Sunday, January 22, 2012

Gone Fishing

(Scriptures: Genesis 1:1-5, Acts 19:1-7, Mark 1:4-11)

I preached for the first time about 6 years ago. I was meeting with a small Liberian congregation in Southwest Philadelphia who were considering joining the United Church of Christ. In fact, this congregation is where I first met Isaac, who was assistant to the pastor. So I was making arrangements on behalf of the Phila Association of the UCC to visit the congregation, and Isaac said to me, “You will preach.” And I responded, “I don’t preach…..I’ll just bring greetings from the denomination.” And Isaac said, “You will preach.” And I said, “I’ve never preached in my life…..please, I’ll just bring some brief greetings and then sit down.” And Isaac said, “You will preach.” And we went back and forth a few more times, but Isaac said “You will preach” more times than I said “no”….so…oh, all right….I wound up preaching at the Liberian congregation. It was Trinity Sunday, and so I preached on the Trinity, which has been known to send parishioners into a coma, but also about the Great Commission at the end of Matthew’s Gospel, which is more energizing. I wound up my sermon and quickly got ready to take a seat…thank goodness that’s over....but then the pastor gave an altar call. Oh, no. The churches to which I had belonged didn’t do altar calls – ever - and while I’d seen altar calls at other churches, I’d never been up front with the clergy for one. And so I was muttering to myself, ‘Oh, please, nobody come up, I’m not sure what I’m supposed to do at an altar call; nobody come up please please please.’ And so a whole big family came up, a mom, some kids, and some men from the congregation with her to support her. And the pastor told me to pray with them, and I said, “Oh no, this is your church; we’re doing this together.” And so the Liberian pastor and I prayed over the family and laid hands on them as they poured out their hearts to Jesus.

Our readings from Jonah and from Mark’s Gospel show enthusiastic reactions to two preachers, Jonah and Jesus. Jonah was a most reluctant preacher – today’s reading gives us only a snippet from the story, but we remember that earlier in the story, the first time when God told Jonah to preach in Nineveh, Jonah went off in exactly the opposite direction and got on a boat to sail even further away. After all, Jonah didn’t even like the folks in Nineveh; he wanted God to smite them, not save them. But, by means of a convenient whale that happened by, Jonah is brought back to his starting point, and God tells Jonah, “Ok, let’s try this once again.” And so Jonah says, “oh, all right” and slogs his way part way into Nineveh, bringing God’s message, “Forty days more, and Nineveh will be overthrown.” Like me at the Liberian church, Jonah was probably muttering to himself, “Hey Nineveh people, please don’t listen to a word I say”, but instead the people drop everything and respond with fervent repentance. And so God spared Nineveh, and Jonah was angry at God again….but we’ll save that for some other Sunday.

And then our Gospel reading shows Jesus at the beginning of his public ministry. As we found last week, Mark tells his story in a very condensed, right-to-the-point, fast-moving way. The Greek words “kai euthus” – “and immediately” occur over and over in Mark’s gospel. Jesus is not reluctant, as Jonah was, but our reading begins with an ominous note: “Now after John was arrested…..” Whoa! Where’d that come from? Mark will tell us more about John’s arrest later….but with just that brief transition, we see Jesus begin his public ministry. John is baptizing, then John is arrested, then Jesus begins preaching. Did the disruption among the crowds by the Jordan caused by John’s arrest impel Jesus to step in and continue what John had begun?

Jesus begins to preach that God’s reign has come near, to repent and believe. And then he begins to call his disciples. And, as Mark tells it, they respond immediately: “And immediately Simon and Andrew left their nets and followed him…..Immediately Jesus called James and John, and they left their father Zebedee in the boat with the hired men and followed him.

What these readings share with the snippet from I Corinthians is a sense of urgency. Now, Jonah doesn’t feel any urgency at all about preaching to Nineveh, but God does, and won’t let Jonah off the hook until he accomplishes his mission. Paul preaches, “the appointed time has grown short.” Jesus preaches “the time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is near, repent and believe.” In all three readings, those proclaiming the Good News are going outside their comfort zones: Jonah preaching to an enemy city, Paul trying to motivate an early church, Jesus rebounding from the arrest of John, who had baptized him. All three followed God into unfamiliar territory, and God used all three to accomplish mighty deeds.

