Tag Archives: Maundy Thursday

Stripping away

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Photo by Martin Malina (Kalaloch Beach, WA, August 15, 2022)

At the end of the service tonight, we engage a ritual that has become a tradition in many churches on Maundy Thursday. We strip the altar.

We take away all the symbols, the candles, the silverware, the embroidery and fabric that are associated with our faith.

We do this in Holy Week – in the context of Jesus’ suffering and dying when everything he had was stripped away, not only his clothing, but his dignity as a human being. Maundy Thursday sets the stage in the grand narrative of Jesus’ Passion for Good Friday when he was nailed to the tree.

Theologian and American writer Brian McLaren writes about how one tree survives the hurricanes that seasonally batter his home state of Florida. “Many of our trees in Florida survive hurricanes by being flexible. They’re able to bend an amazing amount and spring back into shape. [But] One of my favourite trees,” he writes, “has a slightly different strategy.

“It’s called a ‘gumbo-limbo’ tree, and the way it survives a hurricane is that when the wind starts to blow, it just lets branches break off. It knows that if you can keep the trunk solid and stable, and you don’t get overturned by the wind, you can bounce back after the storm. And that’s what the gumbo-limbo tree does. It travels light through the storm. It lets go of everything that’s not essential to focus on for life” (McLaren, 2023).

If you keep the trunk solid and stable, you will find new life after the storm. What is that proverbial trunk in our lives? What was it, in Jesus’ life? What was that power that allowed him to let go of everything and be stripped of all his humanity?

The mandate to love sets the stage for this proverbial stripping. The mandate to love is the command of Jesus we hear on Maundy Thursday – the night he washed the feet of his disciples, shared the meal with them and led them to the garden to pray. This mandate to “love one another just as I have loved you” (John 13:34-35) is the fuel. It is the trunk of the tree: God’s eternal, unconditional, loving presence for all people. But it comes at a cost.

A quote I came across this past week has stuck, the wise saying of a desert mother from early Christianity. She said, “the hardest world you have leave behind is the one you carry right inside your heart” (Lane, 2024). What you carry inside your heart, it would seem to me, is precious. Whatever you hold in your heart is integral to what you perceive to be an important part of your identity. It defines who you are in the world.

This is important stuff. And it struck me that on Maundy Thursday as we strip away the paraments and silverware from the altar, we’re not talking about the knick-knacks, dusty boxes in basements and stuff we keep in storage rental units.

We’re talking about what we would consider the important, life-altering, life-defining stuff. But these are still the branches, not the trunk. You might say what the gumbo-limbo tree does in a hurricane is counter-intuitive, even unreasonable, impossible for us to do. Why would we let go of what we feel most attached to?

It’s significant that the Garden of Gethsemane was the last place to which Jesus led his disciples before he was arrested, before the dominos began to fall in the Passion narrative, a story that then escalates towards Jesus’ arrest, prosecution, persecution and execution.

Jesus led his disciples to the garden to pray. There is a form of prayer whose aim is finding inner peace and contentment in the storm.

Yet this peace cannot be experienced without a painful letting go. It’s a practice, you could say, of stripping away the non-essentials. Prayer is becoming aware of God’s grace and life of Christ with us and for us. And this prayer needs no words from us.

For the desert mothers and fathers, prayer was understood as practising a way of taming the ego’s desires for being front-row-and-centre in all things, including our conversation with God.

So, instead of doing all the talking in this relationship of prayer, we practice doing all the listening. Instead of trying to change God’s mind, prayer is about allowing God to transform the mind and heart of the one doing the praying. In this practice of letting go we allow God to change our mind about what is truly going on around us. We let God change our mind about the reality right in front of us, a reality which we usually dismiss, avoid or even distort.

In our prayer tonight and throughout these coming three holy days, may we practice letting go. In the way of Jesus, may we learn to be like the gumbo-limbo tree, especially during the storms of our lives. Because as long as the trunk remains stable and firmly planted in the ground, new life will surely find a way again.

“And now, faith, hope, and love remain … and the greatest of these is love” (1 Corinthians 13:13).

References:

Lane, B. (2024). “The Desert Tradition,” The Living School: Essentials of Engaged Contemplation. Center for Action and Contemplation. www.cac.org.

McLaren, B. (2024). 2024 Daily meditations: Radical resilience [Video]. Center for Action and Contemplation.  https://cac.org/daily-meditations/2024-daily-meditations-theme-radical-resilience/

Wagamese, R. (2021). Richard Wagamese selected: What comes from spirit.

Broken and beautiful

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Tonight is not just about the meal. Yes, we strip the altar at the close of the service, so our attention is naturally focused on the Last Supper.

However, the Gospel of John is not overly concentrated on details of the Last Supper when compared to the other Gospel writers. A mere four verses describe the meal itself (John 13:1-4). So, John is obviously trying to emphasize another overriding theme in the meaning of Jesus’ life, death and resurrection through the events of Holy Week.

You may have noticed that the baptismal font has lurked inconspicuously in the chancel area throughout Lent. In some churches it is completely removed. But it has stayed with us, this Lent. For a reason.

