2 Easter, 2026-A: Room to doubt

Lectionary: Acts 2:14a,22-32; Psalm 16; 1 Peter 1:3-9; John 20:19-31 

En el nombre de Dios: creador, redentor, y santificador... In the name of God, Creator, Redeemer, and Sanctifier. Amen. 

After a powerful Holy Week, followed by glorious Easter celebrations, the overwhelming joy continues for us today as we are blessed to Baptize Vera Blair Nash and welcome her into the part of the body of Christ at Emmanuel. The joyful innocence of a child always invigorates our hope, but more importantly, Vera’s presence among us gives us a holy purpose: to notice and nurture her unique gifts, then provide her ways to practice and use them as she grows in her faith.

As Vera’s family of faith, we will affirm our responsibility and our joyful duty to teach Vera to live in accordance with her faith. Vera will learn that from her experience of our words and our lives. She will discover that formation is a life-long process by witnessing us continually evolving and growing in our faith as Jesus continues to be revealed to us.

Like Thomas in our gospel, Vera also will be given room to doubt. In the Gospel story, the disciple Thomas missed Jesus’ first appearance in the locked room to which the disciples had fled in fear. He missed Jesus breathing his Spirit on them. He missed Jesus’ teaching about what that meant; and when the others told him about it he didn’t believe them. I won’t believe a thing you say, Thomas insisted, unless I see it for myself.

Like Thomas, so many of us just aren’t there at first. Doubt is a natural part of the path of faith and it is to be embraced, not denied, as Thomas witnessed for us. There are times each of us may wonder what our friends know and experience about God that we don’t, and it may leave us feeling different or alone, even in the midst of our faith community.

The Good News in this gospel story, however, is that Jesus will come to us, just as he did for Thomas. Jesus will meet us at the place of our doubt and invite us to touch the divine.

We don’t know if Thomas actually touched Jesus or if he was transformed simply by his encounter with the living Christ, but Thomas’ response gives voice to a universal sigh that echoes through the generations each time someone is penetrated by a true experience of unity with God in Jesus: My Lord and my God!

The gospel assures us that whenever we fall into doubt or gloom, Jesus will come to us. It may be that he comes to us through a friend who reaches out, or maybe in a quiet moment of prayer, or in a dream while we sleep. In whatever way it happens, we are assured that Jesus will meet us where we are, invite us to reconnect, and restore us to wholeness.

When Jesus breathed on the disciples, he repeated the act of the Creator God in Genesis who breathed life into the first humans. As he did this, Jesus said, "Peace be with you." This isn't just a word of comfort to the disciples. It's a gift of wholeness.

The word is shalom, and the new life being breathed on them was the very substance of Jesus' own Spirit which connected them. This was their moment of reconciliation to God in Christ and it's a synergistic moment. They are the exactly same as they were, only completely different. Their humanity has now been united to Christ's divinity and that changes everything. The next step is to learn how to live with one foot in both worlds, as my grandmother used to say: one on earth and one in heaven.

Then Jesus taught them how to do just that. What you do on earth happens in heaven. If you forgive what separates and divides on earth, it will be reconciled in heaven. If you don’t, it won’t. The onus is on the disciples to forgive as Jesus forgave. This is not ecclesial power given to some to wield over others, but rather a call for all to work for the reconciliation, the reconnection of all, by the forgiveness of sin.

The world had just crucified Jesus, yet from his cross he forgave them, reconciling even his executioners, and all those who supported them, back into the community of God’s love. We, those upon whom Jesus has breathed his own spirit, are now to do the same. We must love as Jesus loved, and forgive as Jesus forgave.

As we watch the news, we realize how big an ask that is... which, again, is why we do this together, as a community of faith. It takes all of us together to accomplish this.

The world is in a state of tumult at the moment, a monumental transition, as I called it on Easter Sunday. We will survive it. Of that I’m certain.

As we navigate our way through it, we do well to consider: what are we witnessing to our children? How are we preparing them to endure the hard moments they will face one day? In addition, what do those outside of our faith community learn about God’s love by looking at us? What is our true witness?

I am grateful to be serving with a congregation devoted to inclusion, hospitality, service, and justice. I believe we do reflect the life and teachings of Christ here – in all our imperfection. Into this family, we now bring Vera, God’s gift to us.

Given her name, I anticipate that Vera might be bringing us truth – truth we might need to know; truth that might change us. Who knows? God knows and gives us the grace to spend the time with her to find out.

8:00 am: Amen. 

9:30 am: I now invite Vera’s family and godparents to bring Vera to the font for Baptism.

Easter 2026-A: A "Holy Birthing"

Lectionary: Acts 10:34-43; Psalm 118:1-2, 14-24; Colossians 3:1-4; Matthew 28:1-10

En el nombre de Dios: creador, redentor, y santificador. Amen. In the name of God: Creator, Redeemer, and Sanctifier. Amen. 

¡Feliz Pascua! Happy Easter!

Today, we celebrate a holy birthing happening among us - again. The seeds of new life that God planted in us and that we have nurtured through the season of Lent are ready to emerge from the womb of God, live in the light, and bring forth fruit. It’s a sacred cycle we follow year after year, contained within the story of our salvation.

New life, resurrection life in Jesus, is our promise from God in Christ. And it’s about the life we are living now, not one we hope to live after our earthly bodies die.