Two thousand years later, God is still urgently working for our salvation, and for that of our neighbors. And God can use us, as God used Simon and Andrew, to fish for people, to draw people into the reign of God. God can use us – if we’re willing. And maybe even if we’re not – remember God sending a whale to bring Jonah from where Jonah had fled, back to where God could use him.

Are we where God can use us? Like Simon and Andrew, James and John, God calls us to fish for people. To do that, we need to go where the people are. A fisherman who sits back, arms folded, expecting the fish to spontaneously jump out of the water and land in his boat will likely go home emptyhanded and hungry. And yet, we in the church behave as if we expect our neighbors to spontaneously jump out of their Sunday morning routines – soccer, Sunday newspaper, Sunday brunch, whatever - and land in the front pew of the church. And, you know, occasionally it happens – but not often enough to count on. We need to invite our neighbors to come in. Or, if we really want our neighbors to hear good news, we may need to go to them. We may need to bring church to them.

That’s the challenging news. The good news is that God can use all of us to spread the Good News. Simon and Andrew, James and John had no particular qualifications, and God used them to turn the world upside down. And God can use our little church to turn Bridesburg upside down, if we let him. If we let him. We can’t follow Jesus and follow the status quo at the same time – Jesus just isn’t a status quo guy. Status quo, same old same old, is Zebedee left behind in the boat while his sons leave him to follow Jesus.

There’s one thing that always bothered me about the metaphor of fishing for people. If a fish gets caught, it’s good news for the fisherman, but bad news for the fish. A fish that’s caught is going to get skinned and cleaned and eaten. And given all the news stories about misconduct in the church, a lot of our neighbors expect that if they set foot in a church, they’ll get skinned alive and their bank accounts cleaned out as well. It’s up to us not only to tell our neighbors, but to show our neighbors, that what we have to offer truly is good news. Perhaps the fishing we’re asked to do is like some sort of catch and release program, where we catch fish in a net in order to rescue them from the cramped, polluted aquarium of our world’s way of doing things, and release them into the wide, blue ocean of God’s grace, to live with the freedom that God intended.

From Mark’s Gospel: “As [Jesus] went a little farther, he saw James son of Zebedee and his brother John, who were in their boat mending the nets. Immediately he called them; and they left their father Zebedee in the boat with the hired men, and followed him.” May our lives reflect the words of the old Gospel song:

I have decided to follow Jesus
I have decided to follow Jesus
I have decided to follow Jesus
No turning back, no turning back.

Amen.

Water and Spirit

(Scriptures: Genesis 1:1-5, Acts 19:1-7, Mark 1:4-11)

This Sunday, after detours into the Gospels of Luke and Matthew, we return to Mark’s Gospel, where we will spend much of the coming year. Mark’s Gospel is thought to have been the first of the four Gospels to have been written, from which Matthew and Luke drew much of their material. Mark’s is a fast-moving Gospel, portraying Jesus as a man of action. English translations smooth out the language, but the original Greek reads like a story told by an excited child: Jesus did this, and right away Jesus did that, and then right away Jesus said this, and then right away Jesus said that. The Greek phrase “kai euthus” – “and immediately” or “and right away” – occurs over and over. Mark’s Gospel catches the spirit of what it must have felt like to have been a disciple of Jesus, to be have been caught up among those who followed Jesus during his earthly ministry – Jesus does and says one amazing thing after another, and as the readers of Mark’s Gospel, we stand by watching, with our mouths hanging open in amazement.