The Gospel of John which we read during Holy Week and the upcoming Easter season was originally used for baptism and preparing candidates for a life in Christ (Shaia & Gaugy, 2021). The Passion of our Lord is presented in John as a graphic picture of the baptismal movement down into the water and rising up out of it (Philippians 2:5-11).

Of course, Christian baptism uses water to express the elements of death and rebirth. “In the early church, deacons performing baptism were instructed to grasp the candidate around the chest from the back, lowering the individual under the water in such a way that a ‘startle response’ was triggered, thereby providing an experience of near death” (Shaia & Gaugy, 20221, p. 242). It was a visceral reminder of this spiritual movement.

Arising out of the water, the baptized was then blessed and announced to the community as moving forward into new life with Jesus.

It’s the dying and the rising that John is interested in keeping together — that pattern is indivisible in a life of faith. You can’t stay under the water forever; eventually you have to come up. Conversely when you are in the water you can’t keep your body above the water; eventually you immerse yourself in it.

As people who have and are travelling this journey of faith today, how do we move from the old into the new? How do we resurrect into new balance and move forward in Christ? Those are the questions John wants us to ask.

In the Gospel for tonight, Jesus demonstrates the inner posture out of which authentic service happens. Not from a place of dominance, self-righteousness or privilege. But, rather, from a servant posture of humility in the presence of another.

So, and notice the baptismal imagery employed by John, Jesus after supper “poured water into a basin …” (John 13:5). Imagine now the reversal, the paradigm shift: The divine presence strips down practically naked and presents himself to his disciples in a way that would have been appropriate only for marriage partners or a servant before their master. And Jesus washes their feet! “There could have been no more perfect exemplar of both the intimacy and selflessness of Spirit in service” (Shaia & Gaugy, 2021, p. 243).

Intimacy means vulnerability. Being exposed for all our weaknesses. And accepting them. Loving even the fact that we are fragile, insecure human beings. True service comes from that heart-place of letting go of our ego pretensions.

It strikes me that when we wonder how to love others who do not accept our efforts to love them, when we wonder how to be faithful servants of Christ in the world today with those whom we are called to reach, when we wonder how to serve others in Jesus’ name, when we wonder how to move from the old to the new, we need to start by allowing our vulnerability to show.

We receive Communion tonight. From a cup. Maybe the cup you use at home for Communion has a chip in it, or a crack or has some history. Maybe tonight is the night to use that cup with the chip or crack in it.

Listen to this poem by Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer who illustrates the divine beauty expressed in and from a broken cup. It’s called, “What’s in a Broken Cup” (Wahtola Trommer, 2022):                

Not everything broken need be fixed. Even the loveliest cup, the one that seemed perfection, the one that fit just right in the hand and held the favorite wine, even that cup is only a cup, and, being fashioned out of breakable clay, it was, we could say, made to be broken. The fact it was fragile was always a part of its value. In shattered fragments, the cup is no less treasured–perhaps even more treasured now that its wholeness isn’t taken for granted. There are some who would throw the pieces away. There are some who would mend them with glue or even with gold in an effort to repair. But there are some who will cherish what is broken, hold it even more tenderly now, trusting its use– though different– is no less valuable. Trusting a fragment is sometimes more than enough. Trusting in every end is a beginning, and we might now sip our wine straight from the Source.

References:

Shaia, A. J. & Gaugy, M. L. (2021). Heart and Mind: The Four-Gospel Journey for Radical Transformation. Quadratos LLC.

Wahtola Trommer, R. (2022). What’s in a broken cup. https://ahundredfallingveils.com/2022/01/10/whats-in-a-broken-cup/

The loved migrant: a ‘washing feet’ analogy

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The disciples need to have their feet washed.

It was not only customary in ancient times to wash the feet of guests into your home, but necessary. Calloused and muddy feet were the norm in an age of open-toed sandals and pedestrian highways. Providing this service was a kind and appreciated gesture offered to the weary pilgrim.

But no one else had volunteered to do it. The disciples had followed all the Lord’s instructions to prepare for a meal in the upper room. They had bought what they needed in preparation for the Passover. They had gathered the bread and wine. Check. Check. Check.

So, what made them miss this important act of hospitality, friendship and welcome? What blinders did they have on?

Perhaps, we can’t underestimate the state of affairs among the disciples. Recall, they were arguing about which one of them was the greatest.[1]And for any one of them to volunteer to wash feet would be to lose the argument. Because only servants and slaves washed the feet of their superiors.

So Jesus got up to do it—shocking them all by his disregard for social and cultural convention.[2]

And then, as if that wasn’t shock enough to the system, Jesus looks up at the disciples, looks them square in the eyes and says:

“If I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet.” (v.14)

How good are we at ‘washing one another’s feet’? We’re not doing it in worship tonight on Maundy Thursday. I don’t believe we’ve ever done it here at Faith. But maybe we need the practice.