In the story of our beginnings, Moses led the suffering people of God out of oppression in Egypt into freedom in Canaan. Moses was a prophetic voice ushering in a monumental change in the politics and religion of his time, one that echoes in our present time.

Amid the recent unrest in America and around the world, I’ve been hearing a familiar quote repeated. It is often attributed to The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., but he was actually quoting abolitionist, Theodore Parker, who in 1853, said: “the moral arc of the universe is long, but it bends toward justice.”

Parker was a prophetic voice ushering in a change toward justice in the form of freedom for enslaved people in America – which happened when the Emancipation Proclamation was signed into law in 1861. 

One hundred years later, Rev. Dr. King’s prophetic voice ushered in change in the form of equal opportunity and protection of the law, and freedom from discrimination for all people regardless of race, sex, religion, age, and disability. The Civil Rights Act was signed into law in 1964, followed by the Voting Rights Act of 1965, recently repealed.

Each of these examples illustrates for us how difficult and slow monumental transitions can be. They also uphold for us how hope endures.

Theologian Walter Bruggeman says, “Hope is subversive.” I agree. When people hope for something better, they are challenging the status quo, and that makes those in power and those benefiting from the status quo nervous, just as Herod and Pilate were when Jesus challenged their status quo. When that happens, those in power gear up and close ranks to protect the established system.

Like most prophets, Rev. Dr. King’s message was subversive because it was a message of hope, of inclusion, of God’s unfailing love for all people. He assured us all that, despite the entrenched practices of the established system, we could bring about change and live together as one people, in freedom and in unity. We were heading there until this present backlash. 

Each age strives to bend the moral arc of the universe closer to justice. The longer we do this, the closer we get, despite the backlashes.

One day soon, the oppressed and the oppressor will be reconciled and live together in unity and harmony, each person’s dignity will be respected, and all of creation will be stewarded faithfully for the gifts it offers, not exploited to profit a few.

How do I know this? Because Jesus has promised it and God is accomplishing it. 

Our part is to embody the subversive hope we have in Jesus Christ in the midst of global wars and instability, resource hoarding, climate destruction, and the denigration and abuse of LGBTQIA2S+ kin, immigrants, women, and children around the world.

Our Baptism calls us to seek peace, justice, and respect the dignity of all people, remembering what Peter said, “I truly understand that God shows no partiality, but in every nation anyone who fears God and does what is right is acceptable to God. You know the message God sent to the people of Israel, preaching peace by Jesus Christ--who is Lord of all.”

It is our purpose and responsibility as Christians to witness and live as bearers of Christ’s love in this transitional moment in history. It isn’t easy – and often, it isn’t safe either, as the deaths of Rene Goode and Alex Pretti confirm. Yet, we are not afraid because deep in our spirits we continually hear Jesus’ comforting words to the Marys at the empty tomb: “Do not be afraid.”

Every day, we witness the kidnapping, torture, trafficking, and even execution of people by those working to protect the status quo. Is it any wonder God is guiding us into a major transition, a holy birthing, that will upend this status quo and open to us a new way to live together?

Jesus is the source of our subversive hope, and the Holy Spirit is the energy within us that keeps us bending that arc toward God’s justice. The eternal, living presence of God, whose mercy endures forever, is always with us, in us, redeeming all things - sometimes before we even recognize the need for it. In fact, that’s often how we recognize the need for it.

On that first Easter, when Jesus stood up in the grave, shook loose his burial linens, and left that tomb empty, he transformed every future transition for humankind. By overcoming death and the grave, Jesus opened to us a new life - life in the eternal, real presence of God, making every human transition a holy birthing infused by divine life.

The transition Jesus ushered in that first Easter, and every one since, is the establishment of the kingdom of God on earth as it is in heaven. That’s one of those phrases we say a lot, but do we know what we mean? For us, the kingdom of God is a state of being, a way of existing where God’s love is preeminent, guiding us and uniting us in that divine love.

God is sending us again - today - into the world, as prophetic voices of love to challenge and transform the established systems that oppress, harm, and destroy God’s creation. As we head out, it helps us to remember the example of Peter, who was sent by God, not because he was so astute (right?) but because he was faithful, allowing the holy birthing within him to bear fruit.

Look at Peter’s legacy! God created him, gifted him, and sent him to live out his purpose. And Peter did that – in all his imperfection – and changed the world.

So can we, because God chooses us too in all our imperfection. We have one vital purpose as the Church, the Community of the New Covenant established by Jesus: to restore all people to unity with God and each other through prayer, worship, proclamation of the Good News, and by promoting justice, peace, and love. (BCP, 855)

Reconciled people live in harmony and unity with one another and with God. The goal of the moral arc of the universe, its terminus, is accomplished through faithful, perseverant, reconciliation of the whole world to God - including the tyrants, oppressors, and destroyers of life and nature among us.  They are created of God too, broken, dying souls, beloved of God, who need our prayers. As Jesus said, “love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.” (Mt 5:44) Praying for accountability is an act of love that can set them free.

We gather every Easter to claim the holy birthing God is doing in us. Then we take that new life and proclaim out loud, by our words and our lives, the powerful truth that God is love, a love that never dies, as Jesus demonstrated that first Easter, and that God’s love is for all people and all of creation.

The monumental transition we are currently in will lead to more difficult days ahead. The status quo isn’t easily changed, but it does change, and it’s happening again – right now. We don’t know exactly what form this transition will take, any more than the prophetic voices who went before us did in their time, but that doesn't matter, because our faith assures us that God is love, Christ is risen, and the Holy Spirit dwells in us, enabling us to keep bending that arc toward God’s justice for all.