Today’s reading is no exception. For one thing, we’ve fast-forwarded from the time of Jesus’ birth until Jesus was about 30 years old. We begin by meeting John the Baptist in the wilderness, that strange character who dressed in camel’s hair with a leather belt and eating locusts – bugs – and wild honey. His appearance brings up historic memories for his listeners. If we were to see someone at Independence Hall dressed in a colonial costume reading from parchment, we would be reminded of the American revolution – and in the same way, John’s dress reminds the crowds of Elijah. Luke’s Gospel tells us that John’s father was a priest at the Temple in Jerusalem, but John is out in the wilderness, far away from the religious establishment of the day, indeed, offering an alternative to the religious establishment – and at the Jordan River, where Joshua long ago had led the Hebrews from the wilderness through the Jordan and into the promised land, into the land of freedom. Mark’s Gospel tells us that crowds of people from the countryside and even from Jerusalem were coming out to see John, to confess their sins and be baptized by John. Mark gives us a picture of a people who are spiritually hungry, who are not being fed spiritually by the rituals of the Temple and the teaching of the established religious leaders, who are willing to travel long distances on foot and far out of their comfort zone in the chance that John will give them something, anything to hold on to.

We think of baptism primarily as a Christian ritual, but Christian baptism had its origin in the Jewish mikveh, a ritual bath. Jews took such a ritual bath as a rite of purification after some event had occurred to make them ritually impure. Orthodox and Conservative Jews continue the practice to this day, the Orthodox Jews so much so that a newly-gathered community is instructed to build a mikveh for the ritual bath before building the synagogue. So John’s baptism would have been like a washing from sin, a fresh start. The mikveh or ritual bath was also a rite of conversion, by which Gentiles were purified before joining the Jewish community. What is striking is that those coming to be baptized by John were already Jews – but the unsatisfying practices of the religious establishment left them feeling defiled and alienated from God. John’s baptism offered a radical way to re-connect to their faith.

So Mark sets the stage – John out in the wilderness leading a renewal movement which attracted Jews from all over. And John says that he is only preparing the way for the coming of one who will be greater than John. John says that he is not worthy to tie this person’s shoelaces. In other words, John tells his followers, “You ain’t seen nothin’ yet.”

And then along comes Jesus. John baptizes him – this would have been full immersion baptism, Jesus down in the muddy water of the Jordan - and Jesus sees the heavens torn open – the sense of this is that the heavens were in some way ripped apart - and the Holy Spirit coming down like a dove. He hears a voice from heaven, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well-pleased.”

This is a turning point in Jesus’ life. The other Gospels tell us that up until this point, he was the carpenter’s son, not seen by most people as anyone special. Those in Jesus’ hometown assumed he would grow up and take over his father’s business and that would be that. But Jesus, following the leading of the Spirit, makes the long journey on foot out into the wilderness to see John the Baptist. With his baptism, Jesus’ life goes off in a radically new direction. Although we won’t read about it until we begin Lent, we know that after Jesus baptism he was tested in the wilderness, and after John was arrested, began to proclaim the coming of the Reign of God. At Jesus’ baptism, the heavens were ripped apart, and God broke into the moment. Jesus’ miracles, healings, teaching were all ways in which Jesus not only proclaimed the Reign of God, but demonstrated God breaking in to take on the powers of evil.

What sustained Jesus through all that he faced throughout his life – testing in the wilderness, the exhaustion that came with ministering to the crowds, the frustration of dealing with his disciples, the emotional stress of confrontation and opposition from the religious establishment? What kept him from crashing and burning? We know that he spent frequent time in prayer, often going off alone to pray. But perhaps part of what kept him going was this moment of baptism, this moment of seeing the heavens ripped apart, of being equipped with the gift of the Holy Spirit, of hearing the voice of God name him as God’s beloved Son. While many of us were baptized as infants and may not remember our baptism, we too can be sustained by the knowledge that, in baptism, God has claimed each of us and called each of us beloved daughters and sons. In words from the funeral service, we remember that we are baptized into Christ’s death so that just as we share a death like Christ’s, we will also share a resurrection like Christ’s. Just as Jesus was equipped at his baptism with the Holy Spirit, so those being baptized are told, “receive the Holy Spirit, child of God, disciple of Christ, member of Christ’s church.”

Like Jesus, we may experience grief, anger, frustration, loneliness. Like Jesus on the cross, there are those moments when we feel so overwhelmed that we say, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me.” In those moments, our baptism reminds us that God will never abandon us. The words of the old Heidelberg Catechism that our older members grew up with, we’re told that our only comfort, in life and in death, is that we belong, body and soul, in life and in death, not to ourselves, but to our faithful Savior, Jesus Christ - who through the waters of baptism has claimed us for his very own.