Since my father’s death earlier this year, I’ve been reviewing his life story, going over certain details. Especially in his formative days when he migrated from Poland to London, England, in the mid-1960s, I see a pattern emerge.

The small town in southern Poland where he was born and raised was and has been the largest concentration of Lutherans in a predominantly Roman Catholic nation. They called themselves the Lutheran Church of the Augsburg Confession. And, the church whose bishop he assisted later in London was the Lutheran church ‘in exile’ from Poland. This church was taken care of by the Missouri Synod Lutheran church.

Even though commissioned to serve ELCIC congregations when he and my mother immigrated to Canada in 1967, Dad was still called upon to serve Polish-speaking Lutherans once a month in an independent Lutheran Church in Toronto during the 1980s. This congregation has since become part of the Missouri Synod.

When our long-time family friend from Toronto visited us here in Ottawa a couple weeks ago, I was reminded again of this pattern: My father had been, in the first part of his life certainly, born and bred in the culture and beliefs of the Missouri Synod/Confessional Lutheran Church, worldwide, you could say.

The question I’ve pondered is: What made him change his allegiance? Why not continue to remain serving the denomination and church culture of his childhood and youth—even in North America? Why did he change? What made the difference?

It wasn’t doctrinal, by and large. I remember several debates we had around the kitchen table over the hot button issues in the church during the past few decades. And he usually tended towards the more conservative stance. It wasn’t doctrinal. It wasn’t about beliefs and confessions of faith. It was something else.

When he was serving the Missouri Synod church in London, he met someone over lunch after worship one day. This man, William Dase, had been a pilot in the war. A Canadian flying with the British Airforce, he had made many runs over London. And, after the war, decided to make London his home.

He was also a major benefactor of Waterloo Lutheran Seminary. In conversation over lunch, my Dad expressed a desire to learn English, and not anywhere people knew him. Somewhere far away from any Polish-speaking Lutherans, he felt he could master the English language. Following the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968, he also didn’t believe he could ever return to Poland a free person.

And so Dase posed a simple question, with significant consequence: Why not spend a study year at Waterloo Lutheran Seminary in Canada? Dase would sponsor my Dad’s study and booked passage for both my parents on the ocean liner, Maasdam, to set sail from Southampton to Quebec.

Before my parents landed in Waterloo, the Dean of the Seminary at the time, Professor Dr. Hauser, had already arranged an apartment in student housing and a job in the cafeteria kitchen for my mother which paid $75 a month. This was just enough to cover the rent for the apartment.

After completing his master’s degree at Waterloo, my Dad was appointed to serve a small rural parish north of Stratford, Ontario. He needed a car. So, Assistant to the Bishop, Dr. Berner, of the Eastern Canada Synod, went with my Dad to the bank to arrange a loan to buy a VW Beetle. Dr. Berner used his standing with the bank as collateral for the loan.

However, after the year was up, my parents’ temporary student and visitor VISAs were expiring. And so, the Dean of the Seminary, Dr. Hauser, promptly took my parents to the immigration office in Kitchener to vouch for an upgrade to landed immigrant status— ‘my parents would make excellent citizens in Canada’, he told the immigration officer without hesitation. They received their immigrant status on the spot.

When my brother and I came along a couple of years later—twin boys—thus creating an instant family that doubled in size literally overnight, my parents experienced a sudden strain on the household budget.

The bishop of the Eastern Canada Synod, then Bishop Lotz, immediately arranged for a changed call to the three-point parish in Maynooth, Raglan and Denbigh—because these parishes were able to offer a higher wage.

That was then, this is now. I understand. Nevertheless, I am impressed in reviewing this history how church people who were in a position to do so could make such a positive difference in the lives of those in need. No just once. But consistently. Over time. And in response to various needs.

I can say with certainty that it was the love shown in practical, simple, ordinary ways to my parents when they immigrated and settled into Canada, that made all the difference.

The disciples needed their feet washed, after all. Despite all their debating and power struggles and determining who was right and who was wrong. Jesus showed his disciples, and shows us, that to help another is to put oneself on the same level as the other. Not to ‘lord it over’ in a condescending manner, but to recognize the common humanity we all share.

Jesus shows us what it means to fulfill the ‘new commandment’ of love.[3]If the world will know that ‘you are my disciples’, it has nothing to do with agreeing on doctrine, creedal statements, confessions of faith. In fact, arguing about these things, as the disciples tended to do, hinder this expression of true discipleship.

In the Gospel of John, the disciples do not and cannot understand the significance of Jesus’ actions until after Easter.[4]Even then, their faith still falters.[5]In John, “the disciples’ divine election and sustenance do not depend on how much they understand. Their faith is perfected, not in knowledge, but in how much they love their fellow lambs (21:15-19; cf. 1 Cor 13:12-13).”[6]

Jesus tells his disciples after washing their feet, “If you know these things, blessed are you if you do them.”[7]

It’s about loving action, not knowledge/understanding.

St John of the Cross wrote: “In the evening of life, we will be judged on love alone.” I concur. When all is said and done, at the end of the road, we will be asked: “How have you loved your neighbor?” not “Did you believe the right things?”