I close with portions of a prayer poem by Sister Joyce Rupp called, Holy Birthing. I’ve changed it from first person singular to plural. 

 “Holy Midwife, 

you rejoiced at the birth of creation. 

We hold up to you the intuited mystery 

of something new being birthed in us. 

It has no face, no name, no sound, no shape. 

We only know that something unperceived 

is meant to come to life 

inside the womb of our deepest selves. 

 ...Help us to be attuned to the contractions of our spirits, 

to relax when we ought and push when we must. 

Encourage us to believe in what we cannot yet see. 

...Let us have faith in something good slowly taking shape 

and be trusting enough to stay in the birthing process. 

Let us be willing to endure the sweat and the groans 

and to cheer wildly when new life comes bursting forth.” 

 (Joyce Rupp, Prayers to Sophia, Soren Books, 2010, p 18)

Amen.

4 Lent, Laetare Sunday, 26-A: Receptive God-Consciousness

Lectionary: 1 Samuel 16:1-13; Psalm 23; Ephesians 5:8-14; John 9:1-41

The live delivery of this sermon can be found on Emmanuel's YouTube channel.

 En el nombre de Dios, que continúa reconciliándonos en su amor... In the name of God, who continues to reconcile us into Their love. Amen. 

On Laetare Sunday, we pause and assess our Lenten experience. Many of us have given up something to experience emptiness or added in something, like a spiritual practice, to build a new habit to strengthen our God-consciousness.

We have worked to focus our attention and intention – and today we take a breath and see where we are. How is our journey into God-consciousness going so far?

Our readings today equip us to notice God-consciousness through the dynamic relationships of earth and eternity, body and spirit, darkness of understanding and enlightenment. When taken as parts of a single story, the lectionary provides a cohesive, balanced look at God’s loving, continuing plan of reconciliation.

The Old Testament reading illustrates the dynamic relationship of earth and eternity. God and Samuel have regular conversations in which God guides Samuel’s understanding and actions.

Samuel, grieving the rupture of his relationship with Saul, who continued to disobey God and go his own way, had to tell Saul that God had taken away his kingship, making the two spiritual friends into earthly enemies.

God tells Samuel to go to Bethlehem and anoint a new king, a son of Jesse. To get there, Samuel has to pass through Saul’s territory, and he knows Saul will try to kill him if he does. So, God gave Samuel very Episcopalian guidance: worship together. You will be united in your worship – and they are.

The process of choosing the next king illustrates for us that a) God will always show us the way to go; b) it will probably not be what we expect; and c) God sees what we can’t because God looks on our hearts. God chooses David, the youngest and therefore, least important in ranking of Jesse’s sons. Samuel obeys, accepting this surprising choice, and anoints David as king.

The writer of this story uses two very important symbols: the shepherd and anointing oil. In those days, a king was considered a shepherd and a host. They were called to serve and protect their flock and provide for their needs. David was already keeping earthly sheep and now would shepherd God’s people. Earth and eternity...

Oil was used for anointing because it symbolized power and dedication to a holy purpose. When David was anointed as king, he was consecrated for a holy purpose in a manifest way – just like we do at Baptism, Confirmation, and ordinations. Body and spirit...

Once consecrated for his holy purpose, David went on to defeat Goliath and lead the people of God into an era of peace and prosperity. He became the icon of a faithful king, a true shepherd and host of the people in his care.

We move from this story into the wonderful Laetare meditation of Psalm 23 where God is our king, our shepherd and host. Please close your eyes if you feel comfortable and enter the experience of this beautiful psalm.

God says, come, lie down on this soft grass beside this peaceful pond and rest your weary soul. We obey, noticing that our breathing slows, our faces relax, the knots in our stomachs and tension in our chests release.

Please, everyone, take a deep breath in - filling yourself with the grace of God. Now breathe out, releasing all your stress. Stay in that peace for just a moment. (pause)

Then God comes to us, takes us by the hand, and leads us to a beautiful table which has been carefully set for us, but not just for us. As we look around the table, we see those who trouble us also seated there. Yet, somehow, the divine peace within us remains, and we relent from judging, questioning, or even desiring to exclude them.

There we all are, sitting together at a table covered in fresh linens. The fragrance and beauty of the flowers and food fill our senses.

It’s a family meal. Everyone there is included, protected, and provided for. Our cups are truly running over, and joy abounds within us and all around us.

Then, God anoints each of our heads with oil. As you breathe, feel the finger of God marking you, consecrating you, and filling you with God’s own loving power and a holy purpose. This is God’s promise and provision for all.

If your eyes were closed, open them now as we enter the less well-said invitation to live as children of light found in the letter to the Ephesians. The author meant well, but got caught up in earthly judgment, shame, and behavior.

Despite that miss, the light of Christ is real and true. Jesus came to enlighten the darkness of our understanding, just as the disciples and others were enlightened in the gospel story.

This story begins with the disciples asking Jesus about sin, using the example of a blind beggar they pass, probably on their way to the temple to worship. The blind man, being ostracized, would have been begging outside the temple precincts. These people of God are not united in worship.

The common belief was that the man’s blindness from birth was punishment for sin that either he committed while still in the womb or his parents committed before his birth. So, who sinned? the disciples asked.