Tuesday, January 10, 2012

The Empire Strikes Back

(Scripture: Isaiah 60:1-6, Ephesians 3:1-12, Matthew 2:1-23)

Today we celebrate Epiphany – the actual feast of Epiphany was on Friday, January 6, marking the end of the 12 days of Christmas. Epiphany celebrates the revelation of Jesus to the Gentiles, as personified by the Magi, those strange visitors from the East who came to worship Jesus – and who, in the process of seeking Jesus tipped Herod off to the existence of a rival to his power. It’s a story of wonder, the coming of these foreigners to worship the newborn king – a story of horror, as we read of Herod’s slaughter of the innocents – a story of dislocation and exile, as Mary and Joseph and the babe live for a time in Egypt to escape Herod’s fury, basically as political refugees. During my first Christmas Eve here, back in December 2007 – and I used the same readings that had been used before I got here, and have continued with them almost unchanged in the years since - I was struck that the reading from Matthew 2 didn’t stop with the departure of the wise men, but continued all the way to the end of the chapter, with all that we heard Stella read today. Most churches stop short of reading the whole chapter – not wanting to frighten the children on Christmas Eve with words about a murderous psychopath of a king leaving a trail of slaughtered children in his wake – but your Christmas Eve service included everything, the good, the bad, and the ugly. And on that first Christmas Eve here, I thought that said something about this congregation I was just starting to get to know, that you didn’t want an edited, prettied up, Hallmark greeting card Christmas story, but wanted to hear the whole thing, warts and jagged edges and all – and I thought that said something about the faith of this congregation that was mature enough, durable enough to withstand all that life deals out. I was impressed – and I still am.

Matthew’s Gospel circulated within an early Christian community that was primarily but not exclusively Jewish, and so Matthew at every turn ties his birth narrative to the Hebrew Scriptures, what we call the Old Testament. In the Hebrew Scriptures, what we call the Old Testament, there’s a tension, a tug of war, between readings that admonish the Jews to keep separate from the Gentiles, to avoid any contact with them, to maintain ritual purity, and other readings that speak of the Jews being a light to the nations, instructing the Gentiles – which obviously involves being in contact with the Gentiles. This is especially true for those Scriptures written after the return of the Jews from exile in Babylon. So on one hand we have the books of Ezra and Nehemiah admonishing the Jews returning from exile to divorce and send away their foreign wives and any children they may have had with them, while on the other hand we have readings such as this morning’s reading from Isaiah, which tells the Jews rebuilding Jerusalem that “nations shall come to your light, and kings to the brightness of your dawn”, picturing camels coming from the surrounding nations, laden with gifts for the Jews rebuilding the temple, bringing gold and frankincense, proclaiming the praise of the Lord. And this is the image Matthew has in mind when he tells us of the coming of the wise men, with their gifts of gold and frankincense and myrrh. In the coming of the wise men, our reading from Isaiah is being played out. Matthew is telling us that while Jesus the Messiah was born a Jew, he was to be a light to the nations, his coming was for all, Jew and Gentile alike – for you, for me, for all of us, and for our neighbors as well.

And then Matthew goes on to tell us that while the wise men from the east were delighted at the birth of child Jesus, the powers of the Roman empire, in the person of Herod, were distraught. For the powers of the Roman empire, the coming of Jesus was not a gift, but a threat. Rome wasn’t looking for a new king of the Jews – they had already appointed a king for the Jews, and his name was Herod. No others need apply. And so Matthew sketches out an account which would have reminded his Jewish readers of the Old Testament stories of Joseph and of Moses – just as Pharaoh had ordered the slaughter of all male Hebrew babies, Herod ordered the slaughter of the boys of Jesus age. Just as the dreams of Joseph in the Old Testament led him to Egypt, so the dreams of Joseph in Matthew’s gospel led him into Egypt. Just as Moses led the Hebrews out of Egypt, so Mary and Joseph brought Jesus out of Egypt. For Matthew and his community, Jesus was the new Moses, come to lead everyone out of bondage to sin into the freedom of God’s reign.

