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| Out of Nowhere, by Lane Denson, Southern Sage and Jazz Musician |
Grass
Pent 12/13A
'Then he ordered the crowds to sit down on the grass. Taking the five loaves and the two fish, he looked up to heaven, and blessed and broke the loaves, and gave them to the disciples, and the disciples gave them to the crowds. And all ate and were filled; and they took up what was left over of the broken pieces, twelve baskets full. And those who ate were about five thousand men, besides women and children.'
-- Mt 14.19-21
Crowds. Crowds are in the news. Crowds, as well, are looking for news. Some 200,000 Germans were looking for anything new out of the US&A and apparently not only finding it, but liking what they found. Maybe they recognize it easier than we seem to.
Jesus was used to crowds, but not always as welcoming of them as in Matthew's story. They were hungry for whatever he might have, surely in this story mostly for food, but perhaps surprised to find there was more to him than some neighborhood catering service. Crowds were in the news then, as well. But it was the Good News. The fishes and the bread didn't stand in the way.
It's not all that difficult to write off this story as one more incredible miracle. These mysteries in our family history never cease to overcome and baffle us. Mystery doesn't sit well with us moderns. We have a hard time comprehending even metaphor and myth and poetry, let alone a miraculous feeding. We surely want to discount these. With mystery, we'd as
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soon forget it. But we can't. And that may be the miracle of it.
Healing the sick. Raising the dead. Feeding the thousands. Ascending bodily right through airless space without exploding and into heaven. An altar guild friend of mine said once that when Jesus walked on the water she sure was glad he didn't say Do this in remembrance of me. What a sacristy we'd have to build, she said. Only lifeguards could join the altar guild.
We keep telling these tales and trying to believe them, maybe even in our better moments trying to emulate them, wondering why we don't make at least as much fuss over them as we do over somebody's sexual orientation.
But that is the way with us. Mystery is not tangible. It hasn't got any handles, yet its reality keeps staring us in the face. Over and over again it comes. I suppose it doesn't make a lot of difference what we call it. But maybe it's more down to earth to realize that maybe mystery is a form of grace. Maybe we can a hold on grace.
Grace. We say it at meals and hope it doesn't go in one ear and out the other. We recognize it on the stage and in the dance and in the ballet of a baseball double play. We'll soon be witnessing it daily in the Olympics.
Grace surrounds us. In the fresh new green after a summer rain. In the blessed smile of baby, even though it may be only a mild touch of colic.
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A traveling salesman from New England was having breakfast in an a New Orleans hotel coffee shop. When his plate arrived, there was this strange, steaming hodgepodge along its edge near the bacon and eggs. What is this? he asked the waiter. Grits, the waiter answer. But I didn't order it, said the guest. Well you got it anyway, said the waiter. You don't ask for it, you just get it.
Grace is like grits. There's no way you can earn it or deserve it or bring it about any more than, as Frederick Buechner once said, any more than 'the taste of raspberries and cream or (anymore than you can) earn good looks or bring about your own birth.' 'A good sleep is grace,' he said. 'So are good dreams. Most tears are grace... Somebody loving you is grace. Loving somebody is grace. Have you ever tried to love somebody?'
I suspect that when James wrote that faith without works is dead, maybe what he really meant to say had he been a bit more hip was, Don't let the grace grow under you feet.
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| Crossroads by Rev.Buddy Stallings |
God is "IN"
Lynn Sanders began her sermon this morning by sharing some snapshots of her life in the last week or so when for her the Kingdom of heaven seemed to come near in very ordinary experiences. Some were funny, some poignant, others as simple as an account of lunch with good friends. It was a gift to me to listen as she claimed these moments as instances of God’s particular presence. Not one of the events was particularly religious, but each unmistakably carried with it a dimension of holiness.
Maybe we work too hard trying to have a “God moment,” a profound life-altering event that will suddenly make it all seem worthwhile. Perhaps the key to spiritual living is to wake up to the presence of God all around us. There are several occasions in the gospel narratives in which Jesus tells the disciples to wake up. We tend to lay apocalyptic overtones over these comments, understanding them as dire warnings that some great event is about to be missed. Who knows? Jesus’ point could have been much more simple and direct: wake up for the kingdom of heaven is all around you; pay attention so that you won’t miss it!
God wants us to have these moments, deeply desires them for us! Sometimes we seem to believe that finding God is like some deep, complicated puzzle, solved only with a life of sacrifice and devotion. How grim is that? Little wonder we have so few people signing us for a serious walk of faith. The way Jesus responded to children
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| Brian McHugh, Episcopal priest in California |
Whole = Holy
Nothing is born, nothing is destroyed.
Away with your dualism, your likes and dislikes.
Every single thing is just the One Mind.
When you have perceived this,
you will have mounted the Chariot of the Buddhas.
- Huang Po: Zen Teachings of Huang Po
Ah! The Chariot of the Buddhas!!!! “Been there”, as they say. You know about the Chariot of the Buddhas, don’t you? Sure you do! It’s not all as mysterious as it seems to our Western ears.
The Chariot of the Buddhas is the Buddhist equivalent to having entered upon the Unitive Way in the Christian mystical tradition. Of Being One with God. When you understand, even a bit, that we are part of the Mystery that is “God”, of the Buddhist One Mind, we are (if you will pardon the pun) away to the races.
I have become a great foe of dualism. It is the cancer of American religion (and other places too!) - this denigration of the Body in order to glorify the “spirit”. I don’t know that I want to accuse Paul and Augustine of perpetrating this. But weirdoes, religious wackos, obviously driven by deep psychological disturbance, have dumped this perversion on us and we have swallowed the bait. Well, my advice is ………. rebel! Reject! Claim your innate Wholeness! We are an undifferentiated Whole, and we are integrated with the Creative FOrec of the Universe(s).
