“Light in the Darkness”

+May the gentle Christ speak through us, the creative God expand our lives unexpectedly, and the Holy Spirit write the Gospel in our hearts every day. Amen.

I am delighted to be with you this morning at the gracious invitation of your Dean, Father Mark Pendleton, to share the exciting story about the new life we have experienced in St. Paul’s, Norwalk and to help you dream about the possibilities for growth that God has provided for this community. I look forward to my time with you in the forum after the Eucharist and to learning more about your life and mission here. And it is always a blessing to have the opportunity preach the Good News of God’s abundant and extravagant love. I must tell you, however, that the only people I’ve heard preach from this pulpit have all been bishops so I’m more than a bit intimidated to be standing here.

As I began to look at today’s lessons and think about how they were speaking to me, especially in terms of the message I want to bring you, the image of light in darkness struck me. I’m no fan of sunsets that begin as early as 4:30 in the afternoon. The long days of December can make the world around us appear even more fragile than usual, more delicate, more needy, more broken.

Unlike Matthew and Mark’s Gospel which paint a very colorful picture of John the Baptist for us, the fourth Gospel asks us to figure him out for ourselves based on what he says. This testimony of John is a series of responses to the priests’ and Levites’ “20 Questions.” It is more about who John is not than who he is. Flustered by his answers, they finally ask who the heck he thinks he is baptizing if he’s nether the Messiah nor the prophet nor Elijah. “I’m not sure myself,” John tells them, “I just know I must wait for the one coming after me and that I’m not worthy to fiddle with his shoelaces.” Yet for all his uncertainty, John knew exactly what his job was: to testify to the light, to be the voice in the wilderness, to make straight the path of the Lord.

That light of which John speaks is light that is sorely needed in a dark world, a world full of pain and conflict, in which the poor are still poor, the brokenhearted are still grieving, the oppressed still await liberation and justice. The powerful words of Isaiah—the very words which Jesus uttered the first time he taught in the synagogue—look straight into the face of a dark world and proclaim that that world still belongs to God—and therein lies our hope.

Fleming Rutledge, one of the first women to be ordained in the Episcopal Church, preaching at the National Cathedral in Washington once offered this perspective: “Oddly, of all the seasons of the year, Advent preaching is the easiest, at least in my opinion. Why is that? It is because Advent is about a world in darkness, and it is not at all difficult to show that this is a world of darkness, certainly not at this period in our history. Advent is therefore a season in which to help one another to face up to the truth about the human race in general and also the truth about ourselves.”

One of those truths, I regret to admit, is that nothing can so mask the face of God as religion. For far too many people, religion has created a wilderness instead of an oasis, a crooked, hard-to-negotiate path instead of an easily accessed open highway, a dark corner in their lives rather than a place of radiant brightness.

The testimony of John raises for me some crucial questions:
- Who? Who will make the path straight—that is who will remove the barriers and obstacles that get in the way of their knowing and experiencing God’s outrageous and unconditional love?
- Who will embrace the broken-one who is to come, the Messiah in disguise, perhaps the next person who comes along?
- Who will be the voice of justice and peace, of welcome and hospitality for those walking wounded wandering in the wilderness beyond our doors?
- Who will shine the light in their darkness?

There should be only one answer: the Church. No other community has been empowered by God to do that splendid, life-giving, transformative work. Yet how often it fails by refusing to be faithful to the mission to which Jesus calls it.

The number of people who have been hurt by the church and in the name of religion is staggering. In my 33 years of ordained ministry I have heard far too many stories that demonstrate how religion has, indeed, masked the face of God. For me, the question behind all the conflict in our own Church—and in all others—is not where we stand on human sexuality or who should be consecrated a bishop but rather “What is our understanding of the mission of the Church? What kind of Church did Jesus intend us to be? How faithful to that are we today? What kind of church are we on the most local level? How much does it resemble God’s Kingdom? Is it a community that truly fights with passion for justice and includes all God’s people—fully and without exception? Or a community that at some point draws the line?

Earlier this year, the Episcopal Cathedral of St. Paul’s in San Diego opened its doors to the family and friends of a thirty-one-year-old gay businessman who served as Vice-President of the San Diego Human Dignity Foundation and the Greater San Diego Business Association. His premature death during a ski vacation from an altitude-induced heart attack stunned the community.