No one did, Jesus replies. This isn’t punishment for sin. It’s a context for experiencing God’s grace – an opportunity for revelation and right relationship.

Then Jesus takes the dust of the earth, the substance from which we are made in Genesis, and just remembered on Ash Wednesday, and he mixes it with his spittle, living water from his own body. He rubs it on the man’s eyes and sends him to wash in the pool of Siloam.

The man’s obedience to Jesus contrasts with Saul’s disobedience to God. As a result, the eyes of his body are opened, but more importantly, so are the eyes of his spirit.

This sets everyone off. He’s an unworthy nobody, an obvious sinner!

The religious leaders argue with the now-seeing man, eventually deporting him. Focused on rules, order, and authority ( masculine principles, btw), they fail to see what this once-blind man now sees. Banishing him enables them to reassert the status quo.

Jesus sees this and clarifies God’s eternal plan being fulfilled in this moment in him: “I came into this world for judgment so that those who do not see may see, and those who do see may become blind.”

This blind man, who was reviled and exiled for his assumed sinfulness, was the only one being receptive (a feminine principle) to the grace being given to him, and that enabled him to enter into God-consciousness, to “see” the truth, worship Jesus, and believe. The religious leaders were not receptive, and Jesus calls them out as being intentionally blind, which he says is sin, because their presumed knowledge becomes a stumbling block to God’s grace – intentionally disrupting the unity of the family of God.

When we operate from God-consciousness, our perspective is always guided by God’s love for all. Our actions are always guided by God’s love for all.

As we complete our final week of Lent, let’s refocus our attention and intention and open ourselves to be receptive to the grace God is giving us, so we, like the blind man, will truly see, believe, and live as children of the light of Christ. Amen.

3 Lent, 26-A: Identity of Belonging

Lectionary: Exodus 17:1-7; Psalm 95; Romans 5:1-11; John 4:5-42

 

 En el nombre de Dios, a cuya familia todos pertenecemos...                                                                         In the name of God, in whose family all belong. Amen.

The clergy of our diocese met in retreat last week. Our retreat leader was Jake Owensby, former rector here at Emmanuel and current bishop of WLA. It was lovely to get to know Bp. Jake and hear stories about Emmanuel from him and other clergy whose spiritual journeys are connected to us. 

Listening to them affirmed my belief that this parish is really good at something that scares most Episcopalians into silence: evangelism! You are – but we’ll get to that a bit later.

The foundational thought I took away from Bp. Jake’s talks was this: for followers of Jesus, our self is received, not achieved. I’m not even sure he said that, but I wrote it in my notes because it spoke in my spirit.

Who we are is a dynamic reality – both in our bodies and our spirits. Watching ourselves, our children, and grandchildren grow, we witness the dynamic nature of our bodies. There is continual change and progress. Right now, my youngest grandchild, who has quickly become a pro at walking, is beginning to talk: baby-gibberish, but spoken with true intention. The words are not far off.

The same is true for our spirits. Baptism welcomes each of us into the family of God in Christ. Then we spend our time and gifts helping each other grow, moving from what we were taught as children toward a more mature, interconnected understanding and experience of God, other, and self.

Continual spiritual change and movement toward... what? The answer may not be what you think.

You see, we aren’t living our lives hoping to behave well enough to receive the prize of eternal life after we die. Eternal life is already within us for we have been baptized with the living water Jesus describes to the Samaritan woman at the well.

We are called now to do what Jesus was doing at the well: connecting with someone from whom he had been disconnected by the dictums of religion and society. In that newly forged relationship, Jesus gave and she received, a new way of understanding herself, God, and her neighbor.

Here’s the context. The religious authorities are getting nervous because Jesus’ ministry in Judea has become even bigger than John the Baptist’s was. Under threat of arrest, Jesus decides to return home to Galilee. It’s a 3-day-long journey that takes them through the Samaritan city of Sychar, where they pause for food and rest.

The relationship between the Jewish and Samaritan people was quite hostile then, and the place Jesus stopped was a place of shared religious significance: Jacob’s well. If we’re open and aware, we will always find something in common with the opposition, won’t we?

Jesus is sitting at Jacob’s well at about noon, when a Samaritan woman comes to get water. Why she’s getting water in the heat of the day is unknown.

Maybe the woman didn’t want to meet up with the other women of the village because she was ashamed of her personal circumstances. Or maybe, they excluded her - in a Bridgerton kind of way.

Her circumstances, revealed by Jesus, have to do with her husbands – 5 of them – and the man she’s with now is not her husband, meaning they are living together, but are not married. Even by today’s standards, that would turn religious and societal heads.

We don’t know her story. We don’t know why she is in this circumstance, but if we follow Jesus’ lead, we don’t need to. Jesus doesn’t judge her for it, and neither should we.

Let’s look at a few other things Jesus doesn’t do in this story. He doesn’t exclude the woman at the well according to all of her categories: Samaritan, woman, married 5 times, living with a man who isn’t her husband. He doesn’t ask her to repent or change the situation of her life. He also doesn’t stop her from proclaiming the amazing news he hasn’t even told his disciples yet – that he is the Christ, the Messiah of God.

The woman at the well, who has no name, no fame, and no legacy except in this story, is the first person to whom the Christ reveals himself in this gospel. She is the first evangelist, the first person to share the good news of salvation in Jesus, the Christ.

