March 31, 2021

Lord God, whose blessed Son our Savior gave his body to be whipped and his face to be spit upon: Give us grace to accept joyfully the sufferings of the present time, confident of the glory that shall be revealed; through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. – Collect for Wednesday in Holy Week

I don't know about you, but this Collect has taken on a whole new meaning after the arrival of the COVID-19 pandemic.

In previous years this Collect seemed to be more personal. Personal sufferings of jobs, family life, and other events could always be spun as individual events or crises that, if I worked hard enough, I could see the light at the end of the tunnel. If I thought about a situation in just the right way, I could see a possible glorious outcome.

But the pandemic has seemed to raise questions about that. Where is the revealed glory in a disease that requires us to lock ourselves away? Where is the revealed glory in a disease that has killed hundreds of thousands of people? Where is the revealed glory for families who have had to stand by helplessly as loved ones died in quarantine and alone? Where is the revealed glory for those people of faith who have had to receive last rites over the phone?

Suffering for a righteous cause is one thing. Suffering simply to suffer is something else entirely.

And to be honest, I don't have the answers to any of the above questions. But if I look, I can point to revealed glory in the suffering.

A disease that forced us to lock ourselves away may have revealed the glory of rediscovering family quirks and interests. A disease that has killed hundreds of thousands of people may have revealed the glory of understanding how precious life is. A revealed glory for those who have had loved ones die alone might be to understand and give thanks for the health care workers who stood by their side.

None of this is perfect. Sometimes I feel that this falls into the area of cheap platitudes. But through it all, I hold fast to the recognition that there is no Easter without Good Friday and to the blessed hope of resurrection.

However you have dealt with the previous year, however you are dealing with the current year, may you find hope and strength in the power and promise of resurrection.

Blessings,

Todd+

March 24, 2021

Then they also will answer, “Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and did not take care of you?” – Matt. 25:44

What piece of scripture haunts you? What piece of scripture makes you sit up, take notice, and realize you just might be doing it wrong? What piece of scripture causes you to lose sleep.

For me, it's this one. Verse 45 continues, “Truly I tell you, just as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me.”

On Monday I made the decision to evict a gentleman who had been sleeping on the office porch since last week. Yesterday morning Dcn. Sue and I woke him up, explained why he wasn't allowed to camp out on our porch, offered him resource options, and ensured that he packed up his belongings and vacated the premises.

The two of us then packed up a few bags of garbage which Dcn. Sue took down to the dumpster. Heidi showed up for work and the two of us finished cleaning up the porch, washing off the outside of Gatorade bottles, and picking up various other pieces of trash (ie, other duties as assigned).

Can's, cant's, and wont's. I learned about that breakdown from a public health nurse in my previous parish. Can's are those people who, due to circumstances, find themselves in dire straits but who also, with a little help, are able to get back on their feet. Cant's are those people who, due to physical or mental conditions, are literally unable to help themselves and probably need a lifetime of assistance. Wont's are those people who, no matter how hard you try to help, simply will not improve or change.

I'm not sure which category our recent guest fell into – you might be able to make an argument for any of the three. But nevertheless, it was time for him to not be on our porch, so I evicted him.

Memories of Mona, Jimmy, and Tyree came back. People I, or the church, have tried to help in one form or another, but who ended up being eventually evicted. I can now add Rick to that litany of evictions.

Oh, I know the drill – You can't help everybody; You can't solve everyone's problems; You did your best; etc. etc. etc. But the reality is that I evicted a homeless man from the shelter and relative safety of our porch.

What piece of scripture haunts you? For me, it will always be the end of Matthew 25.

Todd+

March 17, 2021

Every year on the 5^th Sunday in Lent we either read (8 am) or sing (10:30) The Great Litany. Due to COVID and restrictions on indoor singing, we will be reading it at the 9:30 service this year.

A litany is a liturgical form of prayer consisting of announced petitions/biddings with formalized, fixed responses from the congregation. You can find a variety of litanies in the BCP – Suffrage B in Evening Prayer; Forms I, IV, and V of Prayers of the People; and Ps. 136 are all good examples. Litanies have been in use in the Church from the time of Pelagius I (492-496), and a litany was the first rite published in English in 1544 as a special supplication when Henry VIII was at war with Scotland and France. This Sunday's Great Litany is called that because this one is much longer than any other litany in the Prayer Book and has five distinct sections.

So as I said, every 5^th Sunday in Lent we pray The Great Litany. We should probably pray it more often, as there are a variety of petitions that address our daily lives. And it does seem that, every year, I find something in it that grabs my attention. More often than not, with Palm Sunday and Holy Week on the horizon, the petition to “Remember not, Lord Christ, our offenses . . .” hits home. I also tend to focus on the petition mentioning Christ's “Agony and Bloody Sweat; by thy Cross and Passion; by the precious Death and Burial . . .” And there are other petitions I focus on at different times.

This past year has been a doozy. We've come yet again face-to-face with racial inequality and injustice in the murders of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Daniel Prude, Etonne Tanzymore, and so many others. We have spent a year dealing with a global pandemic which has killed over 2.6 million people worldwide and affects people of color more often in this country. And on the Feast of the Epiphany, January 6, our country survived an attempted coup led by white supremacists, Nazi sympathizers, neo-fascist Proud Boys, Christian nationalists, and other right wing hate groups.