Sadly, the Roman Catholic bishop of San Diego refused him burial, to the shock of the grieving family. The dean of St. Paul’s had this to say, “Our basic philosophy is whoever you are or wherever you find yourself on the journey of faith, we welcome you. We learned from a city councilwoman that the McCusker family needed some help and we were happy to offer that.” One person who attended the funeral was quoted as saying that “the service and compassion of St. Paul’s ministry brought tears to my eyes.”

A powerful statement of faith, love, compassion and comfort is posted at the entrance to that church: “All persons who enter this sacred place enter with the promise that they will be free to be who they are…If you are visiting please know that you are granted immunity from the painful ravages of religious bigotry…”
You and I must be the voice, the light, the force in the church that will make the path straight, take away the barriers and the obstacles that get in the way, that can create a mask that covers the face of God. We need to answer God’s call to proclaim a message of hope in God’s enormous, unconditional love for all people, opening our doors and our arms and our hearts to those who need to hear that message and embrace it as their own.
The tragedy of Christianity is that far too many church communities draw clearly defined lines that delineate who is “in” and who is “out.” That the Church-at-large—denominations and individual church communities—is sometimes the most exclusive, fence-building, obstacle-creating institution is scandalous. That is not the church Jesus founded.
Our model at St. Paul’s, Norwalk, for doing church differently is based on what we learned from St. Bart’s on Park Avenue in Manhattan. I will talk more about that in our forum later. Early into Bill Tully’s arrival at St. Bart’s the vestry had a retreat led by a consultant in congregational development. He helped them articulate who they were as a church and what their mission must be. At the conclusion of the retreat he told them, “You must listen to the pain of the city.” No matter what city or town we are in, how large or how small, we will find people who are in pain, people who have been deeply hurt by institutions in our society, even by, especially by the church. We must listen to the pain of our city.
I read a story about a pastor who not only listened but proclaimed God’s message of hope and acceptance in a profound way. A young man named Jim sat in his office on Sunday morning between services. He had made some bad choices, was at the bottom of his class, in and out of jobs, and now a father at sixteen. He had come for help. "Jim, I want you to know that this church is going to stand with you. We’ll be there celebrating the life of your little baby - nourishing and nurturing it as a gift of God. We’ll help you in your faith struggle," the pastor told the teenager.
Then, before they ended he invited this kid to help him in the administration of communion during the second service. So there they were, standing in front of everyone offering communion. Jim with his body jewelry and tie-dyed tee shirt, with some weird symbol of chaos emblazoned on the front. His head was shaved on either side except for the Mohawk pony tail.
On the other side was a properly attired church member. The pastor admitted that he knew there would be some grumbling among some and he was not disappointed. At the door, after the service, one man and his wife expressed their anger and disgust. "What were you thinking—letting that punk stand up there in his bizarre clothes to hold the cup? You made a mockery of Communion, that’s what you did."
The pastor tried to tell them that everyone, especially this confused, troubled young person needed grace. And what better place to be than at the Table serving and receiving grace? He felt terribly discouraged until mid-week, he received a letter from an older man. "Oh no, another disgruntled member," he thought. Here’s what it said: “This is a messy church, we never know what’s going to happen next it seems. Just want you to know that I was so taken with that kid up there serving us at communion. It reminded me why I come here. Because this place like no other, is where grace happens every week.”
In his book The God of Surprises, Gerald Hughes writes, “God is a disturbing God. Our temptation in all religion and in all spirituality is to domesticate God, to create a God who favors us, our group, our nation, our church, and who overthrows our enemies. But God is the God who has compassion for all creation, whose living spirit is in all; a God who breaks down in us all our comforting prejudices and false securities, religious and secular. This is very painful for us, but it is the pain of rebirth.”
The community into which Jesus has gathered us will always be charged with this command: to tell all people, no matter who they are or where they are on their faith journey, that they are loved and that they are not alone. No, we are not the Messiah. We are not the prophet. We are not Elijah. But, like John, we know exactly what our job is. It is to be the church. When we are doing that the way Jesus intended us to, we are a voice in the wilderness, a light in the darkness, an unobstructed path to a place where grace happens every week. What an awesome calling. And it is ours. Thanks be to God.