All of this happened because Jesus bridged gaps created by the world, gaps that divided women from men, Samaritans from Jewish people, those judged to be unworthy from those who believe they are worthy. Jesus eliminated those gaps by making a personal connection at a place that mattered to both of them: Jacob’s well, where God saved the people by providing an abundance of water that gushed up out of the well. Jesus tells the Samaritan woman that he offers water that will gush up to eternal life!

She seems to get it! Bp. Jake joked that that’s why Jesus chose women. They got it faster than the guys did. Maybe, but the important thing is, she left her water jar to go home and tell of her encounter with the long-awaited Messiah.

Gathering water was a function women performed. It was part of their identity – and she left that behind, because in Jesus, our identity is determined by who we are: the beloved of God, not by what we do or how society sees us.

This is really good news for us today. In our current culture, both religious and societal, wealth is a source of glory for those who have it, while poverty is a source of shame. The rich overtly blame the poor for being poor.

Blaming them enables those in power to separate themselves and construct a self-contained universe of us and them, the worthy and the unworthy. The list of un-worthies in each era reflects the prejudices, insecurities, and malice of the powerful of the time.

Eventually, they demonize and dehumanize the poor, immigrants, women, and any others they deem to be unworthy, which justifies them arresting, detaining, and even torturing them. Susanna+ preached powerfully last week, reminding us that “identity must rest in promise and belonging to one another.”

This was the shift Jesus demonstrated with the Samaritan woman at the well. Our identity as people of God, as followers of Christ, is received, not achieved, and is grounded in the promise of eternal life and belonging. There are no barriers for anyone in the family of God.

Over and over again in his life and ministry, Jesus brings down these barriers. Sadly, it took the institutional church very little time to put many of them right back up.

Holding the story of the Samaritan woman at the well in your minds, receive what some of our most revered “church fathers” have said about women: 

• Clement of Alexandria (180 A.D): With women, “the very consciousness of their own nature must evoke feelings of shame.” (Pedagogues II, 33, 2) 
• Thomas Aquinas (13th century): “Woman is defective and misbegotten.” (from his most acclaimed and foundational Christian work: the Summa Theologica, 1 q. 92.a. 1, completed in 1273)

If you think this doesn’t continue to affect women in the church, think again. This anti-feminine bias lives in the bone marrow of Christianity. The Church – and by that I mean the Christian Church – with its elevation of males and male principles over women and feminine principles, starting with the story of Eve being the cause of sin, evil, and pain for humanity, played a significant role in the circumstance we now find ourselves in: discovering the nature and extent of trafficking and abusing our girl children and other vulnerable groups. And I truly believe, the Church has the responsibility and the ability to lead the way of transforming this by faithfully following our Savior.

Jesus demonstrated the dynamic interdependence of masculine and feminine principles – both created of God and meant to abide together in unity and harmony. It is from this divine union that we work together as partners with God in redemption. Our current priority as the Church is to reestablish this lost balance and restore the unity, harmony, and peace God intends for us.

The Samaritan woman at the well was transformed by her encounter with the grace of God because Jesus valued her and restored her to the community of the family of God. Through this woman, her whole community was restored as well.

And this brings us back to evangelism. Evangelism is doing what the Samaritan woman did: opening ourselves to receive a new, divinely-bestowed identity grounded in promise and belonging, then making connections with others, especially those the world judges as unworthy, and sharing this good news through our lives, our stories, and our ministries.

That is the great charism I and others find is present here at Emmanuel, and that is encouraging and gives me hope.

I close with a prayer from our clergy retreat, written by our bishop. Let’s pray: “Enduring presence, goal and guide, you go before and await our coming. Only our thirst compels us beyond complaint to conversation, beyond rejection to relation. Pour your love into our hearts that, refreshed and renewed, we may invite others to the living water given to us in Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.”

1 Lent 26-A: Journey to God-consciousness

Lectionary: Genesis 2:15-17; 3:1-7; Psalm 32; Romans 5:12-19; Matthew 4:1-11 

Live-streamed sermon on Emmanuel YouTube. (Found at 32':25")

En el nombre de Dios, co-respirador y fuente de vida en nosotros... In the name of God, co-breather and source of life in us. Amen.

This Lent, our Scriptures lead us on a journey toward God consciousness. I spoke of Christ consciousness a few weeks ago in my sermon on 5th Epiphany. Today, the Genesis story illustrates the beginning of the development of God-consciousness among humans. It helps to know that Adam and Eve weren’t people, but archetypes. Adam means ‘human’ in Hebrew, and Eve means ‘first.’

This is a story of the first step in human relationship with God. Not unlike our own children, who, about the age of two, begin to self-differentiate, this story illustrates the beginning of our self-awareness and how we relate to our Divine Creator. This is not a story of human failure, but of human growth and development overseen, guided, and protected by our heavenly parent.

Like most children who are learning to differentiate from their parents, the humans in Genesis believe that their mistakes are the cause of the problems around them. They aren’t. In fact, as the story develops, we can see that those mistakes provide important opportunities for them to learn what they need to grow and thrive.

For example, it is impossible to live among humans and not learn right from wrong. It’s also impossible to live in relationship with God and not learn trust and humility.

We hear that at one point, Adam and Eve’s “eyes were opened” and they “knew they were naked.” Remembering that the biblical meaning of naked is ‘vulnerable,’ the truth being conveyed here is that in our vulnerability, God, who is always near and always watchful, will show us how to go, just as God does for Adam and Eve providing them what they needed to sew clothes for them to wear.

