intertwined these two things are for as long as I've been in ordained ministry. I was a football official long before I even considered ordination, but it wasn't long after ordination, or maybe it was during seminary, when I really began to see the similarities between the two.

Football officiating has its rules book, procedures, and mechanics. Our church has the Book of Common Prayer, rubrics, and liturgies. One rule may point to or draw from several other rules and it takes understanding each of them to understand the whole. One rubric may point to or draw from several other rubrics and it takes understanding each of them to understand the whole. Football and church have a lot in common.

Yesterday morning before going into the office I saw that the NY Mets had fired their relatively new general manager for sending many inappropriate and unsolicited texts to a female reporter in 2016 while he was with a different team. Yesterday afternoon I learned that Sarah Thomas, the first full-time female official in the NFL, earned a spot on this year's Super Bowl crew, making her the first woman to work an NFL championship game.

Earlier this year people marching for justice and racial equality were met with severe resistance. People who cried, “Black lives matter” were shouted down with cries of, “All lives matter” and, “Blue lives matter.” Banners proclaiming “Black Lives Matter” were torn down, desecrated, or had the word “Black” whited out. In November, a game between the LA Rams and Tampa Bay Buccaneers was the first NFL game to be officiated by an all-African American crew. And I was reminded of Johnny Grier, who, in 1988, became the first African American referee in the NFL (I got to meet him once, but that's another story).

Football has its issues. So does the Church.

But at it's best, in football officiating there is no division, there is only one crew. All four, five, six, seven, or eight people on a crew work together in harmony. There is no male or female, black or white, only positions in a black and white shirt. And all of the positions work for the good of the crew.

At its best, in the Church there is no division. As Paul wrote, “In Christ there is no more Jew or Gentile, slave or free, male or female (and I would add, black or white), there is only one in Christ.” All of us, like a crew of officials, work our different positions for the good of the Church.

In respect to equality and unity, maybe the Church can learn something from a crew of football officials where male and female, black and white, work together seamlessly.

Blessings,

January 13, 2021

 I heard there was a cheese factory explosion in France. Da brie was everywhere.

Last week I wrote about rediscovering joy. A several hours later there was a whole lot of less-than joyful times. From the attempted coup at the capitol to the fallout to the screaming about whose fault this was to the screaming about whether we let the perpetrators go “in the name of healing” or whether we prosecute the perpetrators “in the name of healing and justice,” it has been a rough few days.

Added to all of that is that things in the office have been more hectic than usual. We are working on holding our annual meeting via Zoom. That meeting, by the way, is scheduled for January 24 at 11 am. In order to do that we needed a plan to get ballots to everyone. Most parishioners will receive (or have received) a ballot via e-mail. There are a few, however, who don't have e-mail and we were blessed to have a dedicated crew of couriers who offered to both deliver and pick up paper ballots. It has been a rough few days as we prepare to hold an online annual meeting.

Add to all of that and we still need to produce the annual report. Most individual reports are in, and we (well, mainly Melonie) is working on getting everything in a coherent format. Once she does that, I'll proof it, we'll print a few copies, and then we'll upload it to the website and place it here:

http://www.stjohnshagerstown.org/announcements (not there yet, but that's where it will go).

Add to all of that the situation with COVID and everyone trying to stay safe and healthy, trying to work or find work, trying to learn either from home or at school. Things are rough all the way around. And right now, to be honest, I am exhausted. But so is everyone else.

Which is why I opened today's Wednesday Word the way I did: because I, for one, needed to smile. I needed a little laugh in the midst of all the chaos. Yes, things have been rough, and yes, things will continue to be rough for awhile. But let's try to not lose our joy. Let's not lose our ability to laugh.

I'm reminded of the picture called “Laughing Jesus,” that I first saw in a priest's office years ago. I think about that picture now in the midst of chaos and whatnot feeling like we need to laugh. And I wonder . . . Did Peter tell him a fishing joke? Did he just watch one of “these little ones” do something incredibly funny? Did he, as Son of God, just tell his disciples the best dad joke ever?

We all need to find time to smile and laugh. So no matter how rough these days are, I hope you find time to laugh.

And with that, I will leave you with a favorite joke of a certain someone who always laughs at it:

Do you know what happens when you toss a hand grenade into a kitchen?

You get Linoleum Blownaparte!

Have a great day,