Just like washing one’s feet is messy, and uncomfortable, so at first it may feel out-of-sorts to be so vulnerable to one another. There are boundary issues when it comes to feet, to be sure.

We are not used to small and ordinary acts of self-giving for another. We need to practice. In an age when congregations and denominations are significantly divided over doctrinal, social, and other issues, and sometimes have difficulty even gathering at the same table for a meal with one another—what do we need? What do we really need?

More debate? More information? More knowledge? More convincing arguments? Really?

The disciples just needed their feet washed.

 

 

[1]Luke 22:24-27

[2]Jim Green Somerville in David L. Bartlett & Barbara Brown Taylor, eds., Feasting on the Word: Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary Year C Volume 2 (Kentucky: WJK Press, 2008), p.276

[3]John 13:1-17,31-35, the Gospel text for Maundy Thursday, according to the Revised Common Lectionary (RCL).

[4]2:22; 7:39; 12:16; 14:26

[5]20:19-29; 21:20-23

[6]C. Clifton Black, Feasting on the Word., ibid., p.279

[7]John 13:17, emphasis mine.

The good crowd

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I was ten years old when my parents shuffled me and my brother into one of the front rows of the main, outdoor theatre in the small, Bavarian town. The crowd pushed and shoved for privileged seating to watch the story of Jesus’s last days acted out daily by the town’s folk every ten years.

In fact, the crowd on the large stage did not appear any different than the tourists who got up very early in the morning for tickets to the Oberammergau Passion play.  

This coming Holy Week is rich with story. And when we read the stories about the last days of Jesus — full of drama, plot, and character — we will naturally identify with elements of the story-telling. Our worship is designed to help us identify, for example, with the crowds.

This morning, we sing “Hosanna” and wave our palm branches identifying with the enthusiastic crowd that first day when Jesus entered the city. “A very large crowd spread their cloaks on the road, and others cut branches from the trees …” (Matthew 21:8). Some years in Holy Week we dramatized and therefore simplify the trial scenes. We have individuals and groups speaking the various parts of the story. So, for example, ‘the crowd’ is played by the whole congregation who chants those lines together, such as “Crucify Him! Crucify Him!” (Matthew 27:23) and “He deserves death!” (Matthew 26:66).

Undergoing some mysterious metamorphosis sometime between Palm Sunday and Maundy Thursday, the crowd turns to the dark side. In a tradition that goes back centuries, Christians have most often portrayed the Jewish crowd around Jesus during his last days as rabidly and violently against him. We see it in Passion plays, the most famous of which is at Oberammergau in Bavaria. The evil crowd is also central to Mel Gibson’s film, “The Passion of the Christ.”

This over-interpretation has unfortunately led to harmful, anti-semitic justification against the Jewish people throughout the dark side of Christian history.

It may be easy to identify with these ‘bad’ crowds more than anyone else in the stories. Through the journey of Lent, we have struggled with the shadow self of our own lives, carrying our own cross so to speak, alongside Jesus. We have confessed our sin. Indeed, at the climax of Christ’s Passion, we pound nails into the cross on Good Friday. We so readily identify with the crowds, even saying that ‘we’ have crucified Jesus by our sin. It is little wonder why we come to these rather negative views, from Scripture.

What these portrayals fail to address, however, is this: Why, if the Jewish crowd was so against Jesus, was it necessary to arrest him in the darkness of night with the help of a traitor from among Jesus’s followers? Why not arrest him in broad daylight? And why do they need Judas?

What we discover is a positive, more balanced approach to the identity of the crowd. First we need to understand why the high-priestly authorities wanted to do away with Jesus.

“[The chief priests and Pharisees] wanted to arrest him …” (Matthew 21:46).

If the chief priests and Pharisees let him go on like this, everyone would believe in him, and the Romans would then intervene and execute them (John 11:48). Moreover, the authorities were not just afraid of the Roman Emperor, who was the recipient of Judean tax money and demanded political allegiance from those put in a position of power by the Emperor to keep the Pax Romana in the region. Insurrection in Judea would not be tolerated by Rome.

“… but they feared the crowds …”

Pilate and the high-priests also felt threatened by the whole crowd of people who, if they didn’t do something about Jesus, would eventually turn on them, which in 70AD (around the time most of the Gospels were written), did in fact happen. (1)

The Gospels reveal a clear disconnect between the high-priestly authorities who wish to execute Jesus, and the “whole crowd” who are “spellbound by his teachings” (Mark 11:18) and who “regarded him as a prophet” (Matthew 21:46).

This favourable support of Jesus by the predominantly Jewish crowd does not stop after the “Hosannas” of Palm Sunday. It continues throughout the days leading to the Passover Festival in Jerusalem.

The crowds aren’t perfect, to be sure. Their motivations for supporting Jesus may very well have missed the mark, especially those who still sought in Jesus a violent solution to the end of Roman rule in Judea.

Yet, they are captivated by his teachings. There is some good, therein. The ‘whole crowd’ can be personified by each of us. Which part of ourselves identifies with the crowd that is for the most part good and supportive of Jesus, even during his last days on earth?