Clothing symbolizes protection. Adam and Eve put on the protection of God.

I think there are probably two things humans fear most: being totally alone and being totally unlovable. The story of Adam and Eve affirms for us that we are never alone because God is always faithful, always present, and always ready to redeem; and that God loves us so much that God will seek us out to maintain relationship with us.

In the Gospel from Matthew, the temptations Jesus confronts are also about archetypal. Jesus’ tempter says to him: “IF you are the Son of God…” then prove it. Like the serpent in Genesis, the tempter in Matthew speaks self-centeredness, that is, being the center of our own attention and concern, to Jesus.

In biblical terms, to speak something is to create it. Jesus, in his humanity, is confronting some very real human impulses here, and they’re the same ones we still face: Are we who we think we are? If we don’t take care of ourselves and what we need, who will? Are we really beloved of God – and what does that mean? How does that work in “real life?”

If you are a child of God, the tempter says, then prove that God loves you. Prove God is with you. Prove God will take care of you.

Proof is not the same as faith, and our faith assures us that God loves us. So, we can choose not to believe the lies of current culture, where protestors proclaim that God hates those other children of God because of their sexual orientation or gender fluidity. Around the world, rich and privileged children of God vilify and degrade poor children of God. Male children of God continue to oppress and abuse female children of God. The current Epstein scandal comes to mind.

But this isn’t new. For generations, girls, women, and other vulnerable groups have been and continue to be abused, trafficked, excluded from education, independence, and even leadership in the church. It’s a global and historical distortion of our right relationships. It’s sin, and as Rev. Naomi Tutu preached last Saturday, it makes me weep.

I have Good News to share about this, though. God hates nothing God has made.

That isn’t just my opinion. It’s in our Prayer Book. Did it sound familiar? It’s in the first prayer we prayed together at our Ash Wednesday service.

In biblical language to ‘love’ means to be loyal to, to be faithful to; and to hate means to turn away from, to desert. God hates no one and nothing God has made.

How do we know God hates nothing God has made? Because over and over, our sacred texts remind us that God is steadfast, faithful, merciful, loving, and always ready to help us. In the Genesis story, God covered the vulnerability of the first humans when they realized they were vulnerable. In the Psalm, God is our hiding place, our respite from trouble. In both of these stories, God shows us how to go, how to survive, how to thrive.

So then, why aren’t we thriving in the harmony God has created for us? Where did sin come from?

Our Scripture talks about the devil, the tempter, Satan, and the serpent. All of these are regarded as evil, but what is evil? According to our Judeo-Christian tradition, evil is anything or anyone who actively or on behalf of someone else sows division, pain, or heaps unfair burdens or hardships upon those they can oppress.

The devil, diabolos, is a person, desire, or thing that distracts us from God. The tempter refers to an internal challenge to test oneself, to see whether or not a thing can be done.

The Hebrew term “the satan” describes an adversarial role, not a particular character... Sorry – no, there’s no red guy with horns or a pitchfork – and the “S” is not capitalized. It isn’t a name.

In her book, “The Origin of Satan,” theologian Elaine Pagels says that the ancient Jewish understanding and literal translation of the word “satan” is: “one who throws something across one’s path.” If the path we’re on is bad for us, the obstruction is good; thus, the satan may have been sent by the Lord to protect a person from worse harm. (pp 39, 40) If the path we’re on is right and good, however, the satan is disruptive, distracting, evil, and intent on doing us harm.

The serpent is a pre-Christian symbol of the goddess, of feminine power, strength, and healing. Note how our forebears used this symbol. This matters because blaming women for sin and the cultural and spiritual consequences of that are being openly discussed right now on social media.

When Jesus went into the wilderness, he was showing us how to work out what our relationship with God and others should be. The self-differentiation of humanity begun in Genesis culminates in the full integration of humanity and divinity in Jesus.

We know where this led Jesus, so we are tempted to ignore the call. We don’t want to be led to our death. In fact, we resist death in general, whether it’s the death of our habits or of our understanding about God, the church, and our culture. We much prefer status quo, even when that status quo begins to harm and destroy people and creation.

As we’ve all watched the unfolding of the evils of the Epstein scandal, the rise of Christian Nationalism, ICE aggression, and billionaire-driven cultural influencing, I’ve had people say to me, “Oh, this will pass. It’s not as grievous or life-threatening as some are making it seem. Don’t overreact. It’ll all come back to the middle.”

The thing is, that “middle”, or as I call it, the waters we have been swimming in have been polluted by these evils for so long, we’ve stopped noticing the pollution. We’ve slowly adjusted ourselves to include and normalize the pollution.

It seems we have reached a tipping point. We can either recognize the opportunity God is giving us to restore divine balance, or we can watch the evil we have created destroy us like an aggressive cancer within the body of our humanity.

Jesus showed us what to do - if we have the will to follow him. Away with you, Satan, he said. We will worship and serve only the Lord our God, who, as we said before, is our ever-present, ever-watchful protector and hiding place; the co-breather of life in us. 

Then Jesus gave his life so we could have new life in God. We will have to give up our lives as we know them now and be guided into our new life in God.

Training ourselves to be God-conscious, that is, awake and aware of God’s presence, protection, mercy, and redemption in every situation, and for every human being, along with all of creation, is the work of Lent. Weeping with God for the suffering of anyone and earth itself opens us to love as God loves, and to work for divine harmony on earth as it is in heaven.

