Two Before the Altar

 Luke 18:9-14

“There is a crack in everything;
That’s how the light gets in.”—Leonard Cohen

The upright Pharisee, each hair in place, not a
Fringe on his tasseled loafers askew, stood
Before God’s altar and prayed to himself
Congratulations for his impeccable soul.
He knew what others thought of him.
His righteousness shone from his shoulders
Like epaulets- so certain was he of his goodness.
He checked the lock on the vault of his heart,
And nodded, satisfied. Nothing
In, nothing out, undisturbed. Shrugging deeper
Into the mantle of his own esteem,
Duty satisfied, he knew he was blessed.
Nothing had changed.

On trembling legs the tax-collector climbed the steps, aware
Of the eyes that turned his way, the stink of collusion
That clung to his fine clothes. He could still turn away,
But his heart urged him forward. No one
Expected to see him here in God’s courts,
And some sneered as he passed.
He knew what others thought of him.
Eyes downcast, he made himself small,
And beat his breast,
Pouring out his sins until his soul
Was an empty bowl, so thirsty was he for God’s mercy.
A spark of forgiveness lit the tinder
Of his heart. Cheeks wet, he resolved to turn.
In the new fire of grace and gratitude he was reclaimed.
Everything had changed.

--Leslie Barnes Scoopmire. This was first published at Episcopal Journal's Speaking to the Soul on October 20, 2222.

A Better Resurrection

I have no wit, no words, no tears;

My heart within me like a stone 

Is numbed too much for hopes or fears; 

Look right, look left, I dwell alone; 

I lift mine eyes, but dimmed with grief 

No everlasting hills I see; 

My life is in the falling leaf: 

O Jesus, quicken me. 

 My life is like a faded leaf, 

My harvest dwindled to a husk: 

Truly my life is void and brief 

And tedious in the barren dusk; 

My life is like a frozen thing, 

No bud nor greenness can I see: 

Yet rise it shall—the sap of Spring; 

O Jesus, rise in me. 

 My life is like a broken bowl, 

 A broken bowl that cannot hold 

One drop of water for my soul 

Or cordial in the searching cold; 

Cast in the fire the perished thing; 

Melt and remould it, till it be 

A royal cup for Him, my King: 

O Jesus, drink of me.

-- Christina Rosetti (1830-1894), English poet, sister of Dante Gabriel Rosetti, devout Anglican and supporter of the Oxford movement, from her book The Goblin Market and Other Poems. She is in the calendar of saints of the Anglican Church, with a feast day of April 27.

Attention, Astonishment, Witness: Homily for Ash Wednesday

Some might find it ironic about the gospel reading for today—to hear Jesus warn against disfiguring our faces when many of us are getting ready for the imposition of ashes. On the surface, it would seem that we are engaging in exactly the kind of grandstanding that Jesus is warning about. But when we have the ashes placed upon our foreheads, the purpose is to remind US that we are entering a penitential season, and that since we are ashes, it is important to live our lives in the most faithful way possible.

But also, Jesus spoke at a time when big shows of piety were often put to work for gain in social status or influence, because religious performance was something most people took for granted. And while many people nowadays may do the first part of that last sentence—putting on a show of their supposed religious affiliation, those numbers are getting smaller and smaller each year all across the West. For many of us, walking around all day with a sign of a cross on our foreheads makes us stand out in a different way in an ever-secularizing world.

It's not about showing off. It IS about what you most treasure and proclaim in your life.
The late, beloved American poet Mary Oliver, in her poem “Sometimes,” offered seven linked poems together. Right at the fulcrum, at number 4, she offered these instructions for living a life:

Pay attention.
Be astonished.
Tell about it.

I am convinced that those are also the instructions for discipleship:

Pay attention.
Be astonished.
Tell about it.

Attention. Astonishment. Witness.

So let’s start with paying attention right now. 

Just where did those ashes come from that we will soon have pressed into our brows? They came from the palms that we waved on Palm Sunday, ten months ago. They were once young fronds on a palm tree, and then we blessed them and waved them as we re-enacted Jesus’s triumphal entry into Jerusalem a week before his trial and crucifixion. Then they sat and dried out for almost a full year. Eventually the dried out remnants were collected, and then they were burned. A match was lit, and light and heat were released from the gases that remained in the palms from the materials they had absorbed from the ground during their life on the tree. They were then ground up, and mixed with the same chrism that we use when we anoint people at their baptisms and at their confirmations. Oil and ashes. Light and heat. And a human touch to press them onto our foreheads—one soul to another.