I ask this question, especially in the midst of the most penitential season of the church year. I ask this question, and make this point as a spiritual antidote to what can easily, and so often does, slide into self-hatred on account of all our sinfulness.

We must remember we live in Christ Jesus, and the living Christ lives in us through the Holy Spirit. There is some good therein. We don’t need to be so hard on ourselves.

“The secret of life,” say the American Indigenous people, “is in the shadows and not in the open sun; to see anything at all, you must look deeply into the shadow of a living thing.” (2)

We may begin Lent and Holy Week — indeed our Christian pilgrimage on earth — by confronting our shadow self. It’s important to do so. But by the end of Holy Week we cannot avoid the open sun and see the empty tomb. The ending is always as it was in the beginning when God created everything and everyone, and said that it was good. “It was very good” (Genesis 1:31).

 
1 — Marcus J. Borg & John Dominic Crossan, “The Last Week: What the Gospels Really Teach About Jesus’s Final Days in Jerusalem” (New York: HarperCollins, 2006), esp. p.87-91

2 — cited in Joyce Rupp, “Walk In A Relaxed Manner: Life Lessons from the Camino” (New York: Orbis Books, 2005), p.161

Stick-to-it-ness of love

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Terrorist bombs going off in Brussels during Holy Week should get our attention. Not only and primarily because of the sudden horror and tragic, senseless loss of life.

But also because Christians this week, the world over, are reflecting and imagining the path Jesus took to his own senseless, horrific death hanging on a cross.

Death is on the mind and heart of many these days. How can we approach this reality common to us all? How can we accept the truth of our own mortality, which will be realized some day in some unique way?

In a popular book about near-death experiences, people reported on how they saw a review of their life — the cliched ‘life flashing before your eyes’.

The people who had momentarily died detailed every single encounter they had had with another human being throughout their life. They not only re-lived it, they were able to feel what the other person had felt. In that life-review they knew what others felt because of the near-dead person’s words or actions in that particular encounter. (1)

You may be able to imagine how surprised some felt to know how their behaviour and words actually affected other people. To know what impact our lives have on others. We may not think that a simple action like a smile, or a scowling face, a gracious word, or an angry outburst, could affect someone else’s day — let alone their life.

A friend recently suggested that this is what they thought Judgement Day would be for us — to understand and feel fully what influence our lives had on people around us. And how much our lives mean, in relationship.

I attended my brother-in-law’s retirement reception last week. He was retiring from the military after about twenty-five years. In his speech to the gathered friends, family and colleagues he concluded by saying something that stuck with me: “There’s lots that I’ve done over the years that I’m not proud of — as I stand here today. But, I’ve always and will always be proud of who I did it with.”

On Maundy Thursday, the main theme behind the actions of Jesus with his disciples is love. The commandment to love one another infuses the ritual of washing his disciples feet, of eating with them and instituting the Holy Supper, of instructing them and praying for them that ‘they may be one’.

The motif of loving one another is strangely underneath the surface of the high-tension, escalating conflict surrounding Jesus as he nears the cross — the ultimate place of his suffering and death. You wouldn’t think this is a love story, at first glance.

Yet, Jesus does not seek retribution for the injustice he endures. As Simon Peter did by taking a sword and cutting off the ear of one of the high priest’s servants who came to arrest Jesus (John 18:10). Instead, Jesus is about a restorative type of judgement — one that through love seeks to make right what has been divided or tarnished by sin. Judgement is ultimately always about restoring us, not avenging us for all our mis-deeds. To whom are we restored?

Our religion is not one of individual moral performance and accomplishment for our glory alone. The judgement we individually meet at the end is not considered in a vacuum. Our religion is constituted in a community. Our religion, more to the point, is practised and validated in the context of human relationship. Christianity is a social religion. You can’t do Christianity apart from others.

On Maundy Thursday, the focus is on the disciples meeting together for the last time with Jesus. And they do so around a Meal. This is the context, the meal and the companionship, however flawed and fragile. Sharing food, here, is not an individual indulgence as it is a communal sharing.

For many, in our culture today, to simply sit and eat and talk and to remain together until the end of the meal seems a quaint custom, perhaps incomprehensible, even an empty game: There’s always something else to do in my room — download something, fix something, watch something, communicate in some other media. The community of the table seems far less interesting once you have eaten your fill.

Yet eating with others is what prayer is all about. It is the time — like meditating with others or celebrating a ritual as we do this evening at the Sacrament of the Table — when we are fed and nourished by the One who is the food itself. We need to stay and wait and allow ourselves to be waited upon. (2)

And so, we need to practice doing things together. Practice. Not perfectly. Not always the right way. And not just when all is smiles and joy. Sometimes, in practising our faith together we end up hurting others, and being hurt ourselves. This is nevertheless the nature of practice. 

Like in any endeavour, physical exercise, any discipline, anything that is of value to us. It sometimes hurts. We need to challenge ourselves. We need what coach Dave Cameron of the Ottawa Senators said once in an interview explaining what his team needs in order to be successful in the NHL: ‘stick-to-it-ness’. 

