Saints

 

Saint Gregory of Nyssa Episcopal Church has a beautiful distinction of honoring a diverse group of people.  Their sanctuary has a mural created by artist Mark Dukes known as The Dancing Saints.  Here is a website to explore some of the images:

https://saintgregorys.org/about/the-dancing-saints/

 

For a close-up of each saint copy and paste this link into a new tab:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/saintgregorys-nyssa/albums/72157633771781664/with/26946263800

 

The saints depicted in this artwork include Anne Frank, Black Elk, Desmond Tutu, John Coltrane, Sojourner Truth, and many more.  This beautiful mural of Dancing Saints reminds us of the great cloud of witnesses who enfold us and hold us.  Saints need not be from the past, but are woven into our daily lives.  I pray you are starting to think about saints who have blessed you.  Saints are people who share the journey of faith with you.  Saints are the ones who challenge your understanding and stretch your soul.  Saints, like prophets, are people empowered and infused with God’s light.  Saints let God’s light shine through their actions and words.  We ~ you and me ~ are saints as we seek to live our belovedness with the world, especially here and now.  Saints are not heroes or sheroes…they don’t have to do miracles, unless we are speaking of the miracle of sharing life and living God’s love.  May our understanding of saints continue to help us move in new directions and destinations in our faith each day. 

Saints

 

On Monday, we named St. Katharine, who embodied our Racial Justice Covenant.  Yesterday, we named St. Francis, who embodied our Creation Justice Covenant.  Today, we turn to some saints who embodied our Inclusive, LGBTQ covenant.  A few examples are St. Joan of Arc, who is honored for her courage and challenging gender norms by wearing men’s clothing.  St. Hildegard von Bingen is a German mystic who embraced a variety of human experiences and expressions.  Hildegard wrote of the feminine aspects of our inclusive God.  You may have heard of St. Wilgefortis, who, to avoid a forced marriage, prayed to grow a beard and was crucified.  Finally, St. Aelred of Rievaulx was a monk who wrote about sacred friendship with same-gender individuals.  I pray that what you are realizing from the meditations this week is that there is a vast variety of religious expressions and people who have walked the road of faith before us.  We follow the footprints of brave and bold individuals who cared for all people regardless of skin color, who sought to be in harmony with creation, who saw people as God’s beloved and expressed love in beautiful ways.  When I read about folx like this, I realize that our covenants are built on ancient truths.  We are not the first, nor the last, to explore and expand the holy encounters with the Eternal.  I pray today you might find some time to look into the diversity of saints and begin to read about the ways people have made the road by walking faithfully with God each day.  Amen.

Saints

 

Yesterday, I introduced you to St. Katharine Drexel, whom you may not have known before reading the Morning Meditation.  Today, I want to share about St. Francis of Assisi.  St. Francis is known for his love and care for animals, creation, and his tender heart for the poor and sick.  He is known for the prayer:

 

Lord, make me an instrument of your peace:
where there is hatred, let me sow love;
where there is injury, pardon;
where there is doubt, faith;
where there is despair, hope;
where there is darkness, light;
where there is sadness, joy.
O divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek
to be consoled as to console,
to be understood as to understand,
to be loved as to love.
For it is in giving that we receive,
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned,
and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.

 

Francis once said, “The safest remedy against the thousand snares and wiles of the enemy is spiritual joy”.  Or contemporary poet, J. Drew Lanham says, “joy is the justice we give ourselves.”  One stanza of Lanham’s poem goes, “Joy is all the Black birds, flocked together, too many to count, too many to name, every one different from the next, swirling in singularity across amber-purpled sky. Joy is being loved up close for who we are.”  Many parts of St. Francis speak to my soul, including his simple way of life.  In our own fast-paced, consumer-oriented, information-overload time, we need to slow down to God’s pace (remember the September slow-down meditations didn’t end when we turned the calendar to October!).  Take time today to pray with St. Francis by going outside.  You can read about St. Francis, who had a reputation for living a life of luxury as a young person before giving up all his wealth.  Or did you know that in 1223 Francis staged the first-ever live Nativity scene in Greccio, Italy?  St. Francis reminds me of our Creation Justice Covenant that instills and inspires us to see God’s handiwork in the world around us.  Step outside today and pray the prayer above for yourself and for our world, where faith, hope, and joy are needed today.

Saints

 

Yesterday in worship, we named our saints.  We sang the great line that, “saints are folks like you and me, God help me to be one too.”  Sometimes Protestants are squeamish about saints.  What is your reaction and response to this word, “saints”?  The Catholic church has over 10,000 saints.  Some are names you would recognize: St. Peter, St. Francis, St. Christopher (the patron saint of travelers), St. Jude (the patron saint of lost causes, which I can really identify with), and, of course, Mary and Joseph (Jesus’ parents) are saints too.  Have you heard of the practice of burying St. Joseph upside down in your yard to sell your house? I confess that I did that when we sold our house in Janesville years ago.  Or maybe you’ve seen a statue of St. Francis at your local gardening center, as he is the saint of creation.  Or maybe you’ve heard of someone praying to St. Joseph (Jesus’ foster father) when looking for employment?

 

There are saints for many occasions ~ Saint Isidore of Seville is the patron saint of the internet ~ not exactly the job I would want.  Saint Rita is known as the patron saint of impossible situations.  And St. Friard, who is the patron saint against a fear of wasps ~ which, as someone who has an allergy to stings, I am going to learn more about him, maybe buy his statue to keep in my pocket! 