So what is the astonishing thing about this? We are reminded that we came from the dust and we return to the dust. That sounds dreadful—until you consider that the ash and dust that we are marked with contains atoms which resonate in you, me, everyone and everything, everywhere. The elements that make up that dust were in that palm frond and in that tree and in its roots, but have also been here all along in the billions of years since the Earth’s creation. And those elements were deposited here and fused together to create this beautiful planet, born from the explosions of stars halfway across the galaxy. As Joni Mitchell sang, “We are stardust….” That is indeed astonishing, and it reminds us that here at the start of Lent we are called to recognize the acknowledge the way that this common heritage makes us all one. Especially as the drums of war beat right now across eastern Europe in Ukraine, what could be more astonishing than that bold statement of fact? We are all dust, and we are therefore all one with each other and with all that is.

And then, that mark on our foreheads is part of us telling about it. We are not called to come to church merely to feed ourselves or tend to our own needs. We are called to TELL the world about what we have encountered in Jesus. We are called to let that black smudge on our foreheads be not just an acknowledgement of our finitude, our own mortality, but our own encounter with the love of God as it became human and mortal, just like us, to show us how to live a fully human life—one of love and concern for others, and faithfulness to our God.

And so how does Mary Oliver demonstrate that sense of attention, astonishment, and witness? Now that we have looked at the balancing point, let’s hear the poem in its entirety:

1.

Something came up
out of the dark.
It wasn’t anything I had ever seen before.
It wasn’t an animal
or a flower,
unless it was both.

Something came up out of the water,
a head the size of a cat
but muddy and without ears.

I don’t know what God is.
I don’t know what death is.

But I believe they have between them
some fervent and necessary arrangement.

2.

Sometimes
melancholy leaves me breathless…

3.

Water from the heavens! Electricity from the source!
Both of them mad to create something!

The lighting brighter than any flower.
The thunder without a drowsy bone in its body.

4.

Instructions for living a life:
Pay attention.
Be astonished.
Tell about it.

5.

Two or three times in my life I discovered love.
Each time it seemed to solve everything.
Each time it solved a great many things
but not everything.
Yet left me as grateful as if it had indeed, and
thoroughly, solved everything.

6.

God, rest in my heart
and fortify me,
take away my hunger for answers,
let the hours play upon my body
like the hands of my beloved.

Let the cathead appear again-
the smallest of your mysteries,
some wild cousin of my own blood probably-
some cousin of my own wild blood probably,
in the black dinner-bowl of the pond.

7.

Death waits for me, I know it, around
one corner or another.
This doesn’t amuse me.
Neither does it frighten me.

After the rain, I went back into the field of sunflowers.
It was cool, and I was anything but drowsy.
I walked slowly, and listened

to the crazy roots, in the drenched earth, laughing and growing.


This is our chance to repent. I know that word makes many of us wince and edge away. So let’s try to rephrase it. This is our chance to re-center ourselves, not just for forty days but for each moment.

Lent calls us to attention, astonishment, and witness. Lent calls us to see the potential rather than the dreariness and horror of pandemic and now war, to look for the beauty and unity among ourselves and all God’s sparkling mysterious creation placed here for our support and care. Lent calls us to proclaim, to tell, to be truthful and reliable in our witness to God’s love by embodying God’s love. I don’t know about you, but I have never needed that kind of Lent more than right now. A Life-giving Lent. A Lent of slowing down and inviting ourselves to wonder and gratitude. A Lent that calls us to stand for right and honor and compassion no matter what the price tag. Lent calls us not to more suffering and uncertainty, but to holiness, which is ALWAYS within our range of choices.

Lent is not a season to be endured, but a gift of insight into what we really should treasure. It is in the everyday world that we live, and we need to make our faith not just a Sunday faith or a Lenten discipline but a part of a living and breathing. Some call this mindfulness, and it is such a wonderful concept.

Pay attention.
Be astonished.
Tell about it.

Preached at the 7 pm AshWednesday service, online and in person, at St. Martin's Episcopal Church, Ellisville, MO.

Readings:

• Joel 2:1-2,12-17
• 2 Corinthians 5:20b-6:10
• Matthew 6:1-6,16-21
• Psalm 103:8-14

Lord's Prayer Cycle Prayer 4: Forgive Us Our Sins

Our Father in heaven,
loving Parent and Creator,
tender Mother, 
we thank You for your forgiveness 
of our manifold sins. 

Again and again You call to us 
when we have wandered from your ways, 
and stubbornly separate ourselves from your Love. 
We repent of the evil we have done, 
the evil that is done on our behalf, 
and the very real hurt we have caused.

Forgive us when we place our selves 
as an idol in the sanctuary of our hearts, 
which should be dedicated to worship of You alone, 
O Redeemer.