May each one of us, and all of us together, work toward God-consciousness this Lent, loving God, loving one another, and changing the world. 

Amen.

Ash Wednesday, 2026: Co-breathing the breath of God

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

 

En el nombre de Dios que continuamente insufla nueva vida en nosotros... 

In the name of God who continually breathes new life into us. Amen. 

Those of you who know me, know that on this day, we are entering my favorite liturgical season. I love Lent, but maybe not the Lent you’re thinking of.

The Lent I love is a season that reflects its name. “Lent” means “Spring”... literally the lengthening of days. It is a time that holds the promise of a new verdancy, a surge of the life force of God in us.

One saint who often accompanies me on my Lenten journey is Hildegard of Bingen, a 12th century mystic, healer, botanist, composer, and spiritual advisor to priests and popes in her time. 

Hildegard was a mystic, which is a person who has direct experience of and with the divine. Hildegard heard the voice of God not with her ears but in her spirit, as images, which she then interpreted into words. She described her visions as the voice of the living light.

Hildegard “saw” that within all creation is a Divine life force, the breath of God, ruach, as it is called in Genesis. This, she says, is why everything in creation reflects and glorifies God – because everything contains the life force of God. She calls this life force viriditas which means, greening, and it is in us humans the way sap is in a tree.

Without viriditas we would die. In fact, for Hildegard, the only sin is “drying up,” letting ourselves become arid, disconnected, and distorted, in body or spirit. This sin she calls ariditas.

Hildegard sees all of creation as one living network sustained by this life force from God. That means our duty and our privilege as stewards of God’s creation is to nurture that living network, to tend, befriend, and heal it, not to control, exploit, or dismiss any part of it as worthless or useless.

As Hildegard said in her prayer: “O Holy Spirit, … you are the mighty way in which every thing that is in the heavens, on the earth, and under the earth, is penetrated with connectedness, is penetrated with relatedness.”

Viriditas, the life force of God, fills and transforms us, continually connecting and reconnecting us to God, one another, and all of creation. And this is where we find our path for our Lenten journey.

In what ways have we become disconnected from God, ourselves, one another, or creation? Where are our lives no longer penetrated with connectedness? Where has our relatedness become distorted and destructive, whether by us or on our behalf?

When we observe a holy Lent, we do so not because we’re bad, but because we are beloved! God loves us and wants to be connected to us. Remember our prayer earlier, “Almighty and everlasting God, you hate nothing you have made and forgive the sins of all who are penitent.”

Penitence is simply the awareness of our sadness and remorse from being disconnected. The prophet Joel reminds us that our fear of punishment is a result of our disconnection because God is “gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love.” So celebrate, Joel says, “Blow the trumpet ... sanctify a fast... gather the people.”

And do it now, St. Paul says, for “Now is the acceptable time.. now is the day of salvation – the day of rescue from all that has distorted our relatedness and disconnected us. Now. Today – not after we die.

This Lent, we are called to let the life force of God, the viriditas, flow freely again in us. Let there be no obstacle for us or for anyone, for we are all beloved of God, all reconciled to God through Jesus the Christ.

Our gospel affirms this, offering us a deeper truth about this connectedness. Doing things to prove to others that we are worthy, prayerful, or penitent is hypocritical. No one is more valued - or less valued – than anyone else.

Jesus says, “But whenever you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you.” In other words, go into a quiet place and reconnect with God. God is already there, waiting for you to come.

That’s the reward Jesus is speaking about. It isn’t a prize or honor or even a recognition. It’s reconnection through a conscious and very real co-breathing the breath of God – and that gives us life, no matter what we are confronting in the world around us.

In fact, we can’t possibly live in or respond to the world around us without this co-breathing. We will dry up, as Hildegard says. It will kill us.

We often go about our lives basically unaware that the demands and influences of the world have caused the soil of our souls to slowly but steadily dry up. Our soul-soil hardens and cracks like a dried-up river bed.

When we practice Lent, we enter into a period of self-examination that brings to our awareness just how dry we’ve become – a revelation which brings with it the realization that we are unable to irrigate ourselves. There is almost a desperateness in this moment of revelation, a deep knowledge that without this irrigation, our souls will completely dry up and turn to dust.

But our faith assures us that it is from the dust we were created in the first place. So, we trust… and we wait… through these 40 days, and 40 nights.

At our invitation, the hands of our Creator reach into the soil of our souls, breaking through the dry surface. The Almighty kneads the soil of our souls removing any hardened bits in there like anger, judgment, hatred of self or other, and other distortions of connectedness such as addictions, a desire for power, money, or praise.

Then our Creator irrigates our soul-soil with viriditas – the very life force of God – until we are ready to receive the seeds of new life being planted by our Creator. Then God smooths the surface of the soil of our soul, pats it down, sprinkles on a bit more viriditas, and asks us to wait while those divine seeds within us take root and grow.

This is Lent. Now maybe you understand why it’s my favorite liturgical season.

One final thought - and it's on fasting. If you choose to fast, please remember that fasting isn’t about food, as we heard from Isaiah last week. Fasting from food can work as a catalyst for our self-emptying, which we must do in order to reconnect with God and others, but we can accomplish that by fasting from many things: criticizing ourselves or others, complaining or harsh words. We can fast from over-exposure to the news or from doom-scrolling on social media. If any activity distracts you from your Lenten self-emptying, fast from that.