 

What I find fascinating is the lives of faithful people.  My hunch is Friard didn’t set out to be known for his connection to wasps!!  Let me introduce you to another saint, St. Katharine Drexel, who lived 1858-1955.  She was the founder of Xavier University in New Orleans, the first Catholic University for African Americans.  She is now the patron saint of racial justice and philanthropists.  She came from a wealthy family.  Her mother died when she was five weeks old, so she was raised by a stepmother and father, both of whom cared for the poor.  She spoke about the injustices on reservations and gave up her wealth to become a missionary in the United States.  According to the Archdiocese of San Francisco, “She was crafty and politically savvy, working around Jim Crow laws in the South that prohibited Blacks and whites from sitting together in church.”  As one example of her craftiness, notes Anthony Walton, she set up church seating so that the separation ran from front to back, so that both whites and Blacks were sitting parallel to each other rather than with Blacks in the back.  To be sure, that doesn’t seem so revolutionary or rebellious, but I am sure if Twitter had been around during Katharine’s life, she would have had a few trolls threatening her. Also, did you know, her feast day is my birthday, March 3.  I encourage you today to look up St. Martin De Porres, whose feast day is today.  He lived in Lima, Peru, in the 16^th Century to learn more about his faith and how his song might sing to your soul in these days.  

Morning Meditation

 

On October 31, 1517, the Catholic Priest, Martin Luther, posted his 95 Theses to the door of All Saints’ Church in Wittenberg, Germany.  Many view this action as the beginning of the Protestant Church, which the UCC is classified and categorized.  Luther didn’t want to break from his Catholic faith; he wanted to begin a discussion of the papal practice of raising money by charging for the forgiveness of sins.  There was even a popular saying, “As soon as the coin of the coffer (offering plate) rings, the soul from purgatory springs.”  While I love the fact that the saying rhymes, the reality is that this turns our relationship with God into a transaction and makes my stomach queasy as we begin our Stewardship Season here.

 

The church has had a complicated relationship with money.  On the one hand, we need financial resources to keep the lights on, the air conditioning running, the staff compensated fairly/justly for the faithful work each does, and to maintain our church campus.  On the other hand, the world is full of God’s beloved who lack financial resources that we could direct our dollars toward.  We walk a tight rope trying to be good stewards of your gifts of time, talent, and treasure.  We seek prayerfully to find ways to keep our church thriving and share God’s love beyond our walls.  The reality is that each member of our church has a financial autobiography.  You picked up lessons about money from your family and friends.  You caught cultural messages through advertising.  And we swim in a sea of messages about money ~ trying to untangle the string of thoughts and emotions inside us is difficult and demanding.  We have a past, present, and future with our relationship with money.  In the mail this week, members of our church received your pledge card.  I pray you take a moment before filling out the information to center yourself.  Remind yourself that you are held by the Holy, God has you, knows you, and all of you is welcome ~ from the top of your head to pinkie toe.  We live in a time where peace can be elusive, some of the stress and strain is around money ~ will we have enough, and what is enough?  I pray that our time of stewardship this year will be filled with honesty, peace, and hope for what God is doing here and now.  May the dream of God’s love be realized in us and through us for the sake of the world God so loves.  Amen.  

Prayer for Today

 

Which of the prayers so far this week did you find most helpful?  Remember, there is no right answer; in fact, you may not have liked either poem/prayer from the past three days.  If the peace prayers of the first three days stirred you, I pray these words might hold and help. This prayer comes from John Birch:

 

We are molded, each one of us,
in the image of God,
and within our souls, there is a fingerprint
none can erase.
We pray for those who have no regard
for anyone but self,
who put no value on human life.
For nations and individuals who abuse and kill.
We are not called to be judge or jury,
but we are called to be agents of change,
and if the butterfly that flaps its wings
should be our attitude to others
then so be it, Lord,
and may the waves this generates
somewhere within the world
reach into the hearts and souls of those
for whom we pray, and reveal to them
how precious are those
for whom they have no love,
and how precious are they
who now bring tears to the eyes of God.

 

I find the image of “tears to the eyes of God” to be profound and powerful.  What makes God cry right now?  Are there ways that I might be contributing to God’s sorrow or lament?  Which words of the prayer above caught your attention?  Were there words that caused your shoulders to tense or your stomach to turn?  Were there parts of the prayer your inner defense attorney objected to?  Were there moments your shy soul said, “Amen”?  Re-read the prayer again at some point today to see how the words land in you at that time.  May the preciousness of God’s gaze be felt in your life this day.  Amen.

Prayer for Today

 

Please pray for Jamaica, Cuba, and all in the path of Hurricane Melissa.

A prayer for World Peace from 1978

 

We pray for the power to be gentle;
the strength to be forgiving;
the patience to be understanding;
and the endurance to accept the consequences
of holding on to what we believe to be right.

May we put our trust in the power of good to overcome evil
and the power of love to overcome hatred.

We pray for the vision to see and the faith to believe
in a world emancipated from violence,
a new world where fear shall no longer lead men or women to commit injustice,
nor selfishness makes them bring suffering to others.

Help us to devote our whole life and thought and energy
to the task of making peace,
Praying always for the inspiration and the power
to fulfill the destiny for which we and all men and women were created.

 

Notice this is a personal and communal prayer.  You could substitute the word “we” to “I” above.  I pray for power to be gentle (I love that paradoxical phrase and the counter-cultural idea that power can be gentle); for the strength to be forgiving (again, forgiveness as strong rather than weak); for patience or curiosity to understand.  Where is there a situation in your life where you feel the holy nudge to be gentle, forgiving, and understanding?

 

Which words of the prayer above caught your attention?  Were there words that caused your shoulders to tense or your stomach to turn?  Were there parts of the prayer your inner defense attorney objected to?  Were there moments your shy soul said, “Amen”?  Re-read the prayer again at some point today to see how the words land in you at that time.  And may peace be planted in your heart and alive in your life this week.  Amen.