‘Stick-to-it-ness’ is the quality of staying with the game plan, playing with the team; not, individual heroics as they and we are want to do. Stick-to-it-ness, even in the face of adversity or failure, or disappointment. Not running out the back door when things get tough or uneasy or uncomfortable. Not giving up on others or on yourself, even when they disappoint you. Staying with the game plan. Being persistent. Even when things are less-than-perfect or ideal in your life, and life with others.

‘Stick-to-it-ness’ is a quality sadly lacking in Christian culture today. We are so individually-minded that we delude ourselves into thinking we can go it alone. That we don’t need others. That we can live our Christian lives without being faithful to the community — the hassle or complication of others who will only disappoint and annoy — 

That we can leave a group of people and join another church. That religion is like a smorgasbord; and “I” am the centre of the universe, determining my destiny, choosing what I want and leaving behind what I don’t want. And being in total control.

In the acclaimed film, “The Way”, starring Martin Sheen and his son Emilio Estevez, father and son together experience a walking pilgrimage on the Camino de Santiago. They begin their journey in conflict, estranged from one another. The son tells the father a truth that he learns by the end of the movie: “You don’t choose a life, you live a life.”

Practising our faith is not something we do by ourselves. Practising our faith is not motivated by trying to earn favour from God by all our good deeds. Practising our faith is not creating for ourselves the life we want. 

Practising our faith is first and foremost something we do together, for the sake of the other, and for love of the other. Even in the face of death.

We follow Jesus, who walked the way of life and death as we know it. We worship Jesus, these holy days, who showed us the motivation and stick-to-it-ness of love, of grace, of leading with a heart of mercy. For the sake of the other.

I will offer to you a thanksgiving sacrifice and call upon the name of the Lord.

I will pay my vows to the Lord in the presence of all his people, in the courts of the house of the Lord,

in your midst, O Jerusalem. Praise the Lord!

(Psalm 116:17-19)
(1) Raymond A. Moody, “Life After Life”, HarperCollins, New York, 2000, p.55-65

(2) Laurence Freeman, “Sensing God”, Novalis Press, Toronto, 2015, p.110

You shall know them by their food

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School children were asked to bring, for show-and-tell, a symbol that would describe best their religion. Each would take a turn to stand in front of their class, hold up their object and first, without saying a word, wait until one of their peers would successfully guess to which religion they belonged.

The first child held up some prayer beads — a rosary. “Roman Catholic,” someone called out. Later, the second child held up a picture of the Star of David. “Judaism,” another said. There was an awkward pause before the third child rushed through the door to the front of the classroom. In her oven-mitted hands she held up a piping hot casserole dish. There was silence.

The girl’s mouth hung open in disbelief. “You mean you can’t tell?” she croaked. “I’m Lutheran!”

After this month’s well-attended men’s breakfast group where we basically took over a whole corner of the restaurant, we joked that pretty soon the men’s breakfast group might have more out for their monthly gatherings than we get out for midweek worship! So true — if there is food on the agenda of any social gathering, you’ll likely find at least one Lutheran in the crowd.

Indeed, eating together is central to not only Lutheran identity, but for Christians in general. Someone once noted that in each chapter of the Gospel of Luke you will find at least one reference, directly or indirectly, to food or eating (Kelly Fryer, The Lutheran Course).

And that explains why when Christians gather to worship, the Holy Meal is a cornerstone of the liturgy. What distinguishes us from every other religion in our worship practice is that we eat together. Jewish people, Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, etc., don’t differ from Christians when it comes to practicing their faith in word, song or spoken/unspoken prayer. But the Holy Communion — the meal — distinguishes a truly Christian worship service.

And a truly Christian worship service is done together, with others. Jesus said, “For where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there among them” (Matthew 18:20). The author of Hebrews exhorted the followers of the Christian way to meet regularly: “Let us consider how to provoke one another to love and good deeds, not neglecting to meet together …” (Hebrews 10:24-25). Because around the table where bread is broken and wine is poured, the love and presence of Christ is experienced.

The Holy Communion is the climax of Christian worship because it best embodies a communal experience of God. We can eat alone. But sharing food causes us to love another.

Last month the Lutheran clergy in Ottawa met for lunch. We went to a restaurant where they serve Dim Sum: This method of sharing food is truly a communal act: We all sit around the same, round table — a rather large one. Then, from menus, we choose the food.

But what we choose is not an individual dish. It is a plateful of the same food that we share by circulating the plate around the table. When we order, we need to check in with all the others to see if that’s also something they would like to try. Eating Dim Sum, as unfamiliar as it may feel, and challenging to coordinate, is worth the work. It is an experience of community building and of practising a self-giving kind of love. Because we need to compromise, give-and-take, and take some risks — all for the sake of the community.

Lutheran worship is not about creating a space for private, individualistic encounters with Jesus. Lutheran worship is not about providing individuals with a what-is-in-it-for-me kind of entertainment. Lutheran worship is not about removing ourselves from the actual social context of the service.