In the Gospel reading appointed for tomorrow in the Christian tradition
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(Revised Common Lectionary), Jesus feeds 5000 people with 5 loves and 2 fishes. Think on this. Jesus is saying that, when you are at One with God, even the tiniest morsel of Divine Love feeds us all, slakes our hunger, our yearning, for completeness.
Tomorrow, ride the chariot of the Buddhas! Become One with God and race with the Wind into Life!
Enjoy the ride!
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| Poet and writing teacher Elizabeth Ayres (CreativeWritingCenter.com) hosts the radio program, Soundings, Saturday evenings at 6:00 at www.wryr.org |
Blue Crab Etude
Nana taught me how. No matter how early I got up or how fast I slipped on my summer uniform of shorts, top and flip-flops, she would already be down there in her sundress and hat. Kneeling on the rough wood planks of the dock. Chest butted up against a piling. Left hand working the string, right hand holding the net.
I see the scene so clearly. Those four frontmost pier posts, darkly creosoted, each wrapped with pale twine. The cord plays out into the water at a wide angle to its tether on the piling, and no child of the river needs to be told what invisible tug o’ war holds the line so taut. On the sandy creek bottom, a blue crab struggles to swim away with its carrion prize: a chicken neck tied tightly to the end of the string my grandmother painstakingly works.
On memory’s split screen, I see a closeup of her left hand: the twine, threaded through Nana’s fore and middle fingers, pinned in place with her thumb. Over and under. Thumb up, thumb down. Inch by upward bound inch, crab and bait rise. Where it slices into the water, the net pole appears to break, a distortion that makes distance hard to gauge. Speed is out of the question, the water offers too much resistance, so with a stiff right arm, Nana maneuvers the net’s wooden shaft by quark-sized increments until the head is directly under the feeding, oblivious creature. Then one deft, skywards jerk. “Got him,” she says, grinning. I scamper off to the live-box
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with our catch.
Popi also taught me how, wading along the shore like some long-legged marsh bird. Pant legs rolled up above bony knees. Skinny calves protruding. Net pole cradled – shotgun style – against a bent left elbow. Popi is a vigilant hunter. His far off, silent prowling is keyed forever, in my mind, to the constant slap of water against pier pilings, against moored boats, against the endless beach where tall sea grass whispers snick snick in a hot, dry breeze.
An etude is a musical composition designed to provide practice in a particular technical skill on a solo instrument. Pianists may turn to Chopin to learn their parallel thirds. Flutists might rely on Boehm for their fingering style. I could walk down to the pier right now and catch a crab the way my grandparents showed me. Or I could stay at this desk. Teasing thoughts to the surface word by upward bound word.
And what of this perpetual tug ‘o war called life, where a taut line is sometimes all we have of what we need. Where bait and prize are often indistinguishable. And there’s too much resistance. Too long a solitary prowl. I know that ceaseless effort is the cost of all things hoped for, yet ever and always I am tempted by the hiss of What’s the use? Still, I don’t give up. Nana and Popi didn’t teach me how.
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We strapped on water skis despite the virtual certainty of getting stung while waiting for the boat to pick us up. When one of us would be put to bed with a thick paste of baking soda applied to a swollen body part, the rest of us went right on. Cavorted and splashed. Played mermaid or seahorse or water basketball, all in a gloriously adult-free zone, because grown ups were scairdy cats, afraid to take their pleasure for fear of a little pain. And I’m one of them. Too chicken to swim in this water now that the nettles are back. I understand they’re particularly fond of our Chesapeake Bay, where the right mix of salt and fresh makes the water brackish, their preferred environment.
Life itself is pretty brackish. Pretty much a mix of salt and fresh. Pain of one sort or another is continually arising from the nether darkness. The dangers are as numberless as the stars. But the next time I’m tempted to hold back on living because of some possible hurt, I’m going to consult with the child I was. I think I already know what she’s going to say.
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| Clergy Family Confidential by Tim Schenck |
Day at the Museum
I spent yesterday with Ben's third grade class at the Museum of Natural History. It's great to still be at that stage in life when your kids
aren't mortified by your presence. Though I do look forward to being the mortifi-er rather than the mortifie-ee. I assume it's much more fun.
When I told Bryna I had signed up for this trip she just laughed at me. And I admit my expectations and the reality were slightly different. I thought I'd be hanging out with Ben and a few of his buddies while taking in the ancient bones of t-rex, stegosaurus, and the rest. No, I didn't read the fine print. I had inadvertently signed up for chaperone duty. And while that may have different connotations for a high school dance, chaperoning third graders is mentally and physically exhausting.
I was assigned a group of five kids. My only charge? Don't lose one. So I spent all morning counting to five over and over again. In between the counting were split seconds of terror when I momentarily couldn't find one. When I got back to Todd School, someone asked me how the museum was. I really have no idea – all I saw were the backs of five heads.
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What I really wanted was to get five leashes and hook 'em all up. I'd look just like one of those professional dog walkers you see in Central Park, minus the plastic baggies. I also considered duct taping them together and wheeling them around in a shopping cart. Either method would have been much more humane – for the chaperone.
After shepherding all five of them back onto the yellow bus, I felt an extraordinary sense of relief. Of course this quickly turned to nausea as the bus pulled out and I realized I hadn't ridden on a school bus for about 25 years. They really are horribly uncomfortable. But Ben and the rest of our group had a great time and no one got lost. I think I'll stick to shepherding my congregation.
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