All of these memories from this past year came flooding back as I proofed the bulletin for Lent 5.

From all false doctrine, heresy, and schism . . . Good Lord, deliver us.

From lightning and tempest . . . from plague, pestilence, and famine, Good Lord, deliver us.

From all oppression, conspiracy, and rebellion . . . Good Lord, deliver us.

The Church has used a form of these petitions for centuries, and the Litany has been part of the Prayer Book since 1549. Over the years parts of the Litany have had more meaning at certain times than others.

This was a year like none other in our lifetimes, so it just may be that we pray the Great Litany like we have never prayed it before in our lifetimes.

Blessings,

March 10, 2021

A couple of weeks ago a parishioner came into the office and, among other things she needed to work on, asked me if I would make a home Communion visit because she hadn't received the Sacrament in a very long time and wasn't sure when she would be back at church even after we re-opened. I obviously agreed and, since I was going to be out that way anyway, also called a few other parishioners to set up a series of home Communion visits. So I spent this past Monday driving hither and yon through Pennsylvania as I made stops outside Mercersburg, Chambersburg, and Fayetteville.

As you may or may not know, I used to spend my Monday mornings making random house calls to our parishioners. Sometimes I'd catch people at home, and sometimes not. The goal of these visitations was just to catch up, get to know people a little better, and make connections. As an introvert, it was one of the hardest parts of my job. But I cowboyed up (as they say in Montana) and did it anyway.

I grew to like making those visits and even began looking forward to Monday mornings.

And then COVID hit and there were no more Monday visitations.

I hadn't realized how much I missed making those house calls until this past Monday. Besides reconnecting with people on a personal level, and besides the fact that the visits came with the gift of pie and a Reuben sandwich, the other highlight was sharing Holy Communion with these people.

One of the blessings of being a priest is having the honor of administering Communion. For some clergy, Sunday mornings have become too much like work. For others, it is worship but in a different capacity. Most of the time I fall in that second group – Sunday mornings are a time of worship. There have been times during this pandemic with learning about camera angles, sound systems, and other production aspects, where Sunday morning was too much like work. But most of the time, it's worship.

Like you, I have missed your physical presence on Sunday mornings. I greatly appreciate the online community we seem to have built. I like seeing the online greetings from people as they filter onto the Facebook page before the service starts. And I loved the fact that someone felt comfortable enough to say, “We need more time at the Peace.”

But this past Monday reminded me of just how much I missed administering Communion to a variety of people in a variety of places.

This coming Sunday, March 14, we will once again regather for in-person worship. For those of you who can't be there, or maybe choose not to be there because you're still being careful, know that I appreciate your online presence as well as seeing and reading your comments, prayers, and thanksgivings. For those of you who will be in attendance, know that I have missed administering Holy Communion to you as much as you have missed receiving it.

As we once again regather, even in limited form, let us taste and see that the Lord is good.

Blessings,

March 3, 2021

If you've read the March Soundings (http://www.stjohnshagerstown.org/announcements/soundings--2) I hope you had a chance to read the Deacon's Corner.

In this month's article, Dcn. Sue talks about the new Blessings Box that has found a home on the front porch of the office. “Blessings Box” is a bit of a misnomer, as it's really a set of three full-size lockers, the kind you might see in any high school hallway. In fact, I was thinking about calling this new addition “The Love Locker,” but thoughts of Barry White and the B-52's prevented me from doing so.

These lockers are designed to store any number of items, food or otherwise. A list of suggested items can be found on page 11 of Soundings.

We're also working on getting a banner for it that says, “Give What You Can – Take What You Need.”

The idea is that this will be an ongoing, year-round opportunity to provide items for those needing help. People who come to the office asking for Sheetz gift cards now have another source of assistance. And since we don't really specify what goes into the lockers (we just make suggestions), there are no guarantees of what will be placed there. Dcn. Sue imagines that, along with food, school supplies in late summer, gloves, scarves, and hats when the weather turns cold, and personal hygiene items are always needed. As I said, what goes into the lockers is only limited by our imaginations.

Saint John's gives to Micah's Backpack. We give to Families-Helping-Families. We give to Bester Elementary School. This is one more gift that we are offering to the people in our neighborhood and city.

In her Soundings article, Dcn. Sue thanked those who helped make this happen, and I want to reiterate that here: Thanks to Bob Speelman who was instrumental in obtaining the lockers and getting them fit to be placed on the porch. Thanks to Kelly Moore Sheds and Marketplace for donating the three lockers. And thank you to Dcn. Sue for having the vision and drive to making this dream a reality.

I encourage you to take a copy of suggested locker items and put it in your car or in your notebook where you make your grocery list, and the next time you're out shopping pick up a few of those items, swing by the church, and put them in the locker.

The Blessings Box isn't going to make headlines or garner lots of publicity; but it does reflect part of our Mission Statement as yet one more way we look to Serve the people around us.

Blessings,

Todd+