My friends, my siblings in this beautiful journey, may we all enjoy a blessed, honest, and holy Lent. Amen.

5 Epiphany 26-A: Christ Consciousness

Lectionary: Isaiah 58:1-9a, [9b-12]; Psalm 112:1-9, (10); 1 Corinthians 2:1-12, [13-16]; Matthew 5:13-20

En el nombre de Dios: nuestra luz y nuestra vida... In the name of God, our light and our life. Amen.

There are times being a modern English-speaker is a disadvantage. For example, when we use the word “you,” it could be singular - an individual, or plural - y’all. We can’t tell except from the context, and sometimes, not even then.

This matters when we read the ancient texts in our Bible. All of our readings today, use the plural “you,” referring to the community. There is not a single reference to you, the individual. Yet most of us apply what we read in the Scripture to ourselves as individuals. How does this speak to my experience or guide my actions...?

A more faithful approach is to apply the lessons of Scripture to us, the people of God living in community. Salvation in ancient Israel, was always about the people of God. Salvation in Jesus is about humanity - collectively. As N.T. Wright, the Bp. of Durham once said, “there are no individual Christians.”

We know this. Christianity is, by definition a body: the body of Christ in the world. Still, we get tripped up because our cultural habit is to focus on self: my wealth, my beauty, my position, even my salvation, as if we could – or want to - extricate ourselves from the rest of humankind.

Today’s lessons offer us a refresher course on community-centered consciousness characterized by love, mercy, and compassion, or as priest and theologian Jim Marion calls it, “Christ Consciousness” or as Paul calls it in his epistle, “the mind of Christ:” wisdom taught to us by the Spirit of God enabling us to spiritually discern in every circumstance we find ourselves.

In Christ Consciousness, our relationship with God is living, dynamic, ever-evolving, potent, and actively transforming us and through us, our world. This is what Jesus’ whole life and ministry demonstrated for us. Over and over Jesus showed us that Christ consciousness takes us beyond obedience to the letter of the law to fulfillment of the law of love which forgives, restores, and reconciles all (all!) the world to God.

In Jesus we witness a beloved life lived in the world, and his world was fraught with violence, oppression, bigotry, and corruption – not unlike our world today. Yet, no matter how the world reacted to him or treated him Jesus maintained a consciousness of love and mercy even forgiving his executors from the cross on which they hanged him.

Christ Consciousness.

We don’t have to strive for this consciousness. It’s ours for the asking. All we need to do is invite it. That means, however, putting aside our goals, plans, and hopes, and putting God’s in their place.

This is denying self, or in other words, fasting, and this is the fast the prophet Isaiah is talking about. It isn’t about food. It’s about us (in the community sense of the word ) and our how we relate with God, others, and among ourselves.

Jesus uses two metaphors to teach this: salt and light. Salt was valuable in the ancient world, not only because it has the unique ability to enhance the flavor of food, but also because it preserves food, which in ancient times, often meant preserving life. Salt, however, can also be an irritant, as anyone who swims in the ocean knows.

Jesus proclaims us to be the salt of the world. We are meant to preserve life. We also are meant to irritate those who seek to destroy life, just as Jesus irritated those in power in his day.

Jesus also says that we are the light of the world. That’s both really interesting and kind of scary.

We are the light that is present in the world. This completely transforms our understanding of our relationship with God. Julian of Norwich described this in her concept of “oneing” saying, “For [God] says... ‘I am loving you, and you are loving me: and our loving shall never be parted in two.’” (John Skinner, ed., Revelation of Love, Julian of Norwich, 129.) In other words, we can never be completely cut off from God’s love – and neither can anyone else, whether they are judged to be good or evil, worthy of praise or deserving of punishment.

When Jesus says, “let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works…” it helps to remember that his Jewish listeners understood that he was talking about mitzvah - works of mercy, reconciliation, and service to others. These works glorify God because God is the source of the mercy, compassion, and love that is in us.

When we take ourselves out of the center of our universe and focus our attention and God-given gifts where God guides us, we will find our lives and ministries looking more like Jesus’ life and ministry. I hope everyone saw this in Our Annual Meeting magazine which acquaints us with the many ways Emmanuel’s light shone and glorified God last year.

This light continues to break forth from us now, like the dawn signaling a new day, a new way to be in relationship with God, one another, and among ourselves in our time. We won’t always get it right, but what I see happening at Emmanuel right now is a commitment to fulfillment of the law of love which forgives, restores, and reconciles all the world to God.

The world will often disagree with us as it did with Jesus, and push back, attempting to cover or douse our light with condemnation. That’s OK.

When those in power blame and withhold assistance from the poor, hungry, or disabled, we will continue to welcome them into our midst, offering them dignified friendship as we feed, and tend to their needs as best we can.

When those in power deride people for their sexual identity or whom they love, we will continue to proclaim that God is the creator and author of all love, and they are our siblings in the family of God. 

When the world vilifies immigrants, documented or undocumented, as evil, deceitful, or dishonorable, we will continue to draw them close in community knowing they all worthy of respect because we are all one in God.

People of Emmanuel, you (and I mean y’all) are set apart as holy, consecrated to God. Y’all are salt and light. I have seen it and I can testify to it. I bless you and pray that you freely, bravely, and continually let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to God. Amen.