April 15, 2026

Wednesday Word . . . Church

A church is a community that exists as, and only as, a participation in God's life-giving movement. – Anthony D. Baker, Wisdom, Knowledge, and Faith, pg. 20

The Episcopal Church hosted a Zoom seminar a few weeks ago that featured Episcopal theologians from a variety of schools and disciplines. The seminar was not quite what I was expecting, but the various participants (and some who were not present) had written essays collected in this book. In his essay, Baker puts forth the idea that Christian theology is “a study of motion;” that is, it's the study of our journey from and back to our home with God.

If we think about this journey, and we think about God, we can see that God is motion. From the beginning when God created “the vast expanse of interstellar space, galaxies, suns, the planets in their courses, and this fragile earth, our island home” (Eucharistic Prayer C), to the sending of the prophets and his Son, to the eventual gathering of God and people in the heavenly city, God is in motion. And we are part of that motion.

Like the Prodigal Son, there are times when we wander away, but we also always make our way back. Like that son's older brother, there are times when we refuse to participate in God's expansive love, but hopefully we also choose to be part of God's family and make our way back into the house.

The mission of the Church is to “restore all people to unity with God and each other in Christ.” The duty of all Christians is to follow Christ, come together for worship, and to work, pray, and give for the spread of the kingdom. This is our participation in God's life-giving movement that Baker is addressing.

When we invite people to join us for worship, we are helping them move into God. When we sit with them and help them through the service, we are helping them participate in God's movement. If we are worshiping by ourselves, we are moving into God. In the moment we participate in Holy Communion we have made the journey to join with God in the hope that we become one.

May we never forget that, as God is bound together in the unity of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit and moves in love, we are bound together in a faithful community as we move from separation to union.

This, then, is the point of Church – to help move us ever closer into the live-giving movement of God.

Blessings,

April 8, 2026

Wednesday Word . . . Making Christ Known

O God, whose blessed Son made himself known to his disciples in the breaking of bread: Open the eyes of our faith . . . Collect for Wednesday in Easter Week, BCP 223

The gospel appointed for this day is the story of the disciples on the road to Emmaus. This is one of the most famous resurrection stories – two unnamed disciples are traveling to Emmaus after the crucifixion and have an encounter with the risen Christ. They don't recognize with whom they are talking until Jesus takes bread, blesses it, and breaks it. It's at that point that their eyes are opened.

A few things to note here:

They didn't recognize him while they were talking about the events of the past few days. They didn't recognize him after they had been told about the empty tomb. They didn't even recognize him while discussing the scriptures. They recognized Christ when they had the experience of participating in what we now recognize as the sacrament of Holy Communion – taking, blessing, breaking, and receiving bread.

Christ is not limited to the overly miraculous. While Christ can be found in scriptures, it's probably not a dissertation about Christ in the scriptures that draws people to the faith. And we can talk to people about our experiences of Christ, but it's not our experiences that cause people to experience Christ for themselves.

Christ is made know in a number of small, intimate, personal interactions. Christ is made known in caring for someone in need, in the sharing of a meal, in a quiet conversation, in providing shelter or safe passage, and in any number of ways in which our eyes are opened to seeing another person as a child of God.

We don't need to heal someone of cancer or raise someone from the dead to demonstrate the presence of Christ . . . all we need to do is open our eyes to everyday interactions and love others as Christ loved us.

Blessings,

April 1, 2026

Wednesday Word . . . Present Sufferings

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 . . . – Collect for Wednesday in Holy Week, BCP 220

What does it mean to “accept joyfully the sufferings of the present time?” Are we asked to not complain about what we're going through? Are we asked to lie there and take it? Are we asked to say, “God knows best,” and give up?

I don't think that's what this prayer is asking of us.

Instead, what if this Collect is asking us to compare our sufferings to the sufferings of Christ during Holy Week? Are we suffering because we speak up for those on the margins? Are we suffering because we show compassion to those whom others ignore or abuse? Are we suffering because proclaim a Jesus who didn't resort to violence?

And yes, I know that our sufferings don't always revolve around the above. Sometimes we suffer because of a severe illness, chronic pain, the loss of a loved one, or end-of-life issues.

Suffering comes in many forms and many contexts, and there is no one size fits all way to deal with it.

So maybe what the Collect for this Wednesday in Holy Week is asking us to do is to continually make Christ our focus during all times of our life. Are people attacking us because of our faith? Then let us honestly compare what we proclaim to the teachings of Jesus and use that as our foundation. Are we in chronic pain? The let us continually live a life focused on the life of Christ, in order to show there's more to our life than pain. Are we dealing with end-of-life issues? Let us live in the hope of the resurrection.

All of this may come across as pithy answers that don't really address the issue. But it just may be that this Collect is asking us to find a way to gracefully live in a way that proclaims the presence of Christ, no matter what we're going through.

Blessings,