And so the birth of Jesus provoked wildly divergent reactions – joy, worship, fear, rage, even murder. To the powerless and those on the margins – the shepherds, the wise men traveling from afar – Jesus’ coming brought great joy. To the powers and principalities of the world, Jesus’ coming provoked great opposition – truly for them, Jesus was, as we read last week, a sign to be opposed, so that their inner thoughts would be revealed. And so throughout today’s reading from Matthew’s Gospel, Matthew repeats over and over and over, like a mantra: “having been warned in a dream not to return to Herod, the wise men departed to their own country by another road. Joseph is told to take the child and his mother and flee to Egypt, for Herod is about to search for the child to destroy him….and they went to Egypt and remained there until the death of Herod. Even after Herod’s death, with Herod’s son Archelaus ruling, Joseph is warned in a dream to go to Galilee and keep his distance from Jerusalem.” Don’t return to Herod. Flee Herod, for Herod means harm. Stay away from Herod and his family.

Being warned in a dream not to return to Herod, the wise men departed to their own country by another road. Herod was the local puppet ruler propped up by the Roman empire – and having been threatened by the birth of Jesus, in today’s Gospel reading, the empire strikes back, to borrow a title from the Star Wars series. Having made our annual pilgrimage to worship the newborn king, which road will we take? Will we return to Herod, or will we depart by another path?

For us, Herod represents the worldly powers that be, the powers of empire – the powers of militarism, consumerism, the imposition of the values of the empire on other cultures. As Americans we’re trained from childhood on to see our military power, our wealth, our way of life as gifts from God. But one definition of idolatry is to worship God’s gifts, rather than worshipping God as the giver. And we can – and we do – misuse God’s gifts. World renowned theologian and UCC member Walter Brueggemann, professor of Old Testament at Columbia Theological Seminary in Georgia prior to his retirement, has compared the situation of Christians living in America to that of the Jews living in the Babylonian empire, or that of the early Christians living in the Roman empire – and the Jews and Christians faced a constant struggle not to get sucked into the values of Babylon and Rome. As Christians, if we are not to return to Herod, departing by another way means being not buying into everything our culture wants to sell us, but rather being self-reflective, even self-critical, seeing ourselves as we are, warts and all.

For in Ramah – located north of Jerusalem, and according to some traditions where Rachel was buried – and in Iraq, Afghanistan, and many other lands, Rachel still weeps and refuses to be consoled. I recently attended a talk by Celeste Zappala, a member of First United Methodist Church of Germantown and a Gold Star Mother for Peace. Her oldest son, Sgt. Sherwood Baker, was killed in Iraq on April 26, 2004 as he provided security for the inspectors who were searching for the fictitious weapons of mass destruction. She holds no grudge against the Iraqi people, and indeed feels solidarity with the millions of mothers there whose children have been killed over the past 10 years. Her words of rebuke are reserved for the government who sent her son into harm’s way on false premises. Her talk began with the words of Matthew 2:18: “A voice was heard in Ramah, wailing and loud lamentation, Rachel weeping for her children, she refused to be consoled, because they are no more.” As Herod was on the rampage in our Gospel reading, Herod is still on the rampage to this day, killing innocents the world over. War is a human tragedy, often provoking crimes against humanity, but for military contractors, war is big business. They make a killing, in more ways than one.

We read this passage at our Bible study last Sunday, and many of us asked the question: “Why did God allow all those poor innocent babies to be killed?” At other times we’ve asked about the Holocaust, how God could allow the genocide of millions of Jews. But God did not create human beings as robots, nor is God willing to step in minute by minute to override every stupid, sinful decision human beings make - but instead God allows humans freedom of choice – and real choices have real consequences, intended and unintended – so in one sense, to blame God is to pass the buck. Perhaps a more appropriate - and more challenging – question is, “Why do we allow it?” We need to be aware of the road that leads back to Herod, and of the other road that leads to freedom in Christ.

I’ll close with these words from a song most of us learned as children: “Let there be peace on earth, and let it begin with me” As the sign on our social hall door says, “Let peace begin with me” – and with you, and with all of us here at Emanuel. After all, it has to start somewhere. Amen.