In other words, when we kneel at the railing and come forward to receive the body and blood of Christ, we are doing so in a profound awareness of who is standing or kneeling with us, beside us, at the table of The Lord. We seek their forgiveness, as we forgive them. We are doing this together — sometimes a hard work, but well worth it.

On Maundy Thursday we pause to consider that last evening Jesus had with his followers, his closest disciples. And we recall what he did: He had a meal with them to assure them, and us over two thousand years later, that whenever we eat this meal in his name, Christ is there with us. To underscore his ever-present promise, Jesus kneels in humility and love to wash his disciples’ feet (John 13), and then prays for their unity (John 17) in the Garden of Gethsemane.

On this night we gather not as individuals seeking private, abstract encounters with an imagined God, but as the broken Body of Christ — his body, the church. We gather together to receive the assurance of his forgiveness of our sins, to regard one another in love as co-travellers on the journey of faith, and to share in the food which is his loving presence in our lives. In so doing, we bear faithful witness to the world, that Christians are united in the passion of Jesus.

Ministry of Presence at the Table

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The two go hand in hand: The order places the necessary structure around which I can rest in the holy moment. Without the structure the event takes on too much of a subjective feel which is self-serving more than, I believe, it is serving God. And worship is not about us. It is about God, first and foremost. We gather to praise God, not meet our needs to feel good.

So, I am thankful for the order. Nevertheless, there’s another side on the mountain top down which I can slide.

In a liturgical church, sometimes the rules of the ritual get in the way. In the way of being truly present, that is.

If you’re anything like me, you are easily distracted. I am often pulled away from being grounded in the moment by a compulsion towards following the ‘order’ of the ritual, more concerned by keeping order than by entering the profound meanings of the ritual.

Underlying this distraction is a hyper self-consciousness. A revved up performance mind-set can sometimes lead me astray from the beauty of the sacrament. And I rush through it. Self-consciousness is the evil twin of subjective, feel good, entertainment-style worship, is it not?

So how does the worship leader guide the gathering so as not to make it about the pastor or priest on the one hand; and, on the other, not be overly obsessive about the proper form this worship embodies? How can form follow function in worship and at the same time reflect an order that fits together and effectively conveys reverent meaning about the God we worship?

I have come to learn in my experience presiding over sacramental practices for over fifteen years that the priest embodies the Gospel by our leadership. Denying this profound truth can easily result in a mechanical, robotic style of sacramental leadership. That we, as pastors, are the vessel through which the Gospel message is conveyed by our every word and deed in worship leadership calls upon us to practice a mature self-awareness and humility in the presence of God. Jesus said that the kingdom of God is not only out there but also within us (Luke 17:20-21); Paul greeted the saints and addressed believers “in Christ” (Romans 6:11, 23, 8:2, 12:5, 15:17, 16:3, 9, 10; 1 Cor 1:4, 30 4:15, 15:18, 15:31, 16:24; 2 Cor 1:21, 2:14, 17, 5:17, 12:2, 19; Galatians 1:22, 3:26, 5:6; Ephesians 1:11, 2:10, 13; Philippians 2:1, 3:3, 4:7; Colossians 1:2; 1 Thess 2:14; 2 Thess 1:12; 1 Tim 1:14, 16; 2 Tim 3:12; Philemon 1:8, 23). We have the “mind of Christ” (Philippians 2:5). We are in Christ, and Christ is in us.

We are met with a great challenge to be present to ourselves, true to ourselves and willing to put all of ourselves on the line before God at the Table. Sacramental leadership calls us to be vulnerable to ourselves. Would this mean confessing our hidden most selves verbally to all the assembly prior to Communion? I’m not sure about that; but, essentially, this inner stance is crucial — to be willing to expose my truth to myself, before God and hopefully, at some point, to another human being.

This can be a frightening proposition and cause of great anxiety. For how often in our daily lives are we truly ‘present’ — present to ourselves, present to one another, even present to God who is omnipresent? One psychologist I heard said that well over 80% of our day is spent day-dreaming. In other words, most of our waking hours are spent continually distracted and ‘blind’ to seeing the reality right before us. Is this a coping mechanism for a deep hurt within us? Perhaps. Whatever the cause, our dis-ease with being truly present with another and from appreciating fully each and every moment of our lives suggests that the Eucharist is a profound gift for healing not only in the lives of all who participate in the Sacrament but to the priest as well.

For what is the Sacrament other than the true, real presence of Christ? It is the outer sign of an inner truth. It is the bread and wine and Word to convey Presence — the presence of God in all and through all.

Celebrating the Holy Communion on Maundy Thursday is a wonderful act of worship during a holy time in the life of the church. We follow Christ through his last days. We are present to those holy moments as Jesus shares a last, intimate, meal with his friends. He washes their feet as a sign of loving service and servant leadership.

I pray that, as priests and pastors, we can truly be present to each moment of worship as we bring ourselves to feet of Christ, and receive his loving grace and embrace.