Help us to acknowledge the sins done 
because we do not try to prevent them, 
and arouse in us the will to take action.

Teach us that the root of righteousness and salvation 
is found in fully opening our hearts 
to each other and to You.

Help us clothe ourselves 
and our motives 
in charity and obedience, O Christ. 
Help us direct our wills 
to the establishment of justice and peace.

Come into our hearts, O Spirit, 
and guide us in matters great and small, 
for your Love heals all our woundedness.

O Loving One, hear our prayers 
and grant your benediction and grace 
to those whose needs we now raise before You.

Amen.

How Humble is God?

How humble is God?

God is the tree in the forest that

allows itself to die and will not defend itself in front of those

with the ax, not wanting to cause them

shame.

And God is the earth that will allow itself to

be deformed by man's hands, but He cries; yes, God cries,

but only in front of His closest ones.

And a beautiful animal is being beaten to death,

but nothing can make God break his silence

to the masses

and say,

"Stop, please stop, why are you doing this

to Me?"

How humble is God?

Kabir wept

when I

knew.

-- Kabir (ca 1440-1518), Indian poet and mystic, from Love Poems from God: Twelve Sacred Voices from the East and West, Daniel Ladinsky, ed.

Paradise

I bless thee, Lord, because I GROW
Among thy trees, which in a ROW
The thee both fruit and order OWE.

What open force, what hidden CHARM
Can blast my fruit, or bring me HARM
While the inclosure is thine ARM?

Inclose me still for fear I START.
Be to me rather sharp and TART,
Than let me want thy hand and ART.

When thou dost greater judgments SPARE,
And with thy knife but prune and PARE,
Ev'n fruitful trees more fruitful ARE.

Such sharpness shows the sweetest FRIEND:
Such cuttings rather heal than REND:
And such beginnings touch their END.

--George Herbert (1593-1633), from Garden Poems, 1996

Thee, God, I Come From

Thee, God, I come from, to thee go,
All day long I like fountain flow
From thy hand out, swayed about
Mote-like in thy mighty glow.

What I know of thee I bless,
As acknowledging thy stress
On my being and as seeing
Something of thy holiness.

Once I turned from thee and hid,
Bound on what thou hadst forbid;
Sow the wind I would; I sinned:
I repent of what I did.

Bad I am, but yet thy child.
Father, be thou reconciled.
Spare thou me, since I see
With thy might that thou art mild.

I have life before me still
And thy purpose to fulfil;
Yea a debt to pay thee yet:
Help me, sir, and so I will.

But thou bidst, and just thou art,
Me shew mercy from my heart
Towards my brother, every other
Man my mate and counterpart.

--Gerard Manley Hopkins (1844-1889), English poet and Jesuit priest

Self- Acquaintance

Dear Lord! accept a sinful heart,
Which of itself complains,
And mourns, with much and frequent smart,
The evil it contains.

There fiery seeds of anger lurk,
Which often hurt my frame;
And wait but for the tempter's work,
To fan them to a flame.

Legality holds out a bribe
To purchase life from Thee;
And Discontent would fain prescribe
How Thou shalt deal with me.

While Unbelief withstands Thy grace,
And puts the mercy by,
Presumption, with a brow of brass,
Says, "Give me, or I die!"

How eager are my thoughts to roam,
In quest of what they love!
But ah! when duty calls them home,
How heavily they move!

Oh, cleanse me in a Saviour's blood,
Transform me by Thy power,
And make me Thy beloved abode,
And let me roam no more.

-- William Cowper (1731-1800) English poet

Photo: Figure on the Passion side facade of La Sagrada Familia, Barcelona.

For Lent, 1966

It is my Lent to break my Lent,
     To eat when I would fast,
To know when slender strength is spent
     Take shelter from the blast
When I would run with wind and rain,
     To sleep when I would watch.
It is my Lent to smile at pain
     But not ignore its touch.

It is my Lent to listen well
     When I would be alone,
To talk when I would rather dwell
     In silence, turn from none
Who call on me, to try to see
     That what is truly meant
Is not my choice. If Christ's I'd be
     It's thus I'll keep my Lent.

--Madeleine L'Engle (1918-2007)

Jonah

A purple whale
Proudly sweeps his tail
Towards Nineveh;
Glassy green Surges between
A mile of roaring sea.

“O town of gold,
Of splendour multifold,
Lucre and lust,
Leviathan’s eye
Can surely spy
Thy doom of death and dust.”

On curving sands
Vengeful Jonah stands.
“Yet forty days,
Then down, down,
Tumbles the town
In flaming ruin ablaze.”