Endings and Beginnings

(Scriptures Isaiah 61:10-11, Isaiah 62:1-3, Galatians 4:4-7, Luke 2:21-40)

I’m sure, among the Christmas music that we’ve heard on the radio since about Halloween or so, you remember hearing John Lennon’s song that begins:

“And so this is Christmas, and what have we done?
Another year over, a new one just begun.”

This song, written in 1971 – when I was all of 10 years old - as a protest to the Vietnam war – remember the chorus – “War is over, if you want it” - has after 40 years faded into the background music while we shop at the mall. I guess almost anything can become background noise if we listen to it long enough. A song that 40 years ago had an edge to it, had a bite to it, after 40 years has seemingly had its teeth extracted and its dentures put in a glass to soak. Anything can become background noise if we listen to it long enough – and there’s a risk that our Gospel reading for this morning, which has great pathos, sudden shifts in feeling and mood, along with some sharp, jagged edges, can likewise fade into background noise, especially on this New Year’s morning, when perhaps it’s a bit harder than usual to focus. So I’d challenge us to pay special attention to our changing feelings as we consider this morning’s reading from the Gospel of St. Luke.

This morning’s reading gives us a poignant moment in the life of Mary and the baby Jesus. We’re told that in accordance to the requirements of the law – Luke is very particular about quoting the requirements, including Jesus’ circumcision on his 8th day – Mary and Joseph took Jesus to the Temple, to offer the prescribed sacrifice – a pair of turtledoves or two young pigeons. So far we’ve read about the law, about the fulfillment of prescribed religious observance, about Mary and Joseph doing their religious duty. And we all know what that feels like…doing one’s duty makes one feel….dutiful – sort of like sending in one’s tax return - but it doesn’t necessarily bring any great amount of joy or feeling of liberation, just the relief of having done what is expected and of avoiding criticism or even punishment for noncompliance – sort of like the relief we may feel when we drop our tax return off at the post office on April 15. Relief, but hardly refreshment.

As Mary and Joseph trudge their way to the Temple to do their duty, to do what’s expected, unexpected encounters ensue with two other people who were coming to the Temple that day. (And here’s one quick takeaway – no Sunday morning in church is ‘just another Sunday morning’ – there’s always the chance that God will find a way to surprise us.) Luke tells us that old Simeon, prompted by the Holy Spirit, was on his way to the Temple. Simeon’s path crossed that of Mary and Joseph, and all of a sudden he started gushing on and on and on some more about this baby whom he’d never laid eyes on before. “Now let your servant depart in peace, for my eyes have seen your salvation.” Simeon had been told by God that he would not die until he had seen the Messiah – in Jewish rabbinical literature in use even to this day, there’s all manner of instruction as to where one will find the Messiah and how one will recognize the Messiah - and now Simeon recognized the Messiah, recognized that God’s promise was fulfilled. Simeon goes on, calling the child “a light of revelation to the Gentiles, and the glory of God’s people Israel.”


A few more lyrics from John Lennon’s song:

“And so this is Christmas/ For weak and for strong
For rich and the poor ones/ The world is so wrong
And so Happy Christmas/ For black and for white
For yellow and red ones/ Let's stop all the fight”

We’re told that Simeon blesses the child, but it’s quite a cryptic blessing – Simeon says that the child is destined for the falling and rising of many in Israel, calls the child a sign that will be opposed, revealing the inner thoughts of many – and warns Mary that a sword will pierce her heart as well. Mary’s heart was pierced with a sword more than once, when Jesus left his family behind to hang out at the Temple, when Jesus began his earthly ministry, certainly at the cross. And so we have pain in the midst of God’s blessing, God’s blessing in the midst of the world’s pain – a tension that Mary lived with, that Jesus certainly experienced in his earthly ministry – the state-sponsored execution of John, who had baptized him; misunderstanding by friends and foes alike, betrayal, desertion, his own state-sponsored execution on the cross. It’s a tension that we in the church live with as well, knowing that it is in our deepest moments of sorrow and desolation that God is nearest to us. God is there, and our pain is there in God’s presence. The pain is there, and God is present there in the midst of the pain.