Simplicity I – Holy Week

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Lent is a call to simplicity. We are called in this season to simplify our lives. In the Gospels, Matthew and Luke, the first beatitude is: “Blessed are the poor (in spirit)”.

On Maundy Thursday, the altar is stripped of all its vestments and vessels to remind us of Jesus’ suffering and humiliation at the hands of the soldiers upon his arrest. This ‘stripping away’ was a negative –

Indeed, don’t we look upon “poverty” as something bad? In our remembrance of Jesus’ passion haven’t we come to look with suspicion on anything in our lives of faith that smacks of this kind of ‘stripping away’ in our lives?

Because poverty means we are in a state of doing without something we feel we need. We may even equate a poverty of spirit with self-rejection, self-abasement, self-denial.

Therefore we have quite naturally focused our efforts on righting the wrong. We pursue social justice and serving the needs of the poor.

Yet, for me, something remains unattended, inadequate, in our doing more.

In this Lenten call to simplicity, am I not also called to ‘strip away’ all that which distracts me from being truly present? Will I truly pay attention to whatever circumstance of life in which I find myself – rich or poor? Am I not also called, alongside others – rich and poor – to return to an awareness and appreciation of what is essential?

I have appreciated the opportunity during past Lenten seasons to simplify and try to shed peels off the proverbial onion of my life – peels that represent inordinate desires, stuff and lifestyle choices that are really not that important, especially for my physical, spiritual, mental health. It’s good from time to time simply to pay attention to what I normally do without thinking – my routines and regular decisions in life, my automatic emotional responses to certain situations, the stuff I purchase without thinking.

Can the way of poverty, then, also be a positive force? Especially, too, as we hear the new leader of the Roman Catholic Church, Pope Francis, declare that what he wants is a “poor church serving the needs of the poor.” Surely he doesn’t mean a poverty that is self-denigrating, self-rejecting – but rather a kind of poverty that strips away all that is really unnecessary and frankly only reflects our ego compulsions, our desires, our obsessive behavior.

And perhaps there isn’t a better time to reflect on the question of spiritual poverty than when things aren’t going all that well in life? When taking a step back and assessing where our lives are going is warranted. Maybe you find yourself in a particular bind, or facing a challenging situation with someone, a difficulty that has presented itself now. Before going on the attack and blaming others — even God — what may God be calling you to “let go of”?

Every time a sports team begins to lose games, over and over again, I hear the same thing from coaches when they’re interviewed and asked why their team is losing; often they say – “we have to get back to basics, doing the small things right.” Simplify.

And, it’s also about getting back to basics in our prayer with God. I can’t think of a better way to acknowledge among very diverse Christians our bond of unity, than to affirm the role of prayer in our common practice of faith.

And not that we must pray the same way. But simply in our communion with God who connects with us in our hearts: as we listen, as we wait, as we praise, as we lift our hands and hearts, as we use words even as words aren’t always necessary, as we reach out in prayerful action in the name of Christ. Prayer – getting back to basics. Doing small but meaningful things from the heart. Modern day contemplatives say that the best way to prepare yourself for prayer is by small acts of kindness.

Which doesn’t necessarily always have to be expressed in great deeds of social action. The action can be a small, unselfish act by a young child. Jesus said, “Unless you change and become like a little child you will not enter the kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 18:3). Macrina Wiederkehr in the book, “A Tree Full of Angels” beautifully illustrates this truth and our need for simplicity, simple prayer, simple action; in short, child-likeness; She wrote:

“One special moment of beauty that stands out in my mind I experienced in a bus station …. I witnessed a little girl helping her brother get a drink at the water fountain. Attempting to lift him to the proper height turned out to be impossible. I was just at the point of giving them some assistance when quick as lightening she darted over to a shoe-shine man, pointed to a footstool he wasn’t using, dragged it to the water fountain, and very gently lifted up her thirsty brother. It all happened so fast and it was so simple, yet it turned out to be a moment of beauty that became a prayer for me. So much to be learned from such a little moment. Perhaps what touched me most [she concluded] was her readiness to seek out a way to take care of the need without waiting to be rescued. It was a moment of beauty: a small child with a single, simple heart.”

Lent culminates in this Holy Week as we hear the stories again of Jesus’ arrest, suffering, torture and brutal death on the cross. The reality of death is one we naturally want to deny, to put off thinking about – because its unpleasantness and mystery can unnerve us. No wonder not even many Christians care to worship on Maundy Thursday, Good Friday and Holy Saturday – and wait then to rejoin the worshipping assembly on the joyous exuberance of Easter morning.

And yet, it is through the unpopular way of simplicity and this most simple reality of our mortal dependence on God that we can now know and experience the glory, love and eternal victory of God in Jesus. Without Good Friday there can be no Easter. May our Holy Week observance be a blessing for us in the simplicity of our prayer and being. May the difficult yet simple journey to the Cross and through the Cross open the way for us to eternal life, and make us aware of what is truly important. May the example of Jesus give us the courage to let go when we need to. And receive the forgiveness freely given.

For our health. For our well-being. For the sake of Jesus. And those in need.