With swift lament
Those Ninevites repent.
They cry in tears,
“Our hearts fail!”
The whale, the whale!
Our sins prick us like spears.”

Jonah is vexed;
He cries, “What next? what next?”
And shakes his fist.
“Stupid city,
The shame, the pity,
The glorious crash I’ve missed.”

Away goes Jonah grumbling,
Murmuring and mumbling;
Off ploughs the purple whale,
With disappointed tail.

--Robert Graves (1895-1985), from Faeries and Fusiliers, 1918.

Reading 1, Revised Common Lectionary B

Confession of Sin from A New Zealand Prayer Book

Happy are those whose sins are forgiven,
whose wrongs are pardoned.
I will confess my sins to the Lord,
I will not conceal my wrongdoings.

Silence

God forgives and heals us.
We need your healing, merciful God:
give us true repentance.
Some sins are plain to us;
some escape us,
some we cannot face.
Forgive us;
set us free to hear your word to us;
set us free to serve you.

The presiding priest says

God forgives you.
Forgive others;
Forgive yourself.

Silence

Through Christ, God has put away your sin:
approach your God in peace.


--From" Eucharistic Liturgy of Thanksgiving for Creation and Redemption," in He Karakia Mihinare o Aoteoroa: A New Zealand Prayer Book

A Prayer

Grant I thee pray such heat into mine heart,
That to this love of thine may be equal;
 God grant me from Sathanas service to astart,
With whom me rueth so long to have be thrall;
Grant me good Lord and creator of all,
The flame to quench of all sinful desire,
And in thy love set all mine heart afire.

That when the journey of this deadly life
My silly ghost hath finished, and thence
Departed must without his fleshly wife;
Alone into his lord’s high presence,
He may thee find: O well of indulgence,
In thy lordship not as a lord: but rather
As a very tender, loving father.

--Sir Thomas More (1478-1535), from "A Prayer of Picus Mirandula Unto God," 1510

Icon of St. Thomas More by Theophilia Darn

A Short Testament

Whatever harm I may have done
In all my life in all your wide creation
If I cannot repair it
I beg you to repair it,

And then there are all the wounded
The poor the deaf the lonely and the old
Whom I have roughly dismissed
As if I were not one of them.
Where I have wronged them by it
And cannot make amends I ask you
To comfort them to overflowing,

And where there are lives I may have withered around me,
Or lives of strangers far or near
That I’ve destroyed in blind complicity,
And if I cannot find them
Or have no way to serve them,

Remember them. I beg you to remember them

When winter is over
And all your unimaginable promises
Burst into song on death’s bare branches.

--Anne Porter (1911-2011), from Living Things (2006)

Christ-hymn from "The Everlasting Mercy"

...I kneeled there in the muddy fallow,

I knew that Christ was there with Callow,

That Christ was standing there with me,

That Christ had taught me what to be,

That I should plough, and as I ploughed

My Saviour Christ would sing aloud,

And as I drove the clods apart

Christ would be ploughing in my heart,

Through rest-harrow and bitter roots,

Through all my bad life's rotten fruits.

 

O Christ who holds the open gate,

O Christ who drives the furrow straight,

O Christ, the plough, O Christ, the laughter

Of holy white birds flying after,

Lo, all my heart's field red and torn,

And Thou wilt bring the young green corn,

The young green corn divinely springing,

The young green corn forever singing;

And when the field is fresh and fair

Thy blessèd feet shall glitter there,

And we will walk the weeded field,

And tell the holden harvests's yield,

The corn that makes the holy bread

By which the soul of man is fed,

The holy bread, the food unpriced,

Thy everlasting mercy, Christ.

 

The share will jar on many a stone,

Thou wilt not let me stand alone;

And I shall feel (thou wilt not fail),

Thy hand on mine upon the hale.

 

-- John Masefield (1878-1967), 1911

 

Links: Full Poem

At the round earth's imagin'd corners (Holy Sonnet VII)

At the round earth's imagined corners blow
Your trumpets, angels, and arise, arise
From death, you numberless infinities
Of souls, and to your scattered bodies go,
All whom the flood did, and fire shall, overthrow,
All whom war, dearth, age, agues, tyrannies,
Despair, law, chance, hath slain, and you whose eyes
Shall behold God, and never taste death's woe.
But let them sleep, Lord, and me mourn a space,
For, if above all these my sins abound,
'Tis late to ask abundance of Thy grace,
When we are there. Here on this lowly ground
Teach me how to repent; for that's as good
As if Thou'dst sealed my pardon, with Thy blood.

--John Donne, Holy Sonnets, 1633