As it is for us and as it was for John Lennon, so it was in Jesus time – “for weak and for strong, for rich and the poor ones, the world was and is so wrong. For black and for white, the yellow and red ones, there was and is a need to stop all the fight” Jesus was a threat to Herod, to Pilate, and Jesus remains a threat to the Herods and Pilates of our day, to the empires of our day, to the worldly powers that be. And for exactly that reason, Jesus remains a source of hope for those of us who, with Jesus, don’t march to the world’s beat, but march to the different drummer of the Spirit within our hearts. I’m reminded of these words of the Roman Catholic Trappist monk, mystic and writer Thomas Merton:

“Into this world, this demented inn, in which there is absolutely no room for Him at all, Christ has come uninvited. But because He cannot be at home in it, because He is out of place in it, and yet he must be in it, His place is with those others for whom there is no room, His place is with those who do not belong, who are rejected by power because they are regarded as weak, those who are discredited, who are denied the status of persons, who are tortured, bombed, and exterminated. With those for whom there is no room, Christ is present in the world. He is mysteriously present in those for whom there seems to be nothing but the world at its worst. . . . It is in these that He hides Himself, for whom there is no room.”
(Thomas Merton, “The Time of the End is the Time of No Room,”
in Raids on the Unspeakable, pp. 72-3)

Luke tells us that after Mary and Joseph part from Simeon, they have yet another divine encounter, with a prophet – a female prophet, let me underscore – “Anna the daughter of Phanuel, of the tribe of Asher.” Luke tells us that

“She was of a great age, having lived with her husband for seven years after her marriage, then as a widow to the age of eighty-four. She never left the temple but worshipped there with fasting and prayer night and day. At that moment she came, and began to praise God and to speak about the child to all who were looking for the redemption of Jerusalem."

For Herod, the birth of Jesus was bad news. But for aged Simeon, who had waited so faithfully for so long, and for aged Anna, who had been without a husband for so many years, vulnerable and increasingly frail with the passing of the years, the birth of the Christ-child was great good news – news that upset the status quo, literally earth-shaking (or at least society-shaking) news, but good news all the same. Sometimes having our cages rattled is a good thing, and having our prison doors opened is the best news of all. In a Christmas Eve service in 1978, the martyred Archbishop Oscar Romero of El Salvador, who was gunned down in 1980 by a government hit squad while celebrating Mass, preached these words:

“No one can celebrate a genuine Christmas without being truly poor. The self sufficient, the proud, those who, because they have everything, look down on others, those who have no need of God — for them there will be no Christmas. Only the poor, the hungry, those who need someone to come on their behalf, will have that someone. That someone is God., Emmanuel, God-with-us. Without poverty of spirit, there can be no abundance of God.”
Archbishop Oscar Romero, December 24, 1978,
in James Brockman, ed., the Church Is All of You

Our Gospel reading was a reading about endings and beginnings, the end of waiting for fulfillment of God’s promises for old Simeon and Anna, as they meet the Christ child at hils life’s beginning. Last night and today are days of endings and beginnings as well, as we say goodbye to the year 2011 and begin the year 2012. Forty years after John Lennon sang regarding the Vietnam war, “War is over, if you want it”, our troops have at long last ended another war, are at long last leaving Iraq. We will still have a diplomatic presence there, large enough to populate a sizable town actually, but at least on paper, this particular war is over – though other wars drag on elsewhere in the middle east. For many of us, whether we had loved ones in Iraq, Afghanistan, or elsewhere, or not, it was a difficult year as we fought our own individual and family battles against grief, illness, unemployment, domestic upheaval, depression, deprivation, and as we say goodbye to 2011, we may be tempted to say “good riddance” as well. It may only be in retrospect, looking back months or years from now, that we understand where God was with us in our pain. And for many of us, 2012 will bring both new joys and new battles. May we remember that when we are in need, that is when God is most present with us, that when we feel most strongly our poverty of spirit, we can also know the abundance of God.

I’ll close with these lyrics from John Lennon:

A very merry Christmas And a happy New Year
Let's hope it's a good one Without any fear

May we enter 2012 surrounded by that perfect love of God which casts out all fear, surrounded and filled with the presence of God with us, Emanuel. Amen.